2nd July 2013
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Last week Shadow Foreign Secretary, the Rt Hon Douglas Alexander MP, visited Australia as a guest of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The Australian government arranged the programme for him, but we gave him an in-depth briefing at the High Commission, and I hosted a dinner to discuss foreign policy with MPs, officials […]
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24th June 2013
New York, USA
I was at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, better known as MoMA, immersed in a discussion with a dozen others about what the Ghanaian artist’s piece titled “Bleeding Takari II” was made from and what it was meant to represent. I felt like I had an upper hand on the rest of the group […]
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19th June 2013
Beirut, Lebanon
The windy resort of Lough Erne in Northern Ireland this week must have felt far from the millions of Syrians whose lives have been ripped apart by conflict. Yet many of the G8 leaders meeting there have seen the human impact for themselves. Prime Minister David Cameron’s focus on stopping the war in Syria is […]
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17th June 2013
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
In an exchange of letters on the eve of the Lough Erne G8 Summit, Pope Francis and Prime Minister David Cameron have shared detailed analysis of what needs to be done to tackle the economic and political challenges faced by the world today. The Prime Minister took the initiative to inform the Pope on 5 […]
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10th June 2013
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Last week I wrote about plans for sustaining global momentum on development and against poverty after 2015. 2015 feels a long way away. And yet in the last few days we have seen, very practically, how government, civil society and faith can come together to make a difference now. Speaking on 5 June, Pope Francis […]
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23rd May 2013
Paris, France
We’ve just had David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, in Paris for his first visit here to President Hollande since his election. They travelled down together from the European Council in the same train, and they were able to have a bilateral meeting as they were travelling.
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8th May 2013
Paris, France
We’ve been holding in London the second International Conference on Somalia – the first one was in February 2012. This time, it’s been co-chaired by the British Government and by the new President of Somalia. I used to work on the Somalia problem two years ago when I was National Security Adviser with David Cameron, […]
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11th April 2013
Paris, France
Earlier this week, we were waiting for the arrival of David Cameron here in Paris, on what was going to be his first visit to President Hollande in the Elysée, when we had the sad news of Baroness Thatcher’s death. And David Cameron decided he had to go home straight away from Madrid, to get […]
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15th March 2013
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
The Prime Minister’s visit to India in February set a number of firsts: the first by a British PM to Mumbai for 20 years, the first by a PM to Amritsar, and the first to India (or anywhere) to be joined by over 120 businesspeople. The size of the business group set us in Mumbai […]
Read more on Gas fields, gels and gin – mixing it with the PM’s visit | Reply
25th February 2013
New Delhi, India
In the words of UK Prime Minister David Cameron, the ‘sky is the limit’ for UK-India partnership and this was evident throughout his visit to India (18-20 Feb 2013). The PM’s delegation included David Willetts, Minister of State for Universities and Science, and a host of Vice Chancellors (VCs) from some of the UK’s leading […]
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