THE Foreign Office (FO) is to cut the number of diplomats working in Europe by a third so they can be redeployed to combat radicalism in the Middle East and Asia

Civil servants based in European capitals such as Paris, Rome and Berlin are to be retrained in language skills to reinforce diplomatic posts in Kabul, Baghdad and Islamabad.

The FO is to redefine its priorities with an increased focus on countering terrorism, stopping the proliferation of nuclear weapons and preventing conflicts.

Writing in The Sunday Times, David Miliband, the foreign secretary, said he would narrow the FO’s priorities to four main goals that “speak directly to the economic, social and security concerns of British citizens”.

An extra £79m is to be spent over three years on combating Muslim radicalisation, with dozens of extra political officers deployed to build contacts with local people in the Middle East and Pakistan.

“We will put more resources into countering terrorism and nuclear proliferation,” Miliband said. “We will increase the number of diplomats working in the Middle East and south Asia by 32%. That means we can deepen our engagement with Pakistan to prevent the growth of extremism there, including by spending an additional £79m over three years on counter-radicalisation.” The FO’s annual budget is £1.8 billion.

Miliband said he also wants to strengthen the effectiveness of institutions such as the United Nations and the European Union. Reaffirming the importance of British relations with the United States, which he says remains “our single most important partner”, Miliband said resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians must be a key priority for 2008 and a “year of vision and leadership between the two parties”.

The FO plans to increase cooperation in Afghanistan and Iraq with the army and the Department for International Development. Political officers will be given the job of building links with local people and gathering information about radicals on the ground. For security reasons the FO declined to say exactly how many political officers would be redeployed.

European embassies are likely to be scaled down but will still have enough staff to maintain trade links and offer consular help to British citizens. The staff of embassies in central America are also expected to be scaled down.

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