8th November 2011
Last week Sarah and I were invited to attend the Melbourne Cup, the race that famously “stops the nation”. In British terms it seems to be the equivalent of Ascot, the Grand National and the Derby all rolled into one. It’s an unmissable Aussie experience. We were very fortunate to be able to join the […]
4th November 2011 New York, USA
As my Monster Month of training draws to a close and I enter the final 36 hours before the New York City Marathon on Sunday, I’d like to take this opportunity to praise the efforts of those involved and the causes which are being supported by thousands of competitors. Within the British Consulate in New […]
4th November 2011 Windhoek, Namibia
I thought it was well worth highlighting a couple of key events in turn (over a series of blogs), which really helped round out the heavy commercial focus of the programme and highlight the breadth of our activities here. The photos also help illustrate the tremendous warmth of the reception that the minister received from […]
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4th November 2011
I paid my second visit to Assisi within a week when I attended, with Princess Michael of Kent standing in for the Duke of Edinburgh, the launch by the ARC of their Green Pilgrimages Network. ARC, the Alliance of Religions and Conservation, is an organisation launched in 1995. To quote them, they are “a secular […]
4th November 2011
I’m back in Canberra after a very hectic week in Perth. We had a busy programme around the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM). It was good to see so many UK ministers in Australia. Early in the week I was accompanying Lord Green the Trade Minister. He attended the Commonwealth Business Forum which attracted […]
3rd November 2011
“So it seems to me,” the Ukrainian business leader says, “that Ukraine is so important to the EU that they’ll overlook Mrs Tymoshenko and recent declines in democratic standards and we’ll sign the Association Agreement in December.” “No,” I say. “That’s won’t happen, for several reasons.” I’m visiting an important Ukrainian enterprise which does a […]
2nd November 2011 Chevening, UK
Lishia Erza, one of our 2009-2010 alumnus, completed a Master’s course in Social and Global Justice at the University of Nottingham. Lishia is currently doing a PhD in Edinburgh (Governance for Excluded Communities) and chairs the United Nations Association Edinburgh’s working group for Democracy, Governance and Humanities. In this article, Lishia tells us about the […]
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31st October 2011
I attended a presentation on nuclear safety last week which discussed the prospects for nuclear energy in Jordan. The debate got a bit heated at times, demonstrating the strong feelings that the nuclear issue raises, not only in Jordan, but world-wide. The fact that the debate took place at all was good and it will […]
28th October 2011 Nairobi, Kenya
This week sees the fifth year of the Somali Week Festival in London, organised by the Kayd Somali Arts and Culture organisation. The British Office for Somalia is a proud sponsor of this event, which brings together poets, writers and musicians from across Somalia to perform in the UK. This year’s artists and performers include […]
28th October 2011
25 years to the day that Pope John Paul II hosted an unprecedented gathering of world religious leaders in Assisi to pray for world peace, Pope Benedict XVI on 27 October hosted, in the same place, his own “Day of Reflection, Dialogue and Prayer for Peace and Justice in the World”. Again, leaders of the […]
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