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Craft matters in small ways, like how a coffee is brewed, and in not so small ways, like how your money is cared for. Which is why for 160 years, UBS has elevated banking to a craft, tailoring unique strategies that combine human expertise with the latest technologies, all happening across 24 time zones and and 12 key financial hubs. With you at the heart of it all, UBS advice is our craft. You're listening to the Globalist, first broadcast on 2 March 2026 on Monocle Radio. The Globalist in association with U. Hello, this is the Globalist broadcasting to you live from Midori House in London. I'm Georgina Godwin.
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On the show ahead, combat operations continue
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at this time in full force and
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they will continue until all of our objectives are achieved.
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That's obviously Donald Trump will join our Gulf correspondent, Inzamin Rashid to catch up with the rolling news from the Middle East. And we'll have analysis as Israel and US Strikes kill Iran's supreme leader and the region braces for further retaliation. We'll examine the economic fallout, the international response and the nuclear stakes. We'll also hear how Emmanuel Macron is moving to put France's nuclear deterrent at the heart of Europe's security debate. And we'll see how the weekend's events are being covered in the global media, assess the fallout for worldwide travel, and bring you the latest from the realms of television and film. That's all ahead here on the Globalist, live from London. The Middle east is bracing for a dangerous escalation after US And Israeli strikes inside Iran killed the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Tehran insists the system is intact, but retaliatory attacks are spreading across the region, including Lebanon now, and the risk of a wider war is growing by the hour. Well, I'm joined on the line by Inzamin Rashid, who's Monocle's Gulf correspondent. He's in Abu Dhabi. And by Julie Norman, who's Associate professor of Politics and International Relations at ucl. Hello to you both. Thanks so much for joining us. Insi, could you bring us up to speed with what's been happening this weekend and overnight?
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Well, look, we thought it was a bit of a quieter night overnight here in the UAE and the wider Gulf, because Iran's retaliation wasn't as severe as what we seen over the weekend. They've targeted much of the Gulf, in fact, all of the GCC countries, firing missiles and drones into each of the GCC country, hundreds of them as well, some of Them managing to get through, many of them intercepted by defense missile systems. But we thought that maybe there was a bit of a turning point overnight, that it would stop attacking the Gulf countries. But that has changed once again this morning, as of a couple of hours ago, we've had alerts on our phones. We've heard loud bangs in the skies across Dubai, across Abu Dhabi, Kuwait as well. The US Embassy there has been targeted. A US fighter jet was shot down in Kuwait as well. So look across the Gulf very much. This war continues. Iran isn't letting up. Neither is the United States and Israel with their attacks inside Tehran. And I think following the announcement of the death of the Supreme Leader Khamenei, Iran's backs are against the wall and they are fighting with all their might. And showing that across the Gulf and also beyond the Gulf. We know there was a target towards the airbase in Cyprus, the British Air base, Cyprus, essentially warning shots towards them, reminding them not to get involved. We know they've targeted ports here as well. The Zayed port in Abu Dhabi, where there are French naval vessels, they targeted that yesterday. Huge explosions around there. And then just from where I'm looking, sat on my balcony looking straight ahead, the Jebel Ali port, where there is a huge US Navy fleet currently laying in wait to be deployed if they, if needs be. That was targeted heavily late on Saturday night. So there has been a lot of action across the Gulf in terms of missiles, in terms of drones, and now I think patience is wearing thin. The GCC Council met last night. The foreign ministers of all the GCC Gulf nations met last night. They put out a statement essentially saying that they completely refute the Iranian attacks and they reject the unjustified attacks by Iran and that their states have the right to respond. That may even be militarily. It's my understanding that Saudi Arabia are looking at options to respond directly. If that is the case, then this war, which started in the early hours of Saturday by Israel and by the US firing missiles and tomahawks into Iran, killing the Supreme Leader, this war could really branch out to something that the Gulf doesn't want, doesn't need. But also it very much could have this huge, wide impact that people here in the Gulf are desperately not wanting.
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Well, let's talk about those people, because from where you sit on your balcony, what is the mood? What is the feeling there? What are your friends saying? Are people wanting to leave? Of course they can't. The airspace is closed. But what is the general sentiment in the Gulf, Georgina?
