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Ukraine and Russia take part in biggest prisoner swap since invasion
00:28:53
President Trump says the exchange "could lead to something big"
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Andrew Peach
This is the global news podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Andrew peach and at 13 hours GMT on Friday, 23rd May. These are our main stories. Russia and Ukraine are reported to have begun a big prisoner exchange, the only concrete outcome of last week's peace talks. The Israeli military says more than 100 aid trucks entered Gaza on Thursday in a partial easing of Israel's blockade. We'll look at the humanitarian situation there. Also in this podcast, talks between Iran and the US over Tehran's nuclear program take place in Rome. We'll hear about the impact of the recent conflict in Kashmir. Six in the morning the firing started. I had my child on my lap when the mortar hit it hit the girl and me. The rest I don't remember. And in Norway, a man wakes up to find a huge container ship in his garden. Today is 1,184 days since Russia launched its full scale invasion of Ukraine. In recent weeks, hopes of ending the war have been on a bit of a rollercoaster. Today's been no exception. One minute, reports of a big prisoner exchange. The next, comments from the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, pouring cold water on suggestions that the Vatican could play a role in bringing the two sides together. Now, let's just imagine the Vatican as a venue for negotiations. It would be a bit inelegant for Orthodox countries to use a Catholic platform to discuss issues on how to remove the root causes of the conflict. One of the root causes is the cause to destroy the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. To help us make sense of these developments, I spoke to our Europe regional editorial, Danny Eberhard in Istanbul one week ago. They agreed on the prison exchange. It's a very large number of prisoners, 1,000 from each side was the agreement. We know that lists were exchanged between Russia and Ukraine yesterday, Thursday. And there are media reports in Ukraine quoting Ukrainian sources that the first stage of this process might be underway. There has been a post on social media by President Trump. He said a major prisoner swap was just completed between Russia and Ukraine. It will go into effect shortly. Congratulations to both sides of this negotiation. This could lead to something big with three question marks after that. But we can't discount, of course, the idea that a prisoner swap could lead to something else. It was the only concrete thing. It was also the easiest thing for Russia and Ukraine to agree on on the more difficult things, such as, for example, a ceasefire. There was no such substantial movement in those talks. So I think we can say that for the time being, that's still very much in the long grass. And what do you make of these comments by Sergei Lavrov who's basically said we can't talk to Ukraine at the Vatican, it's too Catholic. There was a suggestion from Donald Trump that the Vatican was interested in being a mediator. And indeed Pope Leo XIV has spoken of a willingness for the Vatican to mediate in global conflicts. Now obviously Russia and Ukraine, predominantly Orthodox countries, so Sergei Lavrov has some point in that, but obviously what he's also doing, he's playing down the idea of some sort of major movement on this. Basically there's been nothing agreed yet as to a venue for any potential further talks, nor for a time. And also Sergei Lavrov's other comments were not at all encouraging. So he was talking about talks basically to try to address the root causes of the conflict. Conflict, that's code for basically Ukraine accepting all of Russia's demands. Ukraine wants a 30 day unconditional ceasefire. That's very, very different. And also Sergei Lavrov was questioning President Zelenskyy's legitimacy. This is a very well worn and entirely spurious argument that President Zelenskyy's term has run out. Now Ukraine's constitution does not allow any election to take place under martial law. Our Europe regional editor Danny Eberhard to Gaza now where we're focusing on the humanitarian situation with reports of hunger several days after Israel lifted its 11 week aid blockade, the Israeli Prime Minister has accused some of his country's closest allies of being on the wrong side of humanity and siding with Hamas for criticizing Israel's conduct in Gaza by asking them to halt its new offensive and increase supplies. Since Sunday, more than three and a half thousand Palestinians in the territory have been killed, according to Gaza, Gaza Civil Defense Agency and the Hamas run Health Ministry. Hanya Al Jamal is the program coordinator for Action for Humanity and she described what families like hers have been eating. Myself and most families within Gaza Strip are down to one meal a day. Mind you, this meal would be lacking on a lot of nutritional prospects or components. This includes protein, vegetables, vitamins and all this stuff are lacking. Usually the meals that are available, it would be like either a lentil soup or a can of beans or just plain bread or plain rice. This is what is available. We're talking about 80 days of nothing coming in. 82% of Gaza's