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Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
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Lost and Found (but mostly lost)
1st March 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
How to sell your city
The chocolate flows down in an endless stream, pouring like a waterfall over the freshly-baked crispy wafers. Further down the production line, individual sticks are wrapped and packed in boxes. Lucky visitors are invited to taste the delicious end-product, fresh from the ovens. I’m at the “Roshen” chocolate factory in Vinnitsa, a city of 370,000 […]
1st March 2011 Geneva, Switzerland
A visit from the boss (and everyone else’s)
These are heady days at the Human Rights Council. On the back of Friday’s firm action on Libya, senior figures from around the world descended on Geneva today for the start of the Council’s March session. It’s the first time so many leading politicians have come to the Council and with them came the world’s […]
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25th February 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Engaging on the Games
Earlier this week I sat with the UK Sports Minister and leading members of the Hungarian Olympics and Paralympics Committees. Hugh Robertson was visiting to attend the Sports Ministerial Informal meeting at Gödöllő and at the end of his programme made time to meet our partners and ask what we could do to help them […]
25th February 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Culture, diversity and art
What do an artist from Afghanistan and a Ukrainian dancer have in common? The answer is that both are big fans of Ukraine who are enriching the country’s cultural life. I’m delivering a short speech at an event at the M17 Cultural Centre in Kyiv organised by the International Organisation for Migration on a cold […]
23rd February 2011 Geneva, Switzerland
Empty Sausages and Children’s Menus
I’m not sure how it started, but there’s a growing trend in UN human rights meetings these days to convey displeasure through culinary metaphor. The German Ambassador did this to great effect when he revealed his reaction to the latest set of proposals on the Human Rights Council Review, which is finally approaching a close […]
23rd February 2011 Ottawa, Canada
Off on some Scientific Adventures!
So as some of you may have noticed, I’ve been unfortunately delinquent in my blog postings this month, due in part to the fact that I have been kept quite busy here on the ground. Not to worry, I have a few tidbits that will be finding their way to this site in the near […]
21st February 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Fair gold
On 14 February, Valentine’s Day, there was the launch in London of the very first Fairmined and Fairtrade gold ingot from artisanal and small-scale mining. This was mined at the Cooperativa Minera Cotapata in the Nor Yungas area of La Paz. To receive this certification, the mine had to comply with a number of conditions. […]
18th February 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
MI6, Art and Freedoms
Back in Kyiv after a holiday in the mountain kingdom of Lesotho and a short working visit to London, I am intrigued to see advertised on the Foreign Office website an exhibition by British artist James Hart Dyke entitled “A Year with MI6”. To spend a year working with the Secret Intelligence Service and then […]
18th February 2011 Chevening, UK
Peru to Dundee, Chevening scholar Graciela Arrieta joins the Conversation
Mi nombre es Graciela Arrieta Guevara, 28 años, abogada. Desde enero de este año resido en la ciudad de Dundee, Escocia, donde estudio una Maestría en Derecho Minero y Política en el Centro de Legislación y Política de Energía, Petróleo y Minería (Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy – CEPMLP) de la […]
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16th February 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
The Britain Brand
Last night the Embassy was full of tour operators, agencies and attraction owners from Hungary and the UK, but also from Austria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Serbia and Slovakia. They had spent the day in a seminar and tailored meetings organised by Visit Britain – the organisation that markets Britain overseas and develops the […]