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Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy
23rd April 2024
Good English – A Key to Panama’s Future Success
21st March 2024
Forests in focus on International Day of Forests
26th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
High Value Opportunities in Australia’s gas sector
I was in Perth last week for the major Australasia Oil and Gas show. We had some 60 British companies there, the largest group we had ever sent to this important show, and the largest international group represented there. That’s not surprising when you consider the scale of the opportunities in this sector in Australia, […]
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24th February 2012 Islamabad, Pakistan
Doing something positive for Somalia
Yesterday Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar attended the international conference on Somalia in London hosted by British Prime MinisterDavid Cameron. Her presence was valuable and built on the good collaboration that Britain and Pakistan have enjoyed over the narrower question of Somali piracy. We’ve both suffered from these pirates. So our two navies have collaborated on […]
24th February 2012 Nairobi, Kenya
After the London Conference on Somalia: Share Your Views
In my opinion the London Conference on Somalia yesterday was a great success. In case you missed any of it then you can find full reports and links here. It was the biggest conference on Somalia, involving the greatest number of senior leaders, from as wide a range of countries and international organisations, as seen […]
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24th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Ukraine: is discounted gas good? #2
I blogged recently about the complexities around Ukraine’s efforts to secure cheap gas from other countries. I noted that increasing the price of gas supplies to domestic consumers could help strengthen Ukraine’s hand in those negotiations. At present, some consumers of gas in Ukraine (mostly industrial users) pay market prices. Other users pay a lower, […]
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23rd February 2012 Islamabad, Pakistan
Introduction – Jasper Thornton
I began my career as a journalist on Egypt’s Al-Ahram Weekly newspaper, spending two years living on a house-boat in the heart of Cairo and reporting on the Middle East. In 2002 I joined the UK civil service. Before the Foreign Office, I was a Senior Policy Advisor in the Cabinet Office, covering Russia, Georgia […]
23rd February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Brilliant Ukrainian computer designers – and trade
It’s February, which means it must be time for the annual awards ceremony for the computer-aided design competition for universities organised by Birmingham-based Delcam, one of the world’s leading suppliers of advanced CADCAM (computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing) for industry. Having hosted several such receptions before and visited Delcam’s 10-year anniversary of cooperation with Ukrainian […]
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23rd February 2012 Windhoek, Namibia
Doubling of bilateral trade with Namibia in 2011
Amidst all the global financial doom and gloom, it was really heartening to receive the UK’s latest bilateral trade in goods figures for Namibia this week and to discover that both imports and exports had doubled in 2011. Imports of Namibian goods to the UK jumped up 108% in 2011 to hit £446m (up from […]
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23rd February 2012 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
The Ultimate Sacrifice…
Like everyone around the world, I was extremely saddened to hear about the tragic deaths of Marie Colvin, an American journalist for the Sunday Times, and French photographer Remi Ochlik, in shelling by the Syrian government’s force in the city of Homs. As the Foreign Secretary said in his statement, they died bringing us the […]
22nd February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
The Commonwealth and the Catholic Church
The senior leadership of the global Catholic Church has been in Rome over the last week to celebrate the latest Consistory of Cardinals, at which 22 new Cardinals were installed. These included the Major Archbishop of Ernakulam-Angamalay of the Syr-Malabars, in Kerala in India, His Eminence George Alencherry. Our congratulations go out to him and […]
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22nd February 2012 Bucharest, Romania
Great Britons in Romania: Shajjad and Katie Rizvi and The Little People
Second in our series of blogs about Great Britons in Romania are Shajjad and Katie Rizvi, founders of The Little People – a charity dedicated to providing psycho-social and educational services to children suffering from cancer. Shajjad came to Romania in early 1990 to deliver a shipment of humanitarian aid. He planned to stay for […]
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