land is either militarized or in evacuation zones. So even produce that are meant to be cultivated within Gaza are out of reach. Farmers cannot reach their land. So we don't have access to vegetables. Israel doesn't allow international journalists to be based in or to visit Gaza. So our Gaza correspondent Rushdie Abu Alouf is following the situation from Cairo. He first explained how much aid was getting in about 130 trucks within the last three days. The last shipment was yesterday. It was convoy about 20 trucks carrying flour and one truck carrying medicine according to some of the local authorities in Gaza. But what happened last night is that as the convoy was approaching middle of Gaza Strip, it was attacked by what local journalists described as gangs trying to loot. There was shooting at two of the trucks trying to stop them. And suddenly there was a small police, Hamas police unit with a civilian uniform who intervened and they exchanged fire with the looter. After that, two, three Israeli airstrikes in the area killed six of those Hamas police. Later on, the Hamas government media office released a statement saying that 6 of the people who were trying to protect the aid convoy were killed by Israel. And they described this as a massacre. This is just to show you how difficult and how fragile is the security situation. When the flour was given and some other material and fuel was given to two bakeries in the middle camps to bake the bread while they were trying to distribute them, hungry people, and hungry people as well were attacked by. There was a chaotic situation. Some of the people were stealing the bread from the area. This morning the two bakeries put a statement on social media saying that they can't operate anymore because there is no security that can protect the people who are producing the bread. So now many experts or many Palestinians in Gaza are advising the international organization to distribute the flourish to the people. So to give like each family one bag of flour and the people can do their baking. This less risky than people gathering outside bakeries and try to get the bread. So instead of giving people bread to give them a flour, it was the humanitarian situation in Gaza that caused France, the UK and Canada to release a statement condemning Israel's actions earlier this week. And that didn't go down well with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As I heard from our correspondent in Jerusalem, Yoland Nell, it shows, I think, the extent to which he feels he's been backed into a corner. These threats of concrete actions against Israel are really causing problems for him in terms of public perception. Certainly Mr. Netanyahu's always presented himself, has been widely seen in Israel as somebody who is really strong in terms of representing Israel's interests on the world stage. And these accusations are really extraordinary. Benjamin Netanyahu basically suggests that Zakir Starmer in the UK The French and Canadian leaders want Hamas to stay in power in Gaza. And he says that with that joint statement that criticized Israel's actions in Gaza, which we had at the start of the week, they were emboldening Hamas to continue fighting forever. So he says they're on the wrong side of justice, humanity and history. And then he goes on as well to say that the calls to create an independent Palestinian state, this longtime international formula for peace, the two state solution, he says that nowadays the call free Palestine has been picked up by neo Nazis. And he says that that is today's Heil Hitler. So, you know, really quite extraordinary remarks. And he says that these world leaders, others, are guilty of hypocrisy that they brought into Hamas's propaganda that says Israel is starving Palestinian children. And of course, we have had this respected global hunger monitoring group warning of looming famine in Gaza. And what sort of reaction is it getting in Israel to see the prime Minister falling out with the country's closest allies? I mean, I think it is a sign of the extraordinary times that we're living through that these remarks are not featuring prominently in Israeli news headlines. But at the same time, you know, there was a lot of coverage of the fact that there had been these steps taken against Israel, the fact that the UK had frozen talks on a free trade agreement, that the eu, which is Israel's biggest trading partner, had said that it was going to review because a majority of member states had called for it, the pact, which governs political and economic ties with Israel. And there is a sort of growing fear that is talked about in the Israeli media that Israel could ultimately become a pariah state. At the same time as all this is happening, Israelis looking towards the US Messaging is with the US being Israel's closest ally internationally. And we had Benjamin Netanyahu saying that after he'd spoken to President Trump following that fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, that President Trump had reiterated his support for Israel's war goals in Gaza. Yola, now with me from Jerusalem, high stakes in Rome. Iranian and US negotiators are meeting for a fifth round of talks in a bid to reach a deal over Iran's nuclear program. There are fears if they collapse, Israel could launch its own attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities. I've been speaking to our chief international correspondent Lise Doucet since April, when they were first held in the Gulf state of Oman, really behind closed doors. No media were involved. It was said to be a mixture of direct and indirect discussions, even though Iran had insisted they should be indirect. And here it is now, the two sides are still talking. They haven't broken down. And the Iranian side led by Abbas Zarakchi, a very experienced diplomat who was part of the first negotiations that led to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. And on the American side, Steve Witkoff, who has become President Trump's envoy for, for everything, including this. President Trump last week said Iran and the US Were getting closer. Iran's foreign minister says a deal is within reach. There is quite a bit of tension over this round because there is a huge and growing gap on the issue of nuclear enrichment. Iran says it is a red line, that it has a right, a sovereign right to enrich uranium as part of its civilian peaceful nuclear program. Steve Witkoff said last week it was a red line for the United states that even 1% enrichment would not be allowed. Our chief international correspondent, Lise Doucet. South Sudan has seen increased violence between government forces and various militias, leading to a dire warning from both the United nations and the charity Medecins Sans Frontier of a humanitarian and public health crisis for civilians fleeing the fighting. Here's Rachel Wright. South Sudan became a new country in 2011, declaring independence from Sudan after years of conflict and civil war. The country then fell into its own six year civil war with fighting between government and opposition forces, including various militias. Since the peace agreement signed in 2018, the country has been governed by a coalition of the warring parties. But the implementation of the peace agreement has been slow and there's been intercommunal violence leading to an increase in civilian deaths, abductions, displacement. Today, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, urged all parties to pull back from the brink and observe the peace agreement signed in 2018. His spokesman, Saif Mugango, spoke to reporters in Geneva. We are warning today about a real risk of a further deterioration in the already dire human rights situation in South Sudan. This follows a sharp increase in hostilities between the South Sudan People's Defence Forces and the Sudan People's Liberation army in opposition and their respective allied fighters. The charity Medecin Sans Frontiere says up to 80,000 South Sudanese refugees have now fled over the border to Ethiopia, saying they were fleeing from aerial bombardment in the town of Nasir in the country's Upper Nile state. Msf, which has relocated its operation to Ethiopia, says the refugees are living in makeshift and overcrowded shelters. The charity says up to 40% of the refugees have tested positive for malaria. Children are suffering, suffering from malnutrition and with waterborne illnesses like cholera on the rise. The risk of a public health catastrophe is imminent. Footage has emerged capturing the moment a submersible imploded while exploring the wreck of the Titanic. Five people aboard the Oceangate sub, the Titan, were killed in June 2023. The recording from a support vessel features in a new BBC documentary which had exclusive access to the US Coast Guard's investigation. Here's our science editor, Rebecca Morell. The footage was admitted as evidence to the U.S. coast Guard's Marine Board of Investigation. It shows Wendy Rush, the wife of Stockton Rush, OceanGate CEO, who died in the disaster. She's in front of a computer used to communicate with the sub. You can hear what sounds like a door slamming. And then her reaction. She asks, what was that bang? The U.S. coast Guard now says this noise was the sound of Titan. Titan imploding. Moments later, Wendy Rush receives a text message from the vessel. Investigators say the message, which must have been sent just before Titan failed, took longer to reach the ship than the sound of the implosion. The US Coast Guard, which has spent two years investigating, said the submersible started to break apart a year before the fatal dive. Oceangate said it had wound down its operations and focused its resources on fully cooperating with the investigations. It said it would be inappropriate to respond further until those agencies had reported. Rebecca Morell reporting. Still to come, Danes aren't too happy with this change. They say it's unfair and they're saying, how long will we have to keep working? You know, there have been protests there by trade unions against the retirement age increase. Denmark is set to change its retirement age to 70, the highest in Europe. Families in the disputed Kashmir region are still reeling after four days of fighting that erupted between India and Pakistan earlier this month. Sparked after a deadly militant attack on Indian Administered Kashmir, the violence widened to claim dozens of lives throughout the two countries, both of which claim the region. A week after the ceasefire came into effect, my colleague Emir Nader was taken by the army into Pakistan Administered Kashmir. And you may find some parts of Emir's report