Posted on 01/05/2008 9:08:34 PM PST by NormsRevenge
LONDON (AFP) - Britain is planning a "diplomatic surge" in the Middle East and south Asia to help counter extremism and nuclear proliferation, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said in an article published Sunday.
Writing in The Sunday Times, Miliband said 2008 would "show in word and deed" what Prime Minister Gordon Brown meant when he described his government's approach to world affairs as one of "hard-headed internationalism".
"We plan a diplomatic surge in the Middle East and south Asia by raising the number of staff by 30 percent," he said.
"That means we can deepen our engagement with Pakistan to prevent the growth of extremism there, including by spending an extra 80 million pounds (107 million euros, 158 million dollars) on counter-radicalisation."
Miliband said the Foreign Office would prioritise work on conflict prevention, with greater co-ordination between international development officials and the military, particularly in places like Afghanistan and Iraq.
Britain would also up its work in areas like combating climate change and seek to increase the effectiveness of international institutions like the European Union and the United Nations, he added.
The Foreign Office played down suggestions in The Sunday Times that the increase in staff in the Middle East and south Asia would mean cutting diplomatic posts in European embassies in Paris, Rome and Berlin by one-third.
A spokesman said it had not yet been decided how resources would be reallocated and staff could be reassigned from missions anywhere in the world. The Foreign Office's annual budget is 1.8 billion pounds.
Miliband reaffirmed that the United States was Britain's most important bilateral partner and also said the next 12 months need to be "the year of vision and leadership" by Israel and the Palestinians in the Middle East.
Boy, that’ll help. 30% more diplomats and socialist bureaucrats.
They are spending less than some multinational corporations spend on advertising for a new product launch in the region, and have the audacity to call this pathetic charade a “foreign policy”.
Peace in our time part two.
What is it with Brits and liberal appeasement disguised as diplomacy? - History anyone?
This has been seen before
How many millions had to die to correct that mistake? - 80 million?
Why hell, toss some nukes freash from Iran into that equation and we can beat that total easy.
Past performance is no guarantee of future results... or sumthin’ ;-)
tick, tock...time is running out for Britain
High Volume. Articles on Israel can also be found by clicking on the Topic or Keyword Israel. or WOT [War on Terror]
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Don’t call us when you will need us. . .
What it is; is ‘Leftism’/Liberalism. . .which speaks from twisted Reason; twisted logic. . .and twisted minds.
1.6m out of a pop of 60 million. And the greatest immigration in Britain today has been the whites from Eastern Europe.
No’ quite deed yet,laddie...
It looks like Britain may already have their own equivalent of the tribal territories:
http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/2008/01/men-without-country.html
Maybe OBL is hiding out in one of Britain’s tribal territories . . .
I agree with one of the posters at Belmont who suggests we’re growing some of our own.
“What is it with Brits and liberal appeasement disguised as diplomacy?”
Chamberlain (consistantly voted Britain’s worst ever leader in British polls) made a mistake, but declared war on Germany, not the other way around. He very much had in mind that the UK/Commonwealth had lost 1 million men in Europe twenty years previously. Britain’s reaction to German aggression before 1939 was matched by the US, who also did nothing and made no noises. I can’t recall any other striking instances of British appeasement?!?
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