4th February 2016 Beijing, China
Last week I visited Seoul to attend the first UK-Korea workshop to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR), expertly organised by the SIN Korea team. If not tackled, AMR is going to kill an additional 10 million people every year by 2050. In China and India there is already 100% resistance to some antibiotics. But this is […]
Read more on Working with Korea to tackle antimicrobial resistance | Reply
8th August 2014
The following is a guest blog by Steve Townsend, Deputy Head of Mission at the British Embassy to the Holy See On 14-18 August Pope Francis will make his first visit to Asia, to attend the Asian Youth Day in Daejon, South Korea. He will also beatify 124 martyrs, killed in the eighteenth century for […]
25th June 2014 Washington DC, USA
“What do British people hate?” A straightforward question – but context is everything. When posed by an earnest thirteen-year-old North Korean schoolboy, in a Q&A discussion with British diplomatic visitors, it took me by surprise. But then much of what my colleagues and I experienced during a week-long familiarisation visit to the Democratic People’s Republic […]
1st July 2011
It’s almost two years since I arrived out here in DC in the summer of 2009. The weather’s the same – hot and humid. But trade politics have got a lot more exciting. Many eyes are avidly watching what is happening on the Hill concerning the pending US FTAs with Korea, Colombia and Panama. It’s […]
21st March 2011
I had the pleasure of going to the Washington International Trade Association discussion about the 2011 Congressional Trade Agenda. It was an opportunity for the DC trade community to hear direct from key Congressional trade staffers what trade issues they thought would be keeping Congress busy this year. It was an off-the-record discussion, so I’ll […]
12th October 2010
As far as transatlantic competitions go, last week was a great one for Europe and the UK. On Monday, Graeme McDowell from Northern Ireland sunk a crucial birdie at the 16th hole of Wales’ Celtic Manor course, which ultimately clinched The Ryder Cup for Europe. To crown it all, the winning European Team was captained […]
22nd September 2010
Whisky is the UK’s top agriculture export – £3.2bn-worth of whisky flowed out of the UK in 2008, accounting for just under a quarter of the UK’s agriculture exports (see Agriculture in the UK 2009). And the US was the top export market, sipping £421m worth of the stuff in 2009, a whopping 13% increase […]