distressing. We're driving in a convoy of vehicles with the Pakistani military on a winding road that cuts through the valleys here in Pakistan Administered Kashmir. Passing a number of farming villages, we can see houses dotted out across the mountains around us. We're heading to see one of the areas affected during the recent fighting. The military have brought us here because they say they want us to see the impact of the conflict on this side. We climbed down a mountain to a humble farming homestead to meet Wajid, a father still in shock. My wife, my mother and daughter were making breakfast in the morning when the mortar hit and killed them. We only found my mother's neck. My wife, half of her body was blown off. My other daughter's arm was blown off. She was just two years old. Three generations of a family lost in an instant. Villages like these by the disputed region's de facto border found themselves on the front line. It's hard to imagine that this exquisite vista of nature and rolling mountains is one of the most militarized places on earth. With hundreds of thousands of troops from both the Pakistani and Indian side based throughout this region. An hour's drive away, at the regional hospital, we meet two year old Horain. Doctors have attached a bag to her stomach after she was hit by shrapnel. Six in the morning, the firing started. We were at the door. I had my child on my lap when the mortar hit. It hit the girl and me. The rest I don't remember. We've just been taken to meet some of the locals who were injured here during the fighting in the hospital. It was a really sad sight. There's been a lot of claims of victory and nationalistic talk of triumphs by both sides. But it's sobering and very hard to to understand what victory means when you meet some of the people whose lives have been changed forever in that violence. In these rural villages, poor Kashmiris will welcome the government's offer of compensation. But officials are keen to make clear who they say is to blame for their suffering. Here's Mohammad Osman Saran, a representative for the region. This attack was totally on the civil side, totally on the. On the destruction of the civil infrastructure. We don't have any reports that retaliation from the Pakistani military has caused any sort of casualties across the border. But there were casualties across the line of control. The Indian side of Punj was one of the worst hit regions in Indian administered Kashmir. Sixteen people were killed, including children in blasts that tore through homes. We continue our journey on the Pakistan side, heading to a family home just meters away from the de facto border. Here there are many who believe that the ceasefire won't last long. And for some, the grief is still war. Omar's house was directly hit. His brother died in his arms on the way to the hospital. What he died, what he did, he did nothing. We are Kashmiris. Our lives are nothing. We are worthless people. We are dying here. We are dying in other side of Kashmir. Civilians caught in the firing line on both sides of the line of control as they have been for decades. While generations of conflict has taught them that their safety is forever at risk. Emir Nader with that report from Pakistan administered Kashmir. The announcement on Thursday that the Trump administration would revoke Harvard University's ability to enroll international students has caused shock waves throughout American academia. Harvard is suing the Trump administration, accusing it of acting unlawfully. Mr. Trump accuses Harvard of fostering anti Semitism and anti American views. Jason Furman is an economics professor at the university. We have 10,000 international students at Harvard. They are amazing. They help make all of us smarter, make all of us better. Lots of them stay in the United States and contribute to our country. Others go home and contribute to their countries. It's just a wonderful, wonderful thing in every way. And now the Trump administration is trying to end it. This step was not done in good faith. It was not done as part of an honest process. It was political retaliation, pure and simple. Harvard has worked in good faith with the administration. This targeting of international students is part of a broader dislike that this administration has for openness in all of its forms. Openness to ideas, openness to people, openness to trade. And that's what Harvard University represents. In a post that Secretary Noem posted on X, she warned that the move should, as she put it, serve as a warning to all universities and academic institutions across the country. You yourself, you are an academic, you are a professor of economics at. Do you feel that the academic world is under pressure, particular pressure at the moment in the United States from the government? Absolutely. You know, grants are being revoked from universities across the country. These were grants because, you know, the United States wants to do things like medical research. How do you do medical research? You give money to universities to carry out that research. Now you have visas and then later they may start to tax our endowments. And in general, it looks to me like they're just trying to find, you know, every single tool they can have to, to pursue a political vendetta and, and, and carry it out. Professor Jason Furman