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Look, it takes A lot to cancel an iftar during Ramadan. The breaking of the fast and those cancellations have been coming thick and fast. You know, government held iftars, usually you've got kind of corporate iftars happening throughout the week. They're all completely being cancelled. I think there is a real sense of worry in a, in a country, in a, in a region as well. The Gulf region usually feels quite safe, secure, quite reliable. When you think of the likes of Bahrain or Doha and, and Kuwait as well, Riyadh, even here in the uae, it feels usually quite safe, reliable. People move here with their families, with young children because they, they want the safety, because they want the better lifestyle. They want to be able to go to the beach club, enjoy themselves. That has been punctuated deeply and punctured over the last few days because of what is essentially a war now in these countries. And this is a, you know, a city, particularly here in Dubai, is a city which just isn't used to the sound of war. It's not used to the sound of the thuds of missiles and the interceptions. It's not used to seeing debris falling from the sky and crashing onto the ground and causing huge explosions. But, and you've got to remember as well, you know, Iran isn't just targeting US Military assets, as that's what we thought that they would just be doing, but they've also been attacking civilian infrastructure like the airports, the airport in Abu Dhabi, the airport here in Dubai. They've also been targeting hotels as well. We saw a huge explosion at the Fairmont Hotel on the Palm Jumeirah, where many tourists were many people, where there was a drone that actually landed at the front of that hotel causing a massive explosion, causing, causing neighbors of the Fairmont Hotel windows completely shattered, a huge blaze as well. And so that's the worry for people, is that, well, you know, if it was the US bases, which are pretty far from residential areas, then, okay, that's one thing. And you know, they've got the military assets there to defend themselves and launch the kind of interceptors and everything. But if it's actually happening over the city and where everyday people, working people are living, working and just trying to get on with daily lives, then I think that's where the worry is for the UAE government, for the people that live here, and for the many tourists that flock to this country.
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Julie, if I could bring you in now. I wonder how the killing of the Supreme Leader changes things and if regime change is now in play. And was that always the objective?
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Well, Georgina, I Think it's impossible to not see that at this point. I think Trump definitely alluded to that in his initial comments. Certainly Netanyahu did as well. And if we look at some of the comments leading up to the actions that we've seen taken, some of it was focused on the nuclear, but much was broader about criticism of the regime more broadly. So I don't think we should be surprised that this is a part of the goal right now. And we saw that quite clear quite clearly with the killing of the Supreme Leader pretty much on day one. I think from here, it's clear that the regime as we know it is not going to be be intact. That's not to say the regime will fall. It still is intact. Right now. There is a sort of a transitional committee that is leading things now. The Supreme Leader put plans in place for this exact scenario if he were to be killed. So the regime is still intact, but it will be extremely, extremely different, extremely weaken, and the country would just be at a very different point if they come through this still intact. There will be so much to deal with internally, with domestic unrest, with a completely upended economy, even from where it was, a completely different set of relationships with its neighbors, as we've just heard from insomnia. So even if the regime can hang on here, it's going to look very different after this war.
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And how close are we, Julie, to this becoming a much wider war?
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You know, I think we've just heard that from Zimmet already is broadening out very rapidly. Over the night, we saw Lebanon targeted by Israel, Israel targeted by Hezbollah. So that's a front that I think we expected would open fairly quickly, and that seems to be happening there. I think the extent of the, the strikes in the Gulf change this conflict very quickly as well. The fact that, again, it's civilian infrastructure, airports that hit, as well as just military bases, this means this is not, this is not just a couple, you know, airstrikes that, that will be done in a day or two. And I would say we still don't exactly know what Trump's endgame is here. I mean, they seem to be hoping for some sort of Iranian surrender or sort of a running out of munitions. But, you know, Iran knows that, and they're trying to, to play this from their point of view as well. They're not launching everything at once. They're keeping some missiles in reserve. They know they want to be retaliate and to have some sense of threat in this moving forward. But at the same time, you have two Very powerful militaries, the US and Israel, that will keep the pressure on them until, until there's some kind of movement again. We're not sure exactly what would be satisfying, I think, to Trump to end this.
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Julie, thank you very much indeed. That's Julie Norman, Associate professor of Politics and International Relations at ucl. We also heard from Monocle's Gulf correspondent, Insamin Rashid, and of course, INSI is in the region. He will be keeping an eye this for us across the day and of course, the coming days, too. This is the Globalist. It is 7:12 here in London, 9:12 in Tel Aviv. As this conflict escalates, attention is now turning to two things that could reshape it entirely. The economic fallout and the state of Iran's nuclear program. So I'm joined now by Alexis Self, who's Monocle's foreign editor, and by Dr. Marion Messer, who's a senior research fellow in International Security at Chatham House. Lex, many thanks for coming in. What are the markets and major businesses most worried about at the moment? And we've seen the suspension of the stock market in Abu Dhabi. Tell us more.
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Yeah, I think at the moment and this morning when markets opened, oil jumped massively. It's trading a bit down on. I think it was 15%. Peaked this morning as London opened. That was down at 7%. I think everyone's looking at the Strait of Hormuz, you know, this pinch point at the mouth of the Gulf through which around a fifth of the world's oil and gas flows. Now it's slowed down to a real trickle over the weekend. If it ceases to be a passageway for that energy, then, yeah, I think we're going to see a big jump again and the repercussions of that on politics in Europe, but around the world as well.
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And I mean, what does this do to confidence in the Gulf as a stable place to invest and to operate?
