US Vice President suggests talks with Iran could resume

Summary

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Global News Podcast – April 14, 2026

Host: Ankar Desai, BBC World Service
Episode Theme: Renewed U.S.–Iran Tensions, the Prospects for Diplomacy, and Global News Updates

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on sharply renewed tensions between the U.S. and Iran, fueled by competing blockades around Iran’s ports and crucial shipping lanes. U.S. Vice President JD Vance signals that diplomatic talks with Iran could resume—if Iran makes the first move on key nuclear assurances. The show also covers stories from Pakistan (malpractice-linked HIV outbreak), Colombia’s hippo cull, and includes business, political, and cultural news from around the globe.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. U.S.–Iran Standoff: Blockades and Diplomatic Stalemate

• Crucial Events:
  • U.S. Navy starts enforcing a blockade of Iranian ports in retaliation for Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz (vital international energy route).
  • Both countries accuse each other of “economic terrorism” by restricting maritime trade.
• Diplomatic Outlook:
  • U.S. Vice President JD Vance claims a willingness to resume talks, contingent on Iran's compliance with nuclear non-proliferation terms.
  • Talks over the weekend in Islamabad fell apart, with both sides accusing the other of moving the goalposts.

Key Quote:

“We must have the enriched material out of Iran. We must have their conclusive commitment to not develop a nuclear weapon. And I think that if the Iranians are willing to meet us there, then this can be a very, very good deal for both countries.”
— JD Vance, U.S. Vice President [03:12]

Analysis & Context [03:30–05:44]:

• Peter Bose (BBC North America correspondent) explains urgency and sticking points.
• The U.S. position: ceasefire, full reopening of the strait, and Iran behaving as a “normal country.”
• Real progress depends on Iran’s diplomatic overtures.

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2. Global Economic Fallout: Oil, Inflation & Winners

Business Editor Simon Jackson Explains [06:05–08:47]:

• Oil prices are volatile but remain under $100/barrel; U.S. stocks are up, possibly signaling misplaced complacency.
• Asian economies highly reliant on Gulf oil face rationing, supply constraints, and inflation.
• Confidence, rather than oil, is the most battered “commodity”—with broad consequences for economic growth.

Notable Exchanges:

• “This is a birthday present for Russia ... Russia is a big winner from this.”
  — Simon Jackson [08:29]

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3. Trump–Pope Leo Spat Over Iran

• Background:
  • Donald Trump removes an AI-generated “messianic” post but escalates a public dispute with Pope Leo, who condemned the Iran conflict and Trump’s posture as “a delusion of omnipotence.”
• Key Moment:
  • Trump on the Pope:

  “He was very much against what I’m doing with regard to Iran and you cannot have a nuclear Iran ... I think he’s very weak on crime and other things.” [09:26]

• Church–State Perspective:
  • Prof. Massimo Fagioli (Trinity College Dublin) contextualizes the spat in the history of popes confronting strongmen leaders, noting the unique dynamic of an American pope and president both claiming moral high ground.
  • The Catholic Church strives to remain non-partisan, but Trump’s “divine mission” rhetoric makes neutrality challenging.

Memorable Analysis:

• “[Trump] claims to be a kind of political messiah ... that’s a different level.”
  — Prof. Massimo Fagioli [10:07]
• “The Church cares deeply about the most vulnerable ... but this is different, because he’s dealing with an administration that is saying they are on a divine mission.”
  — Prof. Massimo Fagioli [12:59]

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4. Colombia’s Cocaine Hippos: Ecology over Escobar

Report by Alice Adderley [13:36–15:52]:

• Colombia will cull part of its now ~200-strong invasive hippo population, descended from animals imported by Pablo Escobar.
• The hippos threaten native ecosystems (e.g., manatees, river turtles) and human communities.

Key Expert Quote:

“This is a necessary action to reduce the population. Without that action, it’s impossible to control the population.”
— Dr. Gull, Hospital Whistleblower/Ecologist? [15:13]

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5. BBC Eye: HIV Outbreak in Pakistani Hospital

Investigation by Ghazal Abbasi [18:25–22:35]:

• BBC uncovers ongoing, life-threatening malpractice in the pediatric ward linked to an HIV outbreak.
• Undercover filming caught syringes reused and unqualified volunteers administering injections.
• Despite official reassurances, a whistleblower’s footage shows the dangers persist.

