Turkish President Abdullah Gül said on Wednesday that Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan needed to act as "six states with one nation" and display solidarity with each other.

Whether one approaches Turkish sponsorship skeptically or not, the soft power approach of Turkey seems to have won the hearts of the people of the Balkans, who openly expressed the sentiment that without leadership, they would never have come this far.

...continued by sharing some facts. "Do you know that Barbados was founded by a freed Nigerian slave? That is cultural diplomacy waiting for us there. Today, the official residence of the prime minister has a Nigerian name... They are asking for (Nigerian) TV content for the Broadcasting Organisation of the Caribbean. They are desperate to connect with us," he revealed.

Yet, it is this role that allowed her [Michelle Obama] to come to South Africa as the president’s proxy on the ‘soft power’ pilgrimage that was surely intended to bring her country closer to South Africa.

The work of Romanian cultural institutes will make the object of a distinct analysis. I believe in soft power, and Romania has a tremendous cultural vivacity which deserves to be properly publicised. I think that the Romanian Cultural Institute (ICR) under the leadership of Dr Patapievici is doing a great job in that sense, and we fully support its programmes.

He used the opportunity to call for dialogue, exchanges and collaboration between the Caribbean and Africa and to factor the role of culture in social and economic development. This forms part of both countries overarching objectives on development, poverty reduction and our gradual integration into the global economy.

I have also come to observe Egyptian public diplomacy efforts in South Sudan - and they are quite feeble. An Egyptian clinic, staffed by Egyptian doctors recognized for their skills, is essentially it. While a good step, it is insufficient to win the hearts and minds of our new upstream neighbors, who often view Egypt through the prism of its close relationship to Khartoum.

There’s growing awareness in government about Canadians abroad. Foreign Affairs and International Trade has been looking at global Canadians as part of public diplomacy and international business development; other federal departments also share an interest.