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Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
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The climate crisis and gender-based violence
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Ecolabels: A Catalyst for Sustainable Food Choices?
7th May 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
A Cocktail of Ambassadors
What’s the collective noun for Ambassadors? A canapé of diplomats? A gang? A horde? Or just a corps? Hopefully not a corpse! Perhaps a Cocktail of Ambassadors, but that risks feeding the erroneous perception of diplomats as pleasure-seeking, gin-and-tonic swilling, expense-account nonentities. Which is far from the truth. Google failed to provide an answer. Most […]
7th May 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
From Port Talbot to Pune, via Coventry – Tata Spanning The UK- India Relationship
Not surprisingly, given the Tata Group’s major interests in the UK, I spend a good deal of time meeting representatives from the company. Most weeks I see someone from the one of the Group’s many divisions, and April has been no exception. Shortly after Easter we welcomed to Mumbai the First Minister of Wales, the […]
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4th May 2012 Guatemala City, Guatemala
Doing more with Honduras
The UK’s relations with Honduras are important, and a key part of this Embassy’s work is to build on the commitment to strengthen them. With this in mind, last week two members of our team spent three days in Tegucigalpa talking about issues important to both our countries: human rights, prosperity, security, consular, climate change, […]
4th May 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Getting our marching orders in London
I’m back in the UK for the annual Leadership Conference that brings together all our ambassadors from around the world, to be updated on the policy and corporate management priorities which will focus our work over the coming year. The strongest message was the importance of the Prosperity agenda, the work that our overseas FCO and UKTI […]
3rd May 2012 Washington DC, USA
World Press Freedom Day
This week marks two auspicious events. One year ago yesterday, I started work at the Embassy in Washington. Even aside from the mad dash to the airport in Moscow, the missed flights and unplanned but very pleasant stopover in Copenhagen, it was quite the day to remember. It’s also World Press Freedom Day, the day […]
3rd May 2012 New York, USA
A Sojourn in Steel City
Known as the “City of Bridges,” Pittsburgh has more bridges than Venice. Last week, on 26 April, the newest one was unveiled; a metaphorical bridge, admittedly, in the form of the posting of a UK Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) officer to the Pittsburgh area-based National Cyber-Forensics Training Alliance (NCFTA) marks the forging of an […]
3rd May 2012 Nairobi, Kenya
Somalia: World Press Freedom Day
On World Press Freedom Day, my thoughts are with the families of the brave Somali journalists who were killed on the course of duty and those who still brave the dangers of operating in one of the most difficult places in the world to be a be a journalist. The shocking fact is that so […]
3rd May 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Ambassador reaches new depths
Last week I found myself at the lowest point in Africa with some Embassy colleagues. Lac Assal in Djibouti is 155 metres below sea level – Mirage pilots stationed nearly like to skim the surface, so they can say they have flown under the sea. The lake itself is heavily salted and you have to […]
1st May 2012 New Delhi, India
Indo-UK Science & Innovation Council
Ministers meet to agree the broad science and innovation agenda for the UK-India relationship and S&IN India invades the UK!
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30th April 2012 Bucharest, Romania
Six things they don’t tell you when you apply for an internship at the British Embassy
So you’ve checked the embassy’s call for interns here and you have decided to apply for an internship at the British Embassy! If you are an undergraduate or graduate student with an economic/political background interested in EU economy/ political affairs, you are about to step into one of the most competitive and dynamic job markets […]
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