Ukraine triumphs on Russia’s turf

‘Jaw jaw’ remarked Churchill ‘is always better than war war.’ And some of London’s finest jaws were being put to good use last night as the cream of the capital’s consular circuit mingled, chatted and wolfed down canapés at the Diplomat magazine awards. From Namibia to Nicaragua they came, packed into Mayfair’s glitzy Biltmore hotel in Grosvenor Square, ambassadors and High Commissioners aplenty.

The attractions of the evening were explained by James Landale, the BBC’s diplomatic editor, moonlighting as Master of Ceremonies for the shindig: ‘This is effectively the diplomatic office party – you can drink and gossip and moan about whoever you want with gay abandon’ as it is ‘the one reception of the year where you do not have to listen to another country’s national anthem, where none of you have to suck up to some junior minister who you find really boring.’

And the assembled envoys and emissaries certainly took that decree to heart, judging from the amount of champagne-soaked schmoozing to toast the resumption of post-pandemic diplomatic shindigs.