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Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
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13th February 2012 Warsaw, Poland
A Big Wow! All on board for the British Olympics in Bialystok – Fall in Love with London 2012!
At some ridiculously low temperature I jumped in the car on Saturday and drove to Białystok to participate in The Polish Olympic Sporting Awards. A great evening with some brilliant people from the world of sport in Poland – an excellent starting point for the visit of the British Olympic Travelling Exhibition to Poland, a […]
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13th February 2012 Dublin, Ireland
A Scottish evening with Wojtek the Bear.
One of the UK’s great strengths is its diversity. That includes some great cultural traditions. One of the best of those is Burns night. To celebrate this, we held an event at the Embassy. Very few of our events feature a pipe band and a sword dance, performed by the outstanding pipe band from Częstochowa. […]
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10th February 2012 New York, USA
Empire State of Mind
2012 is a special year for the UK, and we have much to look forward to in the months ahead with the London 2012 Games and the Diamond Jubilee. On a cold January day in New York, while talking to some colleagues about celebrating the countdown to the Olympics, somebody mentioned the “Empire State Building Run […]
10th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
EU integration and Ukraine: next steps?
What has to happen in order for Ukraine to start benefiting from the Association Agreement with the EU, and the associated Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (DCFTA), conclusion of negotiations on which were announced at the EU/Ukraine Summit on 19 December? It is important to understand that the Association Agreement and the DCFTA will […]
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10th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Credit where credit is due
Romania gets a good report on the battle against corruption in the latest assessment by the Commission. Deservedly so. The last few months have seen important steps forward. Verdicts have been reached in high-level corruption cases. The Civil Code is in force and working. New rules have been put in place for appointing judges to […]
10th February 2012 Nairobi, Kenya
Somalia: Two Weeks to Remember. Two Weeks to go.
It’s been quite a fortnight. At the end of January, I accompanied the UK Development Secretary, Andrew Mitchell, to the AU Summit in Addis Ababa and then to Somalia. In Dollow – the first time a British Minister has visited southern Somalia in recent years, Mr Mitchell saw for himself the huge difference that UKaid […]
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9th February 2012 USA
The Fast and the Amphibious
Some weeks, Tuesday is just Tuesday. But this week I had a “James Bond” Tuesday. It was with great pleasure that I was able to participate at the unveiling of a revolutionary and truly game changing technology on Tuesday, with the Pentagon as the backdrop. On show was the “Phibian,” the newest high-speed amphibious vehicle […]
9th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Romania’s first Oxford Prime Minister
The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge have a long record in educating British Prime Ministers. William Gladstone, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair all studied at Oxford. In fact, from the first – Robert Walpole – to the last – David Cameron – 41 of Britain’s 55 Prime Ministers went to Oxford or Cambridge. In recent years […]
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9th February 2012 Athens, Greece
Championing London 2012 in Athens
Minister for Europe, David Lidington, visited Athens this week for official discussions. As everybody knows Greece has been going through very difficult times. Britain wants to see the Eurozone strong and successful, and so it is important that we work closely to understand the developments in Greece and support Greece’s efforts wherever we can. However, […]
9th February 2012
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Volunteering in Ethiopia
Earlier this week, I met a group of volunteers from the British NGO Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) – some newly arrived in Ethiopia, several who have been working here for some time. VSO has a long and very successful history of operations in Ethiopia. And it is easily one of the most highly regarded charities […]