Memorable Testimony:

“I had the reports for 65 to 70 children that I had diagnosed. The THQ Hospital in Tonsa was the common factor between them ... almost all the children had gone there for treatment.”
— Dr. Gull, Whistleblower [20:08]

• The stigma around HIV persists—children shunned by their communities.

  “The neighbors and our relatives don’t even let their children touch Asma. ... other children don’t play with me. They won’t even walk with me.”
  — Interview with victim’s uncle [22:21]

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6. Trump’s Lawsuit Against Wall Street Journal Dismissed

Analysis by Neda Tofik [23:20–25:36]:

• Trump lost a defamation suit over a drawing published by the WSJ allegedly linking him to Jeffrey Epstein.
• Judge rules Trump failed to show “actual malice”—the threshold for defamation cases.
• Trump vows to refile before the April 27 deadline.

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7. Hollywood Merger Backlash

Report by Shama Khalil [25:36–27:02]:

• Over 1,000 actors, directors, and filmmakers (Kristen Stewart, Glenn Close, etc.) sign a public letter protesting the Paramount–Warner Bros. Discovery merger.
• Fears: industry job losses, reduced competition, higher costs, increased media concentration—including more political influence over CNN and other outlets.

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8. The 'Taxi Test' Job Interview at Duolingo

Report by Helena Berg [27:02–29:56]:

• Duolingo secretly had taxi drivers assess job candidates’ behavior en route to interviews, acting on the logic that “if a person is mean to their driver, then they’ll be mean to coworkers.”
• One candidate lost a senior role based on poor cabbie feedback.

Direct Quote:

“We had been looking for a chief financial officer ... turned out they were pretty mean to their driver ... That made us not hire them.”
— Luis von Ahn, Duolingo CEO [27:59–28:14]

• Cab drivers in London found the test amusing or justified, while HR experts warn it could be discriminatory, especially for neurodivergent candidates.

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Notable Timestamps & Quotes

• 02:31 — U.S. and Iran mutual blockades escalate; Vance outlines conditions for talks.
• 03:12 — Vance: “We must have the enriched material out of Iran...”
• 06:29 — Simon Jackson on effects in Asia: “Fuel rationing in Sri Lanka, LPG rationing in India, four-day weeks elsewhere...”
• 08:29 — “This is a birthday present for Russia.”
• 09:26 — Donald Trump on Pope Leo: “Pope Leo said things that are wrong... I think he’s very weak on crime...”
• 10:07–12:59 — Prof. Fagioli on historical context of pope–strongman tensions.
• 15:13 — Colombia’s hippo cull: “Necessary action” to save ecosystems.
• 20:08–22:21 — Testimonies about HIV outbreak and its social impact in Pakistan.
• 23:20–25:36 — Neda Tofik breakdown of Trump/Wall Street Journal lawsuit.
• 27:57–28:14 — The “taxi test” revealed by Duolingo CEO as reason for rescinding a job offer.
• 29:15 — HR expert Kate Bennett criticizes “taxi test” as potentially discriminatory.

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Memorable Moments

• Trump’s “messiah” post controversy and spat with the American pope, underscoring the intertwining of faith, identity, and geopolitics in the current U.S. administration.
• The Duolingo “taxi test” sparks a lively debate on fairness in hiring while offering a glimpse of unconventional HR strategies.
• Heartbreaking stories from Pakistan, where systemic failures in healthcare place children at risk and expose enduring societal stigma.

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This episode delivers gripping updates and analyses on the global ramifications of U.S.–Iran confrontations, the complexities of politics, business, and culture—and the human stories behind the headlines. For a full multimedia experience, visit the BBC World Service YouTube channel for video content on featured investigations.

Transcript

[BBC News Presenter]

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[Ankar Desai]

this is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. Hello, I'm Ankar Desai and in the early hours of Tuesday 14th April, these are our main stories. The US Vice President JD Vance suggests talks with Iran could resume, but the ball is in Tehran's court. He was speaking after the US Navy began enforcing a blockade of Iranian ports. A BBC investigation uncovers evidence of life threatening malpractice on the pediatric ward of a Pakistani hospital previously linked to a HIV outbreak. Also in this podcast, Colombia is to begin a cull of its invasive hippopotamus population to protect local ecosystems and native species such as manatees and river turtles.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

This is a necessary action to reduce the population. Without that action, it's impossible to control the population.

