22nd January 2021 Belgrade, Serbia
This is the first blogcast I have recorded for several weeks. This is mainly because I had to travel to the UK for family reasons – a journey that was a story in itself. But there is another reason too. I have been spending my evenings doing an online training course. Diplomacy is a career […]
18th August 2016 Colombo, Sri Lanka
Since arriving in Sri Lanka, I have become a bit of an expert on visas. In fact, when my phone rings, there’s almost a one in two chance that someone is calling about their visa. Getting a visa can be complex, frustrating and time-consuming. My colleagues in UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) work really hard […]
24th October 2014 Colombo, Sri Lanka
The Chevening Scholarship programme celebrated its 30th anniversary earlier this year. It’s a universally popular programme, offering scholarships for post-graduate study in the UK to outstanding individuals who have the capacity to be leaders in their chosen areas of work. So it’s great news that the anniversary is being celebrated by an increase in the […]
13th September 2014
A few weeks ago some cases of malaria briefly gave rise to rumours that #Ebola had arrived in #Addis. Thankfully this was wrong, but the story went viral on social media. Rumours and misinformation can spread even faster than Ebola. As the disease continues to spread, there are increasingly worrying projections about how far it […]
11th April 2013
There are few things more important than education. Our Chevening scholarships benefit the individuals who come to the UK to study, the communities from which they come, and the societies to which they return, often to play future leadership roles. So it was a great pleasure to be sending four more young indigenous Australians off […]
Read more on Four more indigenous scholars head to Cambridge and Oxford | Reply (1)
5th March 2012 Islamabad, Pakistan
I have been Political Counsellor at the British High Commission in Islamabad since December 2011. This is my first posting to South Asia. Before coming to Pakistan, I was Head of Human Rights and Democracy Department at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London, and before that I served in Moscow, Paris, New York and […]
8th February 2012
There is a significant Australian presence at Oxford University, as in so many other aspects of UK life. I have just spent a fascinating day there. First, I attended the opening of the new global HQ of Australian company SAE Institute which runs 54 creative media training institutions in 26 countries around the world. The […]
14th April 2011
I’ve been blogging about Ukraine for a while now – over 170 entries, plus the web-diary I started in 2009 before the blog went live. It’s been a fascinating time and I hope readers have found the blogs interesting. Blogging is a good way to set out what I think about Ukraine on different issues. […]
12th April 2011
I recently wrote about the centre of Kyiv turning British. So it’s good to find the centre of Oxford turning Ukrainian. The occasion is the Canada-Ukraine Parliamentary Programme Oxford Model Ukraine Conference “Ukraine’s Domestic and Foreign Affairs: Quo Vadis” (“where are you going”), held in St Anthony’s College and New College, Oxford from 6-8 April. […]
5th April 2011
I’m in the UK this week to speak at the Oxford Model Ukraine Conference “Ukraine’s Domestic and Foreign Affairs: Quo Vadis?” (Quo vadis means “Where are you going?” in Latin.) It will be good to hear the views of the assembled experts, and to contribute my own thoughts – I’m speaking first thing on Thursday […]