GPlus Europe

GPlus Europe, part of the Omnicom empire, is a public relations company with offices in London and Brussels that specialises in advising clients on winning support from decision makers in the European Union. "GPlus Europe produces made-to-measure political and communications strategies for our clients. We think through an organisation’s whole approach to the EU in order to position it, brand it and build its reputation with policy-makers, stake-holders and the media," it states on its website.

Working for Russia
In 2006 the Russian government signed a multi-million dollar deal with the Washington office of the PR company Ketchum and GPlus Europe. The Financial Times reported that the contract is "to improve the presentation of Russia's presidency of the Group of Eight leading nations." In late April 2006 U.S. Republican Senator from Arizona, John McCain, criticized the decision in January by the Russian government controlled company, Gazprom, to cut off gas supplies to the Ukraine. The deputy press attaché to Mr Putin, Dmitry Peskov, told the Financial Times that Russia's 12-month presidency stint of the G8 "didn't get off to a good start on the communications front." "Perhaps if we had already been working then with some kind of communications company things would have been different," he said.

GPlus founder and partner Peter Guilford told PR Week that the agency was tasked with covering "Russia's G8 priorities - energy security, education and infectious diseases. In reality, the broader view of that brief was everything to do with Russia's integration into the broader world economy."

"Russia is not perfect," he told PR Week. "It doesn't have a perfect democracy, it doesn't have perfect human rights, but it has come a hell of a long way in the past 15 years".

"Now there is a commitment to liberal economics, human rights and democracy. They're not always perfect, they're not always kept to, but the direction is right," he said.

Personnel

 * Peter Guilford
 * Nigel Gardner
 * John Wyles
 * Michael Tscherny
 * Julia Staunig
 * Tom Brookes
 * Antony Vinall, former Head of Industry and Internal Market at the UK’s Permanent Representation to the EU
 * John Wyles, formerly Financial Times correspondent in Brussels

Contact details
GPlus Europe 239 Old Marylebone Road London NW1 5QT United Kingdom GPlus Europe Rue Breydel 42 1040 Brussels Belgium

Web: http://www.gpluseurope.com/