[Ankar Desai]

As the US and Iran continue to tussle over the key waterway that is vital to the global economy. The US Vice president has given an indication that fresh talks could be revived, but says the ball is in Iran's court. This comes after JD Vance accused the Iranian government of carrying out what he called economic terrorism by largely closing the Strait of Hormuz to ships. On Monday, the US began a rival blockade stopping ships from using Iranian ports, and it comes after talks between the US and Iran crumbled over the weekend in Islamabad, Mr. Vance has been speaking to Fox News, but insists certain conditions must be met.

[Ryan Seacrest]

We must have the enriched material out of Iran. We must have their conclusive commitment to not develop a nuclear weapon. And I think that if the Iranians are willing to meet us there, then this can be a very, very good deal for both countries.

[Ankar Desai]

I heard more from our North America correspondent, Peter Bose, who's in la.

[BBC News Presenter]

He said the ball was very much in Iran's court. He also addressed some issues that we didn't hear about when the talks broke up in the early hours of Sunday over the weekend, namely the status of the straigh of Hormuz. In fact, Mr. Vance went as far as to accuse Tehran of moving the goalposts during the meeting, saying that he'd expected the Iranians to fully reopen the strait in return for a ceasefire. He said by blocking traffic, Iran was engaging in an act of economic terrorism. And were that to continue, he said the US would abide by the same principle, that no Iranian ships would get out either. He said two could play at that game. And as we know, and as you've been reporting, the US blockade of Iran's ports is now in effect. Donald Trump has said more ships are getting through, but this issue remains the most sensitive, at least I think, for the next coming days, because as long as global trade is being hampered in the way that it has been in recent weeks, it seems highly unlikely that any of the other big issues are going to be resolved.

[Ankar Desai]

Rapizi also seemed to allude that they talked over a number of things in Islamabad over the weekend with Iran, seemed to give an indication of what some of those topics would have been.

[BBC News Presenter]

Yes, he did. He elaborated a little bit more on these core issues that are dividing the two countries. He said the US had to put a lot on the table, and he said it had done that. Tehran, he said, wasn't responding in the way that he and the President wanted. On the table, he said, was the ceasefire and the promise that Iran could one day be treated like a normal country. He said if it was a normal economy, people would prosper and thrive. But in order for Iran to be a normal country, he said it could never get a nuclear weapon. And he said we must have, just to quote him, the enriched material out of Iran. We must have the conclusive commitment not to develop a nuclear weapon. That, he said, would be a very, very good deal for both countries. And he repeated what he and the President have been saying, that their view was that the weekend talks made some progress, but that both side had to progress even further and that it was up to Iran to make the next move.

[Ankar Desai]

North America correspondent Peter Bose reporting. Well, the conflict in the Middle east has had a volatile effect on markets and the wider global economy. A few hours after the start of the US blockade of Iranian ports and shortly after the close of trade on the American markets, I spoke to our business editor, Simon Jackson.

[Simon Jackson]

The oil price is still actually right now below $100. And stock markets in the US are actually up and in fact have eradicated all their losses so far this year. So either they're being horribly complacent about this or there's reasons for confidence that a deal can be achieved.

[Ankar Desai]

Asian markets, Asian countries and their economies are desperate for all because we know this strait is so important to them. So what are their solutions then if they want to try and access oil?

[Simon Jackson]

Well, we've seen supply constraints, which has seen what they call in economic terms, demand destruction. Things, you know, e get so expensive you stop doing them or the supplies aren't there and you can't do them. And we've seen things like fuel rationing in Sri Lanka, we've seen LPG rationing in India, four day weeks elsewhere, people being told to stay at home, all of these kind of things to try and bring down demand. And also there are of course other sources of oil. The Gulf isn't the only one. China, for example, gets quite a lot of its oil from Russia. India also gets some from Russia. But I'm not trying to downplay the fact that there are real shortages in some places causing real hardship. And the more you are reliant on the Gulf, the more that hardship. And certainly Asia fits that bill.

[Ankar Desai]

Yeah, reserves are being drained by the day for sure. A lot of people listening will wonder, well, how is this affecting me? How is this affecting my pocket, my bank balance and the finances of many people around the world?