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Yeah, I think that. Well, it damages it. You know, the Gulf has sold itself as a place for, for affluent people to base themselves and base their money, for people to holiday, especially at this time of year. And air travel has again come to a bit of a standstill in the Gulf, affecting thousands of flights and hundreds of thousands of people. And perhaps Iran's game is trying to force the Gulf to realize the consequences of, of this conflict ongoing on its status and on the way it's perceived, particularly by people in the Western world, so damaging at the moment. But again, I think that Iran is particularly. It knows that it can't really endure a full on conflict with its Gulf neighbors. So it's just trying to pressure them to then put pressure on the US and I guess Israel to let's just
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have a quick look at international actors and partners. Britain was very quick to stress that it wasn't involved. It's now allowing the use of air bases. We've also got Mark Carney who was arguing that, you know, middle power should take a stand, but he's backing the strikes. What do we feel about the international response here?
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I suppose quite surprising in that all of the noise and the rhetoric of the past few weeks and months has been on Canada and Europe beginning to move away and become more critical of U.S. foreign policy and particularly Trump's more aggressive posturing. This was the first test, at least of Mark Carney's new world order as he articulated it at Davos so effectively and to much praise. And the result was full throated support for the US and its aim to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. He criticized the Iranian regime's influence in the region and across the world, and particularly the reaction to the protests in Iran and Iran's human rights record. Then the European states, led by the E3, which is this group of the continent's biggest military powers, the uk, France and Germany. Again, their response initially was not exactly to equivocate, but not to either go in full throatedly behind the US and Israel or to criticise them for what they were doing since then and since the attacks began, the UK has now agreed to US requests to allow it to use British military bases in the region. And a few hours after that, one of these bases in Cyprus was the subject of drone attacks. So whether that will change over today and whether more European countries will pledge their support, at least in that kind of support capacity, not actively putting their troops or arms into the battle, I suppose, remains to be seen today.
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Marion, if I could bring you in now, do we know where Iran's nuclear sites stand after these strikes?
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Well, I mean, we never really knew to what extent Iran's nuclear sites were able to recover from the June 2025 attacks, where they were much more explicitly targeted than in this, its latest round of attacks, and where they were damaged to a big extent. So what we know is that there is likely still Iran's stockpile of highly enriched uranium that the international community lost sight over after the attacks last June. Iran claimed that they were buried under the rubble, but there were also rumors that maybe Iran had been able to divert them before the aerial attacks started last summer. And While there were nuclear negotiations ongoing that actually were, you know, despite President Trump's claims that they weren't, that Iran wasn't making sufficient concessions, they were actually going relatively well until the US decided to launch this latest round of attacks. So for that reason, there's not much that we can say about the state of Iran's nuclear program at this point.
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I mean, how credible are the claims that indeed have been made by the US that Iran was days away from bomb grade material?
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Well, so we do, we do know that Iran had a stockpile of highly enriched uranium that could have been enriched to be ready to be used in nuclear warheads relatively quickly. But a nuclear weapons program is of course, more than just highly enriched uranium. It also requires a assembled warhead and it also requires the means of delivery. So we know, of course that Iran has a solid missile production facility, but where some of the warhead assembly was at that, that point was never clear. So it seemed, it seemed to me that Iran was still very much hedging, of course, inching closer to actually having a fully fledged nuclear weapon. But just because you have all the parts to assemble a nuclear weapon doesn't mean that you actually have a usable nuclear weapons program that could then also serve as a deterrent. If we think about, for example, the North Korean case, it took North Korea quite a long time after the first test explosion to then get to a point where North Korea actually assembled anything that would come close to an established nuclear weapons program.
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Marion, thank you very much indeed. That's Dr. Marion Messmer there, senior Research Fellow in International Security at Chatham House, and also Alexis Self, Monocle's Foreign editor, who's bracing himself for extremely busy day, week and possibly months ahead. This is the Globalist. It is 9:20 in Tel Aviv, that's 7:20 here in London. Well, the escalation with Iran has dragged nuclear risk back to the centre of global politics. And in Europe, it's sharpened an already uncomfortable question about who ultimately guarantees that the continent's security. Well, later today, French President Emmanuel Macron is expected to outline how France's nuclear deterrent could play a wider role in protecting Europe. So still with me is Dr. Marian Messmer, senior Research Fellow in International Security at Chatham House. We're also joined from Paris by Florence Biederman, who is a journalist and political analyst. Marian, how much has the Iran crisis accelerated Europe's thinking on nuclear deterrence?
