Credit Crunches Embassies

The art and craft, the subtlety and subterfuge, the pomp and pageantry, and the dealings and misdealing of international politics easily lead to the conclusion that in the world of international diplomacy nothing – but nothing – is ‘a given’.  And not even it would seem is it any longer a given that countries can afford swish embassies in the likes of Knightsbridge, from which to conduct their wheelings and dealings.

This is the North Korean Embassy to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.  It is an end of terrace with a naff extension in Ealing!

The tiny Pacific Ocean nation of Tuvalu has its embassy in Cottenham Park, in south-west London.  Guinea-Bissau, for instance, handles its British diplomacy via a PO Box in, of all places, Tunbridge Wells.  Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase “It’s a small world”…