[Simon Jackson]

Well, it pushes up inflation. And inflation is a killer in two ways. One is it increases the cost for businesses of doing business and at the same time it takes money out of the pockets of those customers. So it's a double whammy on, if you like, economic growth. So inflation goes higher, economic growth goes lower. For many governments, that means that the amount of tax they get in from that economic activity will also go down at the same time as interest rates being higher, the amount they pay on their borrowings. This is particularly true in Asia, which has a lot of US dollar denominated debt. So the public finances can get very stretched very quickly. And the longer this goes on, the worse it gets. And there's one commodity which really gets battered in a situation like this and it's not oil and it's not helium and it's not fertilizer. It's confidence. Confidence means that business, businesses don't spend money, they hoard cash, they don't invest. And that can affect growth for many weeks, months, even years down the line.

[Ankar Desai]

Finally, in every situation, someone benefits. So a lot of people looking towards Russia. So are Russian oil producers currently rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of many countries knocking on their door?

[Simon Jackson]

This is a birthday present for Russia. They're obviously big suppliers to both India and China, both of who are in desperate need of it. So, yes, Russia is a big winner from this. And also given the fact that the Ukraine war is going on, international attention has obviously been diverted to the Gulf. So good news for Russia, bad news for Ukraine.

[Ankar Desai]

Simon Jack. Donald Trump may have removed the AI post on his truth social feed which depicted himself as a Jesus like figure after supporters accused him of blasphemy. But he's not backing down in his spat with the leader of the Roman Catholic Church. Late on Sunday, he accused Pope Leo of being weak on crime and terrible for foreign policy after the U. S. Born pontiff had said a delusion of omnipotence was fueling the war in Iran. But the pope said he had no fear of the Trump administration and he would continue to speak out loudly in response. President Trump stood his ground when he was asked about the row at the White House.

[BBC News Presenter]

Pope Leo said things that are wrong. He was very much against what I'm doing with regard to Iran and you cannot have a nuclear Iran. Pope Leo would not be happy with the end result. You have hundreds of millions of people dead and it's not going to happen. So I can't, I think he's very weak on crime and other things. So I'm not. I mean, he, he went public. I'm just responding to Pope Leo.

[Ankar Desai]

So how does the current spat compare to previous disagreements between popes and political figures? Professor Massimo Fagioli from Trinity College Dublin is an expert on the Christian church. He's been speaking to the BBC's James Kumarasamy.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

So there is a history of contraposition between strong men, strong leaders, Hitler and then Mussolini and then Stalin. But there was a sense of respect of the Vatican as an institution that we don't see here. Right. What's different now is that the United States of. Donald Trump claims to be the defender of Christianity and Donald Trump himself claims to be A kind of political messiah. Right. And so that's a different level.

[James Kumarasamy]

The Pope during the war years, Pius

[Ankar Desai]

xii, the Pope who remained in the Vatican City during the hard fought battle for Rome, granted an audience to allied troops after the occupation and gave them his blessing.

[James Kumarasamy]

What would you point to in terms of how he interacted with politicians? Because it's a pretty controversial legacy he has, isn't it?

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

It is.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

And that's the problem that every Pope wants to avoid, meaning the question of how silent a Pope can be in the face of war crimes, genocide. And so here you had a church that was very much in between Soviet Communism on, on one side and fascism, Nazism on the other side. But everything was dealt at the level of ideology, of we Catholics, we Communists.

[James Kumarasamy]

Of course, what we have now is an American Pope and an American president locking horns. And I just wonder, looking back to more recent times, when we have a Polish Pope, John Paul ii, being seen as a real beacon in the fight

[Ankar Desai]

against communism, the imperialistic monopoly of economic

[BBC News Presenter]

and political supremacy at the expense of others.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

That's true. The big difference is that in 1979, when John Paul II visited Poland, just a few months after his election,

[Kohler Ambassador]

he

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

knew he had almost the entirety of the Polish people behind him. That cannot be said for Pope Leo because America is very polarized.

[James Kumarasamy]

How unusual is it for the Pope, the current one, to very specifically saying, look, I'm not afraid of what the Trump administration is going to say, being quite direct in standing his ground against, well, specifically the riposte from the White House.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

It's very unusual. Pope Leo spent 20 years in Peru at the time when Peru was a very dangerous place. A civil war, armed gangs killing priests. That has given him an armor that I think is quite interesting to see.

