[Terpelaziun] Foreign Minister - September 2022

[Breneir Tzaracomprada]

Honorable Tuischac'h,

This terpelaziun is for the Foreign Minister. Minister Autofil, your report last month was well-received. As has been mentioned, an open and active stance with respect to foreign affairs has broad support. Based on last month's report, please update the Ziu on progress made concerning the cultivation of relations with other nations. Also, in a previous reply, you had mentioned that the BHAID was a lower priority but if there are any updates regarding this agency then please provide those as well.

[Ian Plätschisch]

Honorable Tuischac'h,

S:reu Autofil has informed the Cabinet that for the past few weeks he has been away from Talossa dealing with a personal issue. I hope the questioner will be understanding of this and allow for additional time.

[Breneir Tzaracomprada]

Honorable Tuischac'h,

S:reu Autofil has informed the Cabinet that for the past few weeks he has been away from Talossa dealing with a personal issue. I hope the questioner will be understanding of this and allow for additional time.

Yes that is perfectly understandable, Seneschal. Tuischac'h, if it is permissable I would like to extend the response period for an additional 7 days?

[Ian Plätschisch]

Honorable Tuischac'h,

S:reu Autofil has informed the Cabinet that for the past few weeks he has been away from Talossa dealing with a personal issue. I hope the questioner will be understanding of this and allow for additional time.

Yes that is perfectly understandable, Seneschal. Tuischac'h, if it is permissable I would like to extend the response period for an additional 7 days?

That should be sufficient, thank you.

[Mic’haglh Autófil, SMC EiP]

I thank the Senator for this question, as well as for his understanding regarding my unexpected absence.

I can confirm that I had a very productive discussion with Ladonian Foreign Minister Yvan Bertjens on August 14. This discussion ended up going well beyond the allotted time, which I view as a positive indicator that the two of us are off to a good start in terms of building relations between our two nations. Some topics of discussion include:

• His impressions of MicroCon 2022, as formed from his third-party information (he's in Belgium, making it even harder to get to Las Vegas than it is from Wisconsin).
• As MicroCon is returning to its schedule of every odd-numbered year starting next year, MicroCon 2023 will be hosted by Ladonia itself, in Queen Caroline's home city of Chicago. Being that Chicago is, for me, an hour's drive to Milwaukee followed by an hour's train ride to Union Station, I can say that no matter who is in charge of the Foreign Ministry at this time next year, I would gladly attend as part of the Talossan delegation.
• Ladonian efforts to achieve some form of recognition as an NGO by the Swedish government are beginning to gain steam, making them among the closest micronations to achieving any sort of official recognition (even if not a recognition of sovereignty, sadly).
• Basic information and comparison on the constitutional structures of our respective nations. Ladonia is for example more of a direct democracy -- effectively, anyone is allowed to apply for a "Ministry" of their choosing and creation, and all "Ministers" form the legislature (which elects the "actual" Ministers, if you will). One could think of this as analogous to the Maricopan Cabana. He was actually surprised that our government terms are really only eight or nine months, and that's if an election isn't called early; he was surprised we were able to get anything done with such turnaround.
• He did ask for a brief explanation on why Talossa is beginning to reverse course on self-identification as a micronation, which I told him in my estimation was largely due to the departure of some of the older-growth Talossans -- as we opened to the Internet in the 1990s, the term was largely adopted by many "micronations of one" and this likely made those in power at the time feel that such a classification was beneath our station (having already had over 15 years of growth at that time). Now that many of the current generation of Talossan leaders are more used to other micronations that even outpace Talossa in terms of population, we can reassess our position and come to a more frank self-evaluation.
• Any interesting projects in Talossa at the moment? For his part, he was happy to share information about ongoing maintenance/repair/expansion of Nis, the driftwood sculpture at the heart of Ladonia. I in turn displayed our sample ID card -- it was rather neat to be able to show it off!

Unfortunately I cannot provide any news of additional progress with other micronations, though as I understand it Duke Bertjens has put in a good word to our Flandrensian counterpart, with whom he is a good friend (and a fellow Belgian), so I may pivot to focusing more of my efforts there as a "path of least resistance" in terms of response time.

With respect to BHAID, as previous efforts to solicit recommendations for sourcing from the public (namely, as part of the Town Hall / Trivia Night that was ultimately attended only by myself and the Seneschal) have born little fruit, within the coming days I will be creating a thread for public feedback/input. I'm happy to direct our efforts, but I'm also interested in hearing what sort of efforts the community would prefer there.

[Breneir Tzaracomprada]

I thank Minister Autofil for his excellent reply and hope that things are now in a good place for himself and his family. The report on interactions with the Ladonian foreign minister is well received. I also look forward to the BHAID thread as well. I would alert the Minister that I suggested the Campaign for Uyghurs as a potential organization for support. They support victims of the People's Republic of China's abuse of the Uyghur population in Xinjiang.

I will follow up in next month's terpelaziuns.