Le Floc’h, UEFA’s former marketing director until 2010, leaves Dubai-based Customised Solution FZ to take up the role of FIFA’s chief commercial officer on Oct. 11. The position was created as part of the restructuring of world football’s governing body in the wake of the corruption scandals that brought the federation to its knees.
Portugal’s former Prime Minister Antonio Guterres has unofficially been selected as the next U.N. Secretary-General. He is expected to be officially endorsed in the coming days. Following a decisive round of voting Wednesday in the U.N. Security Council, the veteran politician and diplomat prevailed with 13 votes in favor of his candidacy, none objecting to it and two votes of “no opinion”.
Gibraltar Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said that all the potential economic benefits from joint UK/Spain Gibraltar sovereignty could exist today if Spain respected the Gibraltarians' choice not to be Spanish. The statement was in response to Spain's formal invitation to the UK to commence joint sovereignty negotiations on Gibraltar.
United Kingdom's International Trade Secretary Liam Fox has said he is confident a Brexit deal could be struck that “will get a suitable and adequate response to the problems we face” both for Gibraltar as well as for the UK.
Foreign minister Susana Malcorra said that the Falklands/Malvinas issue has “an enormous emotional content”, but as her country's main diplomat her duty is to ensure a dialogue that can advance, in the best possible way, on all issues. The minister also described the Mercosur relation with Brazil as “inexorable”, which is beyond ideologies underlining the significance of Brazil's Michel Temer recent visit to Argentina.
Spain's Fisheries Secretary General Andrés Hermida opened on Monday the World Congress on Cephalopods organized by FAO and the Conxemar in Vigo underlining the importance of this large and heterogeneous group of species, --octopus, cuttlefish, squid--, for the fisheries sector and as raw material for the processing industry.
The United Kingdom has no doubt about the principal and the right of the Falkland Islanders to self determination as enshrined in both the UN charter and Article one of both UN covenants of Human Rights, said British representative Barrister Margaret Purdasy, at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland.
Argentina again claimed Falkland Islands' sovereignty and called for bilateral negotiations, as indicated by the UN General Assembly, at the closing 33rd session of the Human Rights Council last Friday in Geneva.
The Chinese currency Yuan entered a new phase in its journey to become more important to the world economy: starting on Saturday the Yuan is officially a member of the International Monetary Fund’s basket of global reserve currencies. Together, this group of currencies, known as Special Drawing Rights (SDR), forms a kind of pseudo-currency—used only by the IMF—to supplement countries’ official reserves.
Prime Minister Theresa May said on Sunday that Britain would begin the process of withdrawing from the European Union by the end of March and suggested that she would seek a clean break that makes limits on immigration a priority.