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Well, I think this is something that has been long in the making and of course, concerns about Iran's missile program and the potential for Iran to develop nuclear weapons has been a European concern for a really long time. You can go back as far as the early 2010s to see how that has shaped strategic choices and also actually has shaped tensions with Russia because NATO was investing quite heavily in missile defense systems, essentially being concerned about threats from Iran. But Russia always took that as concerns about Russia's capabilities. So that's something that's been with us for a long, long time. And I think something that we can expect to see from President Macron is that he's likely to give a nod to the crisis in Iran. But I don't think that he will want to be seen to be reacting exactly to that because France, of course, has a long policy of being very measured and very cool headed when it comes to their nuclear deterrence posture.
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So Florence, I'm wondering how, why Macron has chosen this moment to push the issue politically and exactly what it is that he is offering.
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Well, we will know that in a few hours. The moment has, I think, nothing to do with Iran right now because this talk was planned well before what's happening and the main concern, I said the main, most pressing concern for European security now is rather the Russian threat and the fact that the link and the relationship with the US and the transatlantic link has been, let's say, a bit deteriorated or damaged since Donald Trump came to power. You remember what J.D. vance took in Munich at this security conference said about Europeans like they should take their own defense in their own hands. I mean this is what Trump has been insisting on. So I think it's of course the threat of Russia after it invaded Ukraine and the changes and I would say the deterioration in the link with the US So now the EU and the European country started this strategic thinking like how can we protect ourselves not depending of the American nuclear umbrella. But of course you cannot think that the French nuclear umbrella could replace it. But how could it give a certain amount of self confidence or to give more guarantees to the other EU countries that France can play a role? How exactly? Like this is what he's supposed to explain today later in the day.
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And Marianne, as Florence is saying, if those U.S. security guarantees, just how meaningful would France's deterrent be?
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It would be extremely meaningful. I mean the, the uk, the other nuclear power in Europe, has always given its nuclear weapons to NATO as well as part of the NATO extended deterrence guarantees. But France, while a NATO member, has always said that its nuclear weapons are for national means primarily. And so, so this has been part of what European countries trying to work out over the last years as. As there has been a concern that US support for NATO might be weakening, which is, how can we use the combined nuclear powers of France and the UK to strengthen nuclear deterrence in Europe, and what will this mean with all of the conventional investments that European states are making? And so I think it will be really interesting to see what the French answer to that is, because what we've been hearing over the last few years is states statements that have essentially ranged from, of course, a threat to Europe as a threat to France and similar lines like that, which is of course credible to an extent, but it is very different to what French posture has been for a while. And so I think Europeans are looking for much more concrete measures that France thinks it can undertake to essentially showcase that its nuclear deterrence posture also includes
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other European countries and Florence with elections looming. Is this about domestic politics? And is Macron also trying to lock in a strategy that a successor would struggle to undo?
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Well, yes, there is this aspect like he still has like another year and some months to stay in power. I would say there is also an aspect like this kind of question of nuclear strategy is bigger than one man or one political party. There is kind of constant line since it was defined by General de Gaulle after Second World War, like the fact that there is the strategic autonomy of France. Those principles probably will stay. But there is still a question mark because the presidential election are coming soon and there is the prospect that maybe the far right party raison Blame national would win. They had so far a different view on defense. Like they said they wanted, for example, to withdraw from NATO integrated military command, but they are also mellowing and mellowing their son and changing. So, you know, it's not quite clear what their position would be, but certainly on Macron's part, yes, I guess he's defining the principle as every French president has done when he came to power, like he has to define the. So, yeah, it could be changed maybe in the next election.
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Florence, thank you very much indeed. That's Florence Biederman there, who is a journalist, a political analyst, speaking to us from Paris. And we also heard from Dr. Marion Messmer, senior Research Fellow in International Security at Chatham House. Now, still to come on the program,
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towards the end, Khamenei found himself in the impossible position of being a stubborn old man ruling an impatient young people.
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We'll hear more about the man at the centre of this crisis. This is the globalist craft, is a matter of perspective, a unique outlook, an obsessive attention to detail. With UBS's Chief Investment Office House View, we're focused on identifying the latest investment opportunities and market risks to help you achieve your financial goals. So you get the big picture broken down into thought provoking insights. Delivered daily and curated by over 200 globally connected, locally active analysts. UBS banking is our craft. This is the Globalist on Monocle Radio with me, Georgina Godwin. And joining me in the studio now is Steve Krawshaw, author, journalist and formerly Human Rights Watch UK director. Steve, you're here to have a look through the papers and particularly how these events we've been discussing are being covered around the world. I'd really like to start off with what's going on inside Iran because it's had very little coverage in terms of the reaction of people there. And what we have seen has been contradictory. I've seen footage of people celebrating, but also, also of people in deep mourning.
