His Excellency, Ambassador Stefan Frowein and the EU flag (presumable before 2009)
The European Union has a vast network of "embassies" - officially called Delegations - all over the world. This is how the EU External Action Service describes the network:
The EU maintains diplomatic relations with nearly all countries in the world. It has strategic partnerships with key international players, is deeply engaged with emerging powers around the globe, and has signed bilateral Association Agreements with a number of states in its vicinity. Abroad, the Union is represented by a network of 136 EU Delegations, which have a similar function to those of an embassy.
The EEAS will have a staff of about 5400 - probably many more at a later stage. The budget for this year is about 500 million euros, and it is expected to rise in the future. We are talking about a lot of money - paid for by the European tax payers.
Do we, the tax payers get full value for this rather lavish contribution?
One way to look at it, is to check how an - in this case randomly chosen - EU "embassy" manages to inform us about its work. For this purpose we chose to have a look at the Delegation of the European Union to Bangladesh - with a staff of 50 people, led by Ambassador Stefan Frowein - through its website.
Let´s start with the main page:
The main item seems to be a picture or video (?) under the headline "Climate change, a call to action". Unfortunately there is only an empty white space, so nobody will actually know what this is all about (which actually is a good thing, knowing the EU´s disastrous climate change policy).
Then there is a "What´s new" section which is supposed to offer the people of Bangladesh fresh news about the activities of the Delegation. These are the headlines:
No news after 2009 on the Delegation´s home page!
On the main page you can also find a link to Ambassador Frowein´s speeches.
The newest speech is from 2009:
8th October 2009: The Death Penalty, EU Roundtable, Dhaka
PS
For somebody who visits the webpage of the EU Delegation to Bangladesh, it certainly looks like nothing has happened after 2009. That may be true - and even a good thing! Would it not therefore be time to shut down the 50 person embassy and allow His Excellency, Herrn Dr. Stefan Frowein to retire? That would save us, the European taxpayers, a lot of euros! If the EU Delegation to Bangladesh is at all representative of the other units in the EEAS network, there might be quite a number of other "embassies" to close, too. (This just as a free tip to the EU auditors.)
PS 2
The website mentioned above is the one that Google gives as the first choice when searching for "EU Delegation Bangladesh". The Delegation appears to have a new, more updated website. But still, one wonders why the European Union is, in spite of its vast number of media and technical experts, not able to remove old outdated websites. (The Delegation even appears to have a new ambassador, Mr. William Hanna - and the staff is now almost 60!). Even with the updated website, one has to ask the question: Do we need an EU "embassy" with a staff of close to 60 diplomats and other employees in Bangladesh? The answer should be clear: NO!
The video missing on the old web page is available on the new page. And it is as awful as could be expected. The EU is doing its best to indoctrinate people in developing countries to falsely believe that floodings and other natural catastrophes are caused by human induced global warming:
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