[James Kumarasamy]

Has the Pope always been a political figure? To a certain extent, yes.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

The Catholic Church has a very political understanding of itself. Not partisan, though. Right. So that's the difference. So being political means that you care deeply about the most vulnerable, the environment, but you also avoid being on the side of one political party, one nation, one leader. That's in the DNA of Catholicism. But this is different again, because he's dealing with an administration that is saying they are on a divine mission. And that makes it very hard for the Vatican not to respond.

[Ankar Desai]

Professor Massimo Fagioli, speaking to James Kumarasami. Colombia has announced that it's going to begin a cull of its invasive hippopotamus population, which is descended from animals smuggled in by the late narco terrorist Pablo Escobar. The government says the beasts, which form the only wild population of hippos living outside Africa, are threatening its ecosystems and native species as well as posing a danger to local people. As Alice Adderley reports, In the 1980s,

[Alice Adderley]

Pablo Escobar was renowned for being a violent cartel leader, but he was less known for creating an extravagant private zoo featuring more than a thousand exotic animals smuggled from overseas. The wildlife included giraffes, elephants, zebras, rhinos and exotic birds. But the most famous and destructive part of the collection was four African hippos, one male and three females. After Escobar was killed in 1993 in a shootout with Colombian security forces, the hippos escaped from his abandoned hacienda and began breeding thriving in the Colombian climate with no natural predators. Now there are estimated to be up to 200 of their descendants living in the wild. The environment minister, Irene Velez, said that following scientific advice, the government was issuing a euthanasia protocol to control the numbers of the so called cocaine hippos.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

This is a necessary action to reduce the population.

[Alice Adderley]

Without that action, it's impossible to control the population. And as we saw in the estimates, by 2030 we would have at least 500 hippos affecting our ecosystems and harming our native species such as manatees and river turtles. While some of the hippos which roam freely in the Magdalena River Valley will be culled, others will be sterilized or moved. Maybe some will be lucky enough to end up in the family orientated theme park and wildlife sanctuary, which Escobar's former ranch, Hacienda Napolis, has become.

[Ankar Desai]

Alice Adderley reporting. Still to come in this podcast, people open up to you because they're not likely to ever say you're again.

[BBC News Presenter]

Some people can be more than generous and other people the opposite. Always got to be good to your cab driver cuz he's only trying to do his best.

[Ankar Desai]

The taxi test used by one company for interviews where the cab driver could have a say on whether you get the job.

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[BBC News Presenter]

a

[Ankar Desai]

BBC Eye investigation has uncovered evidence of life threatening malpractice on the pediatric ward of a Pakistani hospital previously linked to an HIV outbreak. Undercover filming caught staff reusing blood contaminated syringes, placing children at risk of infection with HIV or other blood borne diseases, the BBC's Ghazal Abbasi reports.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

In 2024, eight year old Mohammed Amin was treated at THQ Hospital in Tonsa, Central Pakistan for a fever. Doctors gave him injections and sent him home. Instead of recovering, he grew worse. Muhammad Amin's mum Sugra describes what happened next. My son started feeling pain.

[Ankar Desai]

He developed a very high fever.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Eventually Mohammad Amin was referred to another hospital in the neighboring city of Multan where he was tested. They said, according to his report, your child has hiv.

[Helena Berg]

The infection has attacked.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

He began treatment but it came too late. His eyes closed up. Then at 5pm he passed away. But the family's trauma didn't end there. What's your name?

[Ankar Desai]

Asma Bibi.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Asma Bibi Shortly after Muhammad Amin's death, his older sister Asma developed flu symptoms. She received treatment at THQ Hospital two Months later, she too fell seriously ill. I had her tested.

[Ankar Desai]

The Tonsa hospital staff said, your daughter has HIV.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Asmaa was not alone. Over the winter of 2024 and 2025, a local clinician called Dr. Gull found that dozens of children had contracted HIV.

[BBC News Presenter]

I had the reports for 65 to 70 children that I had diagnosed. The THQ Hospital in Tonsa was the common factor between them, almost all the children had gone there for treatment.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Following doctors raising the alarm and protest from parents, the government intervened. The hospital medical superintendent was dismissed and the authorities reassured parents that the wards were now safe. But months after the crackdown that I heard from a whistleblower from inside the hospital in Tonsa. He told the BBC that nothing had changed.