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Yeah, it's, it's kind of, it's, it's odd, as you say. So there's all of the reasons to be worried about what Trump is doing, who doesn't really think through anything at all. So all of that we can not exactly park, but that's very much in the forefront and there's so much discussion of that. But as you say, it's kind of odd that how people are reacting inside Iran has become almost invisible. Or alternatively, because they can get more easily better quality pictures of the official demonstrations those are shown. So I'm looking at. Daily Telegraph has a huge double page of someone in mourning. The Guardian has used similar pictures and quite little about the incredible celebrations from people who of course want this guy to be gone. And unsurprisingly, and yes, they are aware of all of the difficulties. The New York Times is one that has a standalone story of jubilance in the streets over Autocrat's death. And the illustrations they've used are some screen grabs from videos, lots on social media media, but very interestingly, that people somehow are parking what ordinary Iranians are thinking, which to be honest, is what politicians have done, politicians of all stripes have done over many years. They've always been interested in nuclear. They've never really been interested in what ordinary Iranians think.
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Absolutely. And I mean the Ayatollah's death. This comes after nearly 40 years of authoritarian rule. It's an historic shift fit for Iran's theocratic regime. And are we seeing enough about that?
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I don't know. I hesitate to say it's wrong to be looking at all of the doomsday scenarios, which are quite rightly there. But I do think that that sense of, well, maybe this could mean this in terms of opening up, I think is certainly it's going to be a huge shift, whether it leads us to yet more darkness, which, of course, is a pattern that we've seen before, Whether that was Iraq or Libya or elsewhere, that's certainly a possibility. But for the moment, it is striking, the celebrations that we're having of Dancing with neighbors, Lots of extraordinary things. An interesting piece by Anne Applebaum in the Atlantic where she talks about the lack of planning that's been going on in the US Administration and that kind of obsession. Trump got rid of the broadcasting, the Farsi person language broadcasting into the state, into Iran last year, then had to partly reinstate, but they've never been interested in that. And I think that sense of how everything is going to change is clearly huge. And it's not just to be seen from the perspective of nuclear. And what can happen, though, that's important as well.
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I mean, without that Farsi service, that's just contributing to the fact that there doesn't seem to be any kind of organized resistance. Yes, we're talking about the son of the Shah, which may or may not happen, but there is no obvious leader on the ground.
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H
That's exactly right. So unlike, for example, in Eastern Europe, as things collapsed, you had civil soc. Well, civil society is very strong, actually, in Iran. So. So that's the plus is there are lots and lots of people. So I was there.
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And you've been.
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Yeah.
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In, in your human rights role.
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One of the most, actually, not in my human rights role. I went on a tourist visa. I don't think on my human rights role, I would have got the visa. But they must have known who I was. They, you know, but nonetheless. And I was there with a friend who is a journalist from Channel 4. So they knew perfectly well who we were, but nonetheless, they gave us the visas and we were able to travel and above all, able to talk to people. And even when people weren't saying things directly, the message that came through from every conversation and the body language was like, we really need this change. I. I almost never, although I've traveled a lot in different authoritarian regimes, I've almost never been in a place where both the repression was so strong and at the same time, the desire for other change. So I think that's so important to bear in mind and quite bizarre that Trump's administration didn't see the importance of the soft power of American broadcasting going in for people to actually know what's going on, to have a reliable sense of what is fact and not fact, which obviously is so problematic today.
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Well, talking about fact and not fact, let's talk about conspiracy theories because the Economist is. Well, it's got a very good piece on there about how conspiracy theories are better than apathy.
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H
I love it. The Economist is great. The Economist is great for just like I don't understand what's going on somewhere and they'll do a two or three page and they'll explain it.
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Great.
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H
But it also has very. So the Badgert column, which is the main UK politics column in the Economist has a column this week called the Paranoid Style in British Politics, which when I looked at it I hadn't realized actually when I was looking it up there was a similar one called the paranoid style in US politics, clearly matching this 20 years ago. But as you say, it kind of looking at says the first golden age came in the 70s, but we are now living through a new golden age of paranoia. And it then goes through the various bits of everyone having their own conspiracy theory, both on the right and the left, that somehow, as it put it, paranoia permeates Britain's elites, always finding some other reason why things have gone wrong. And it quotes an important essay on paranoia from, from years ago where it said to be paranoid is to be a member of the avant garde capable of perceiving conspiracy before it is obvious to us and yet unaroused public. So that was said a bit sarcastically of why like you know, things nobody else quite knows. But as the Economist points out, what we've seen, which I've been reflecting also many of us probably have been reflecting. The Epstein emails remind us that actually sometimes it really is as bad as you think. It's incredible reading those emails, how interlocked things were and the kind of things that conspiracy theorists were asking happened in some ways to be true. As the old phrase has it, it just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you. Which was a kind of funny joke as a line but there's elements and so as you say, the Economist argument that he makes, it's being, it's being wry and provocative but basically it says, well at least paranoia, the opposite of paranoia is not cool headed analysis but apathy. And anyone who thinks Russia's behind all Russia, Britain's ill is deranged. Anyone who thinks it's behind none of them is a fool. So it's that sense of be alert to things, but don't go down them rabbit holes completely.
