Home Minister Gurung, British Ambassador Fenn Discuss Disaster Response and Policing Cooperation

Dragon Media Correspondent

Home Minister Sudan Gurung and British Ambassador to Nepal Rob Fenn have discussed ways to expand bilateral cooperation in Nepal–UK relations, disaster preparedness and response, and modern policing.

During the meeting, the two sides exchanged views on strengthening the longstanding friendship between Nepal and the United Kingdom while expanding practical cooperation in line with evolving needs and shared priorities.

Ambassador Fenn expressed his pleasure at meeting Home Minister Gurung, saying the discussions reaffirmed the long-standing friendship between the two countries and focused on joint priorities in disaster preparedness and response, as well as modern policing.

Given Nepal’s high exposure to earthquakes, floods, landslides, inundation and climate-related disasters, strengthening institutional capacity, preparedness, emergency response and coordination among relevant agencies remains an important national priority.

The meeting also explored possibilities for closer institutional cooperation and the exchange of experience between relevant institutions in Nepal and the United Kingdom in the field of modern policing, according to the ambassador.

Fenn said the United Kingdom seeks to advance such cooperation not through a traditional donor-recipient model, but through a peer-to-peer partnership based on the exchange of institutional experience and expertise.

Such cooperation could include professional capacity-building, modern policing practices, institutional knowledge-sharing and the exchange of relevant experience between Nepal’s security institutions and their counterparts in the United Kingdom.

Ambassador Fenn described the cooperation as part of the broader “Investment and Expertise Partnership” that the United Kingdom is seeking to build with a new Nepal.

The partnership is intended to connect investment, expertise, institutional knowledge and experience available in both countries in areas capable of generating mutual benefit.

In recent engagements between Nepal and the United Kingdom, both sides have increasingly emphasized expanding economic and development cooperation beyond conventional assistance toward a relationship based on investment, expertise and mutual benefit.

Ambassador Fenn said the United Kingdom aims to develop this new partnership with Nepal in a manner that benefits the people of both countries.