[BBC News Presenter]

I felt concrete action should be taken. It's my duty to save my people.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Believing children's lives were at stake, he went undercover. The footage recorded over three months shows nurses injecting children through their clothes, passing over dirty syringes for reuse and unqualified volunteers injecting child after child from a contaminated vial of medicine. In March 2025, during the government intervention, Dr. Ghassim Buzdara became the new medical superintendent of THQ Dansa. The BBC showed him the evidence collected in his hospital including the use of unqualified volunteers.

[Ankar Desai]

There are no volunteers in the hospital at this time.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

Then why were they here?

[BBC News Presenter]

Either your footage is staged or it dates back to the time of the

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

hospital boss before me.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

So according to our evidence, the nursing staff take one syringe and draw medicine from a multi dose vial and then administer it to the child through a cannula. Then they take the same syringe back to the multi dose vial. This contaminates the.

[Ankar Desai]

No. Now this practice is not happening at all. We can see injections being given with 10cc syringes. This is old footage.

[Dr. Gull / Hospital Whistleblower]

This is not old footage. The Punjab Local Government which runs the hospital told the BBC there is no evidence to suggest the hospital is the source of an outbreak and said infection control measures are in place. Asma will have HIV for the rest of her life. Medication is keeping her alive. But there is no remedy for the stigma that has blighted this little girl's childhood. Gari Arbid is her uncle.

[BBC News Presenter]

The neighbors and our relatives don't even let their children touch Asma. Then she asks her mother, what is wrong with me? The poor girl says, other children don't play with me. They won't even walk with me.

[Ankar Desai]

You can watch the full documentary BBC Stolen Lives who Gave Our Children HIV. It's on the BBC World Service YouTube channel. A federal judge in the United States has thrown out President Trump's multi billion dollar lawsuit against the publisher of the right leaning Wall Street Journal. The lawsuit centered around the publication by the newspaper of a drawing of a nude female body the newspaper said was done by Mr. Trump as a birthday greeting for the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The President said the drawing was a fake and sued the paper, which is owned by his former friend, Rupert Murdoch. Our correspondent in Washington, Neda Tofik, began by giving us the background to President Trump's lawsuit.

[Neda Tofik]

This was from last summer when the Epstein crisis was really in full steam and President Donald Trump kept saying, the press needs to focus on my accomplishments. This is all a democratic hoax. And you had the Wall Street Journal that Donald Trump back in 2003 had actually contributed to Epstein's 50th birthday book. And it wasn't just the fact that he contributed to the birthday book. It was that he wrote a handwritten note in the shape of a naked woman, signed his name, and in the note there were a few lines such as, you know, may every day be another wonderful secret. And you had not only the president, but all of his advisers saying, that's not even Donald Trump's signature. That is a complete fake. This is all about destroying his reputation. And so Donald Trump said he was going to sue the Wall Street Journal for defamation, insisting that this was all just a fake attempt by the Journal to make him look bad.

[Alice Adderley]

Why did the judge throw out the case?

[Neda Tofik]

Well, for defamation cases in the U.S. you have to show actual malice, right? So you have to prove two things. Not only that it is false, but that the outlet who reported it should have known it was false or did know it was false, or they just acted in complete reckless disregard. And the judge noted in this case, there was no way that President Trump could have proven that in this instance. So the judge said that President Trump could refile a lawsuit, but in this case, there was nowhere close to showing that there was malice towards him.

[Alice Adderley]

And last Netta, any word from Donald Trump?

[Neda Tofik]

In reaction to the judge's decision, President Trump put out a truth social post confirming that he would refile a lawsuit. He's going to take a second crack at this before the deadline of April 27 that was set by the judge. So he has just a limited time to kind of redraw up the lawsuit. And this was a pretty, pretty conclusive decision by this judge. Let's see what happens if the president does in fact, refile the lawsuit.