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And very difficult to do at this very difficult time.
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H
I do think I, I quite like that sense of, and there are a couple of my own, like, oh, yeah, actually I did go down that rabbit hole. Because you grasp instinctively for that natural comfort that it's somebody else's fault when actually it may be bigger things than that.
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Absolutely. Steve, thank you very much indeed. That's Steve Crawshaw there. Author, journalist and formerly Human Rights Watch UK direct director. This is the Globalist on Monocle Radio. Now here's what else we're keeping an eye on today. Clashes between Afghanistan and Pakistan have intensified after Kabul said it fired on Pakistani aircraft over the capital following airstrikes and border fighting. The escalation has fueled fears of a wider conflict, drawing calls for restraint from regional powers and the United Nations. Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney is meeting Indian PM Narendra Modi in India today in talks billed as a reset after relations soured in 2023. The discussions focus on trade, energy, critical minerals and people to people ties as Canada looks to rebalance its global partnerships amid tariff pressures from the United States. And the United Kingdom has launched a consultation on a potential blanket ban on social Media for under 16s. With gaming platforms and AI chatbots also in scope, the move could clear the way for an Australia style restriction later this year, putting child safety back at the center of the culture wars. This is the Globalist. Stay tuned. The conflict in the Middle east is now disrupting one of the world's most important aviation corridors, grounding flights, closing airspace and sending shock waves through global travel. Well, I'm joined now in the studio by Ash Bhardwaj, who's a travel journalist and a filmmaker. Ash, what exactly happens to global aviation now with the Gulf airspace closed down?
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I
Well, it's the biggest disruption to global air travel since the Icelandic volcano eruption. Do you remember that back in 2010, I think it was. And it shut down airspace for days. And you have this real problem for what's happening in the Middle east because so many of those hubs there are really important international hubs. If you're flying to Australia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, a lot of the flights are routed to there with airlines like Etihad or Emirates. So the first thing that happens is the people that were supposed to be on those flights can't get on them because those flights have been canceled. The people in those places are stuck there because they can't get out. And airlines are going to have to find alternatives to get around that region. But of course, crew, aircraft, they're all dislocated. So from a logistics and planning perspective, it's a real nightmare for the airline industry.
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A
Why is Dubai so to critical?
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I
So Dubai has, through the airlines that fly through there, it has become this amazing international transport hub. 250, 250,000 people, a quarter of a million people transfer through Dubai every single day. So if you, you know, if I'm going to visit my sister in Australia, I might well take a flight that goes via Dubai. And that means that it's not just affecting flights in and around Europe or the Middle east or North Africa. It is affecting these really big flights that people are doing across the whole world. So if you're now trying to get from Australia to the UK for example, you would have to go via Hong Kong, Singapore or the United States. And of course, Russian airspace is closed to a lot of Western airlines now as well. Chinese airlines cancel flight through Russian airspace. You have airspace closing for a couple of different reasons. One is political sanctions. That's what's happening with the closed airspace in Russia. And then security and safety. If you've got missiles, air defense flying around in a region, you do not want planes going through it.
- [40:16]
A
No. And I wonder how quickly costs mount up for airlines when flights are rerouted or grounded.
- [40:22]
I
So it depends where the airline is from, what the cost, immediate cost is to them. So if you're a European or a British airline, so if you're flying with a European or British airline or a place or an airline that is starting or finishing its flight in Europe, then the airline is obliged to get you on the next available will flight to your destination. Now let's use that example of flying from Thailand back to Paris as an example. If your flight would have been going via Dubai, if it is Air France or Lufthansa or klm, one of those European carriers, they are now trying to find a way to either use another airline to fly you via the United States, or you could do something really long like going down to South Africa and coming up again. That's what the airlines are going to be trying to do at the moment.
- [41:06]
A
Quite extraordinary. I mean, the region's whole economy runs on connectivity, tourism, trade, finance, logistics. How quickly can it recover? I mean, even assuming all of this stops tomorrow, which I don't think it
- [41:19]
I
will, we've got the Americans have said that they might be continuing this activity for another four weeks. Then there's the question of what is Iran going to do with its counter Strikes. So this could go on a long time. But the industry has shown itself to be able to recover much quicker than we anticipated. But both after the Icelandic volcanic ash cloud and after Covid, it's pretty well incentivized to sort itself out as quick as it can. But there's going to be this huge backlog of flights. So particularly people who are stuck in those countries where the airspace is currently closed, if someone's booked on a flight in a month's time, they will have that seat. So if you're stuck in Dubai Travel trying to book a flight and the next flight out isn't until six weeks time, if people have already got that space on that flight booked, you're going to be fighting for the spare spaces. So that's going to cause a problem. And people are doing quite, quite extensive things to avoid this. So people are driving from Dubai down to Riyadh because Riyadh airspace is still open. Virgin Atlantic did cancel their flight today to Riyadh, but other than that, you can fly in and out there. So that's the kind of thing that's going to be happening now to relieve that initial pressure. And flights always have spare spaces. So as quickly as they can, they're going to be filtering that out. I imagine people are going to be cancelling flights anyway. The Foreign Office in the uk, for example, changed its travel advice. So in that instance, you can get a cancellation without having you get all your money back.
