19th April 2022
Belgrade, Serbia
This joint article by Ambassadors Rafal Perl (Poland), Giles Norman (Canada) and Sian MacLeod (UK) first appeared in Serbian in ‘Nedeljnik’ on 14 April 2022. This week Protestant and Catholic churches around the world mark the darkest, most solemn days in the Christian year followed by celebration of Easter and hope for the future. Next […]
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28th March 2022
Belgrade, Serbia
People around the world have watched in horror and disbelief as Russian military hardware wreaks death and destruction across Ukraine. Moscow’s decision to launch a brutal and bloody war is illegal and unjustified. It is unsurprising that the world has moved quickly to condemn the invasion, and actions such as targeting of maternity hospitals and […]
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18th March 2022
Belgrade, Serbia
A Russian-British journalist friend, speaking on air this week, observed that ‘violence and propaganda go hand in hand’. He suggested that people accept propaganda and lies because of fear, and because the truth is too terrible to contemplate. Perhaps that helps explain the attempts of Russian representatives who had no part in the decision, to […]
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14th January 2021
Vienna, Austria
Outside “The Two Chairmen”[1], the beer was cool and fresh. My colleague raised his glass. ‘You had children a few years back,’ he said. ‘We can’t decide on the best time. What do you think?’ ‘Some things, you can’t plan,’ I said. I had met Pamela, a colleague in London, in 1990. Later that year, […]
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26th January 2018
London, UK
Last month Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson visited Moscow for talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Whilst media reporting of the visit focused on our bilateral political relationship and what we are doing to solve together the world’s most pressing global challenges, science and education were also among the topics discussed during the visit. Both […]
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14th July 2017
London, UK
The UK-Russia Year of Science and Education – 2017 (YoSE) is already proving a useful bridge for people to people contacts at a time of challenging political relations. First, the Year’s programme reflects the breadth of science that Russia and the UK are involved in. But, we also aim to understand more general issues such […]
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23rd July 2015
Guest blog by Sir Martyn Poliakoff, Foreign Secretary and Vice-President of the Royal Society I am delighted to be contributing to the Embassy’s blog. I am a British chemist, born in London, with a Russian father and English mother. I work at the University of Nottingham, and my research is focussed on Green Chemistry, a […]
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7th May 2015
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
A number of military anniversaries are being celebrated at the moment. Earlier this month there were striking images from the centenary of the Gallipoli landings. I’m sure there will be similar scenes throughout the period leading to 2018 and the centenary of the ending of World War I. In Russia we have been marking the […]
Read more on Triumph and Tragedy: remembering World War II – Guest post by Jon Sharp, Consul General in Ekaterinburg | Reply
5th March 2015
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
International Women’s Day is a huge festival in Russia, and the biggest sales day of the year for florists across the country. But yesterday in Ekaterinburg we marked the occasion with a more practical demonstration of what International Women’s Day means. With support from our Consulate in Ekaterinburg, the directors of womens’ crisis centres and […]
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28th November 2014
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
St Andrew may not be my name saint, but he is my adopted one. I’ve been following him around all my life, born in Scotland and serving in three of the other countries that have St Andrew as their patron saint – Ukraine, Romania and Russia. Indeed he was in the background before I was […]
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