CHOGM pride

D.Bruce Shine is the Honorary Consul for Malta in Tennessee and North Carolina. He wrote this piece after attending CHOGM as an accredited correspondent of the Kingsport Times-News:

..Throughout Malta citizens participated in hosting their multiple guests. One such event which Betsy and I attended was sponsored by our dear friends Professor and Mrs. David J. Attard, for Cherie Blair, wife of British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Attard, an internationally recognized maritime legal scholar, is director of the UN sponsored International Maritime Law Institute, a graduate law school located on the campus of the University of Malta, where this writer has been a Visiting Fellow.

The IMLI event for Mrs. Blair was attended by all of Malta's resident foreign ambassadors including U.S. Ambassador Molly Bordonaro, as well as the institute's 36 students, all lawyers from around the world.

Given the fact Malta's population is less than 400,000, with a land mass about one half of Sullivan County, CHOGM 2005 was a stellar event which brought together the representatives of one-fifth of all world trade and showcased this small but economically vibrant nation. The Maltese will be taking about this event with pride for decades to come with ample justification.