talking to my colleague Victoria Uwanhunda. Retiring at an age of 60 or younger is a dream for many. But as people are living longer and pension funds come under strain, governments around the world are raising the age that citizen state pension. Denmark is due to raise its retirement age to 70 by the year 2040, making it the highest in Europe. Here's our reporter, suranjana tiwari. Since 2006, Denmark has tied the official retirement age to life expectancy and has revised it every five years. It's 67 at the moment, but that will rise to 68 in 2030 and then 69 after that. Now, last year, the Prime Minister said that the sliding scale principle, as it's known, would eventually be renegotiated, adding that she didn't believe that the retirement age should be increased automatically and that you can't just keep saying that people have to work for a year longer. Danes aren't too happy with this change. They say it's unfair and they're saying, how long will we have to keep working, you know, and for blue collar workers especially, they've got physically demanding jobs. So the changes are likely to be difficult. There have been protests there, backed by trade unions, against the retirement age increase. And in the last few weeks, and as for the rest of Europe, retirement ages really vary. Many governments have raised the retirement age to try and reflect longer life expectancy and to tackle budget deficits. In Sweden, for example, the earliest that people can start drawing their pension is 63 in Italy, at 67. In the UK it's 66 for some. And for others, the state pension age will increase gradually. In France it's between 62 and 64. But that was a very unpopular change and that sparked protests and riots for President Emmanuel Macron as well. Ella hibbert is a 28 year old British sailor who on Saturday will attempt to become the first person to circumnavigate the Arctic Circle solo and non stop, a journey of 16,000km. It's a challenge she says she wished were impossible, but it's become achievable because of climate change. If the Arctic had the sea ice cover that it should, this voyage wouldn't be possible. And the only reason that it's never been done before has been because of Arctic sea ice cover. It is going to be a challenging circumnavigation. It's quite treacherous. Navigation, the ice is one of the biggest things to contend with and it's not something that you can really train for or practice for until you're there, you know. But I have undertaken as much training as I can from afar on board. I do carry a flare gun with 30 red flares to use as a deterrent to help scare bears away. But the plan is very much to to not become a stationary target. I've undergone quite extensive medical training where I can now do my own cannula insertions into my veins and stitches and sutures. It's been about three years in the making. I'm feeling very ready and just excited to overcome those challenges as and when they happen, because they inevitably will happen. The British sailor Ella Hibbert. The authorities in Norway are investigating how a huge container ship rammed a fjord side house near Trondheim in central Norway. They say it seems the person steering the vessel fell asleep at the helm. Here's Risto Pukko. Police have detained one person over the incident that took place early on Thursday near Trondheim in central Norway. They say he appears to have been alone on the bridge of the Sultan and for some reason dozed off while navigating the Trondheim fjord. The ship, more than 100 meters long, is said to have been traveling at full speed when it ran ashore and only stopped meters from Johann Helberg's house. Mr. Helberg didn't seem too upset by the events. We were lucky that it ran ashore just there, 5 meters to the south, or it would have hit the bedroom and that wouldn't have been very nice. Nobody was injured in the accident and the only real damage appears to have been to a pipe in the Helberg's heat pump, meaning they will have to live in a cold house for a few days. Mr. Helberg was actually unaware of the ship almost ramming his house until a neighbor phoned him to alert him to the intruder in the garden. The neighbor had first tried to ring the doorbell, but Mr. Helberg said it had been too early to answer the door. It will probably take several days to refloat the ship and Mr. Helberg says that until then he will just have to accept the absurdity of having a huge ship next door. And you can see pictures of the ship in Mr. Helberg's garden on our website, BBC.com news now. We are loving your messages about where you listen to the Global News podcast. And now we want to know what you're doing while you listen to us. Lo Yang Chi from Taiyuan in Taiwan says he hates commuting, but his two hour journey has now become less boring and more meaningful. Karen Bruchalova tunes in from Huyuchin in the Czech Republic while on her daily walks around the beautiful lake. So, so what do you do? Send us a voice note, an email, even a picture. Globalpodcastbc.co.uk and that's all from us for now. There'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast to download later. This edition was mixed by Louis Griffin. The producers were Alice Adderley and Marion Straughan. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Andrew Peach. Thank you for listening and until next time, goodbye.