- [42:46]
A
And they're saying do not. Anything but essential travel is strongly advised
- [42:51]
I
against, advised against all but essential travel. And what that means is that a whole load of protections for tourists kick in. Going to Thailand, for example, and your flight routes via Dubai and you've booked it as a package holiday because you now can't fly to Dubai and you can't transfer in Dubai, you cannot complete that package holiday. You can cancel that package holiday and get all of your money back. So there's a whole host of things starting to come into play that will prevent additional pressure going onto that system. They're not loading more people into Dubai.
- [43:20]
A
So what should passengers, particularly those in transit or about to travel, expect over the coming, coming days?
- [43:26]
I
I would anticipate not being able to travel is the first thing you should consider is going to happen. And contact your airline, because I mentioned some of the protections exist for European airlines. Other airlines and other nations have similar rules. And then you can ask them what they can do. Can they find an alternative route for you? That is the first thing you should be asking to do. Can you get home via a safe route. And if you're stuck in one of those destinations, let's say you're in the Maldives, wanting to come back at the end of a holiday. Under the UK package travel regulations, similar protections in Europe, they have to put you up for three days and then if your flight is cancelled under those same protections, the airline is obliged to put you in accommodation until you can get a flight home.
- [44:09]
A
God, wouldn't it be nice to be stuck in the Maldives right now?
- [44:12]
I
I mean, if you're going to be stuck anywhere, the Maldives is not a bad place to be stuck. Indeed. Thailand as well would be lovely.
- [44:18]
A
Yeah. And I'm just going to ask you for a crystal ball moment here. Can I go to Abu Dhabi Book Fair next month?
- [44:22]
I
Well, I'm supposed to be going to Dubai for the Arabian travel market as well. That's in May. I would hope that the Dubai Book Fair can go ahead. It's a great event. But let's, let's see. I think it depends on. On a certain man in Washington about what happens next.
- [44:39]
A
Ash. Thank you. That's Ash Bhadwaj, who's a travel journalist and a filmmaker. And this is the globalist on Monocle. Radio, iq, EQ and AI. Three components key to the craft of innovation at ubs. Because to stay ahead in a rapidly evolving age, you need a partner with decades of experience, endless passion for the work and a finger on the pulse of leading technologies. Bridging human expertise with artificial intelligence. All to elevate you. UBS banking is our crush. Now, just who was Iran's supreme leader? Ali Khamenei. Here's Monocle's Andrew Muller. Do you still say, Imam, that if the Shah, the ex Shah, is not returned to Iran, that those American hostages
- [45:41]
G
in the American embassy compound will.
- [45:44]
A
Will not be freed?
- [45:47]
E
In the name of God, the most merciful and gracious.
- [45:52]
H
This issue has to do with the people.
- [45:56]
G
The Islamic Republic of Iran, founded in 1979, is generally held to have been created in the image of its inaugural supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khamenei, a fundamentalist fire breather who encouraged his acolytes to hold resident embassy staff as hostages, offered to underwrite a hit on a foreign novelist for making up a story, and ordered hundreds of thousands of his country's young citizens to pointless martyrdom in frontal assaults against Iran's volatile neighbour, Iraq. It is arguable, however, that the crucial figure in the history of the current Iran, modern seems the wrong word, was actually Khomeini's. Successor, the cooler cleverer Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, under whom the anachronistic theocracy not only survived but flourished at least for for a while in the field of power politics, taking advantage of chaos, unusual even by the standards of the Middle east, to assert itself as the dominant regional power. Ali Khamenei was born in Mashhad on July 17, 1939. He was set on his path early, enrolled in Islamic schools from the age of four by his father, also a religious scholar. Scholar. By his early 20s, Khamenei was studying in the Islamic seminary at Qom, one of the most prestigious and one of the least compromising centres of learning for Shia clergy. Among Khamenei's teachers was a charismatic agitator with firm views regarding Iran's then leader, the repressive and preposterous American backed Shah of Iran. The name of Khamenei's early and lifelong men mentor was Ruhollah Khomeini. Ayatollah Khomeini, you have told the people
- [47:45]
A
of Iran that they should use, starting
- [47:48]
H
tomorrow, any possible means to overthrow the
- [47:52]
A
regime of the Shah.
- [47:54]
H
What does any possible means mean?
