Walking up to the embassy of the most closed nation on Earth and finding the door wide open is a strange feeling.  But last week the Acton-based embassy of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, better known as North Korea, was open to the public for an art exhibition.

One of Britain’s highest-ranking intelligence officials on Tuesday castigated the giant American companies that dominate the Internet for providing the “command-and-control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals” and challenged the companies to find a better balance between privacy and security.

Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II sent her first ever tweet during a visit to a museum Friday, signing it “Elizabeth R” - and even removing a glove to post it.  Another tweet on the same account shortly afterwards said that the previous one was “sent personally by The Queen”, adding its own hashtag for the event -- #TheQueenTweets.

The British parliament’s vote to recognise a Palestinian state reflects shifting public sentiment against Israel in Britain and around the world, Britain’s ambassador to Israel said on Tuesday.

According to a declassified Ministry of Defence report on the power of soap operas, positive messages and storylines slipped into New Home, New Life, the British-backed Afghan incarnation of The Archers, have helped reduce landmine injuries, and persuaded Afghans to vote and to stop producing opium.

The British government is spending £1.5 million ($2.44 million) to have all of Shakespeare’s works translated into Mandarin by the Royal Shakespeare company. UK culture secretary Sajid Javid said he hopes the move will build “stronger links with China.”

The government has pledged a £1.5 million grant to the Royal Shakespeare Company, to translate the entire works of Shakespeare into Chinese.  The Department for Culture, Media and Sport will give the RSC a further £300,000 to tour through China, in the hopes of boosting tourism and "cultural links".

When political leaders and diplomats from different countries struggle to communicate in a cultured way, it is the artists, poets and museum curators who may bring sanity back to international relations. There is no shortage of cultural bodies, grass roots and state sponsored, that are working to keep up the dialogue between Russia and Britain.