[Ankar Desai]

Nadia Torfik speaking to Celia Hatton News from Hollywood now More than a thousand actors, directors and filmmakers have signed an open letter voicing their opposition to a proposed merger between Paramount and Warner Brothers Discovery. They warn it could further damage an industry already under pressure, with California alone losing around $4 billion and thousands of job in recent years. Los Angeles correspondent Shama Khalil reports a

[Shama Khalil]

host of a list stars including Kristen Stewart, Glenn Close and Kristen Scott Thomas have signed the letter, which warns that the merger would slash competition at a fragile moment for Hollywood, leading to fewer opportunities for creators, job losses and higher costs for audiences. If the merger is approved, it will cut the number of major US studios to just four, raising fears of deeper cuts across the entertainment industry. The letter calls on California's attorney general and other regulators to step in and block the deal. In February, Paramount Global agreed a deal worth over 80 billion pounds to take over Warner Bros. Discovery that would bring together some of the biggest names in global media, including cbs, CNN and hbo, under one umbrella. There are also concerns about what the deal could do to the US News landscape, with warnings that cnn, which has regularly been criticized by Donald Trump Trump could end up under the control of the Ellison family, who are seen as being close to the White House.

[Ankar Desai]

Shama Khalil reporting. How would you feel if the taxi driver taking you to your prospective job interview could make or break whether you get the role? The boss of the language app Duolingo said the business conducted what it called a taxi test on people applying for senior roles. This involved paying the driver who took them to their interview and to assess their behaviour unbeknownst to them. Helena Berg has the details.

[Helena Berg]

Difficult co workers are a fact of life for many people, but Luis von Ahn, the boss of Duolingo, believes he may have found a way to avoid hiring nasty workers. Mr. Von Ahn told a podcast called the Burnouts that Duolingo paid drivers taking candidates to interviews to give feedback about the way they were treated by them. The logic is that if a person is mean to their driver, then they're probably going to be mean to the people they work with. Mr. Von Ahn told the podcast that Duolingo had followed through on this.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

There was a one hire that we were going to make.

[Ankar Desai]

We had been looking for a chief

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

financial officer for like a year and there was this one person that we

[Ankar Desai]

all really liked, had a really strong

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

resume and then it turned out that they were pretty mean to their driver from the airport to the to the

[Ankar Desai]

office and that made Us not.

[Professor Massimo Fagioli]

Not hire them.

[Helena Berg]

The BBC asked taxi drivers in London what they thought of the idea.

[BBC News Presenter]

You get chatting with him, it's quite a long journey. You can people open up to you

[Ankar Desai]

because they're not likely to ever see

[BBC News Presenter]

you again, so they can give you little details of what's going on and stuff? Yeah.

[Alice Adderley]

So you think it's quite a good idea?

[Ankar Desai]

Yeah. Why not particularly, I guess, if they're paying you to give the judgment.

[BBC News Presenter]

Yeah. Yeah. Even better. Well, I tend to think that you see the best and the worst of people in dealing with the public, especially. Especially as a cab driver. You do see the best of the worst. And some people can be more than generous and other people the opposite in an interview. You're being your best, aren't you? They don't always treat everybody else the same, do they? Always got to be good to your cab driver because he's only trying to do his best.

[Helena Berg]

Not everyone is in favour of introducing the taxi test. At other companies, the practice raises questions about fairness and transparency. Kate Bennett, who is the CEO of a human resources service for businesses, says it could potentially be discriminatory.

[Alice Adderley]

For example, if I'm neurodivergent and part of my condition being neurodiverse is that I might not pick up on social cues and that natural conversation, and I don't know that that's part of the interview process. That could be deemed as discrimination based on my neurodivergence, if that was a disability. But also whether it's the cabbie or the receptionist, it's their personal judgment, it might be how they feel about, you know, how that person is on the day. Are they really making objective, unbiased opinion?

[Helena Berg]

For now, Duolingo says it's dropped the taxi test because now that it's public knowledge, applicants are savvy to the consequences of being mean to their driver.

[Ankar Desai]

Helena Burke. And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can email us@global podcastbc.co.uk and you can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag globalnewspod. And don't forget our sister podcast, the Global Story, which goes in depth and beyond the headlines on one big story. This edition of the Global News podcast was mixed by Pat Sissons and the producer was Alice Adley. The editor is Karen Martin and I'm uncle this time. Until next time, goodbye. With VRBoCare, help is always ready before, during and after your stay. We've planned for the plot twists, so support is always available. Because a great trip starts with peace of mind.