- [48:14]
G
Strikes, demonstrations, all sorts of the political activities. When the Shah wearied off Khomeini's fulminating and drove the turbulent priest into exile in 1963, Khamenei remained in Iran and paid a price for his enduring loyalty to the older king cleric. He was arrested and tortured on several occasions, spent three years in prison and another three in internal exile. When Khomeini returned to Iran to lead his revolution in 1979, Khamenei had the connections and the credibility for an unquestioned welcome into the inner circle. This was however, no guarantee of safety. An assassination attempt in June 1981, attributed to the eccentric militant organization organization Mojahedeen Iqalq cost him the use of his right arm.
- [49:07]
C
One should shed tears of blood for
- [49:09]
G
an Islamic society that would even consider
- [49:11]
C
someone like me to be its leader. There are serious technical issues with this decision.
- [49:21]
G
Khamenei was elected president four months later while still recuperating. He was at least luckier than his predecessor, Mohammed Ali Rajai, who'd been killed in another bombing by culprits still disputed along with Prime Minister Mohammad Javed Bohanna. When Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989, leaving no formal structure of succession, Khamenei was an acceptable compromise choice. As the Islamic Republic's second supreme leader. Khamenei's most impressive accomplishment may have been preserving his role as long as he did. Pro democracy protests in 2003 and 2009, some of them bloodily suppressed, did not untowardly wobble him, and nor did the regional upheaval of the Arab Spring from 2011 onwards. Indeed, Iran gleefully seized the opportunity presented by the latter tumult, becoming a significant, if not the significant, power broker in four Arab capitals Beirut, Sana', A, Damascus and Baghdad.
- [50:25]
A
Death to the dictator, they chanted in Tehran, a direct reference to Iran's supreme leader, who today blamed foreign enemies for the protests. The government spokesman later named Britain, the US and Saudi Arabia.
- [50:43]
E
The enemy is waiting for an opportunity
- [50:45]
G
for a crack through which it can infiltrate domestically. However, it was difficult to acclaim Khamenei's rule much of a success. Iran was economically hobbled by bureaucracy and corruption and by sanctions imposed to thwart the country country's ambiguous nuclear ambitions. Iran, always a potential powerhouse, stayed needlessly poor. Khamenei's unbending interpretation of Islam saw Iran remain a country in which, well into the 21st century, gay men were hanged from cranes for being gay men and women could be assaulted by employees of the state for failing to adhere to address code. Nevertheless, Khamenei's forbidding visage continued to glower, apparently inextinguishably from posters overhanging Iran's public spaces. Despite various further setbacks. In 2020, the architect of Iran's regional machinations, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps General Qasem Soleimani, was killed, killed by an American drone strike. Other IRGC officers and Iranian nuclear scientists met picturesque demises, either overtly or covertly at the hands of Israel. There were further mass protests against Khamenei's rule in 2022, occasioned by the death of a young Kurdish woman named Mahsa Amini in the custody of the goons that Khamenei's governments paid to punish. Immodest flashes of female hair. It began to unravel for Khamenei. On October 7, 2023, the Palestinian militant group Hamas, long supported by Iran, broke from the confines of the Gaza Strip and committed a horrifying pogrom.
- [52:35]
F
More than 700 Israelis are now feared dead after unprecedented attacks by Hamas militants.
- [52:43]
G
Israel's response was not confined to garbage Gaza or to Hamas. Israel hit Iran's clients Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen and Syria, where Iran had propped up President Bashar al Assad through the Arab Spring and beyond.
- [52:58]
F
Breaking news this hour.
- [53:00]
A
Israel's defense Minister says it's launched a preemptive attack against Iran Israel Katz.
- [53:06]
G
By June 2025, Hamas were destroyed, Hezbollah decapitated, the Houthis diminished and Assad defenestrated Israel with the assistance of the for Iran directly bombing nuclear and other sites. Iran was unable to muster much response beyond largely ineffectual rockets and drones. Iran's people perhaps sensed weakness. Towards the end, Khamenei found himself in the impossible position of being a stubborn old man ruling an impatient young people. His decades of power, which created little but misery at home, home and mayhem abroad, were years wasted. For Monocle Radio, I'm Andrew Muller.
- [53:56]
A
This is the globalist on monacal radio. And finally today, as geopolitics dominates the headlines, we turn to film and television, where the business of entertainment is undergoing its own dramatic shifts. I'm joined now in the studio by Karen Krasanovich, film critic and regular Monocle Radio contributor. Always lovely to have you here today in your leathers, looking stunning, squeaking on the mic. I'm sorry, Karen. This big Paramount deal. So Paramount has clinched the Warner Brothers deal because Netflix walked away. Just, just, just tell us exactly what this means and what it means for us, the viewers.
- [54:43]
J
Well, I mean, everybody's going to be wondering, okay, you know, I mean, if you're not in the industry, because we feel the industry is really, really dead right now in the UK anyway. And other places you can drive into Pinewood and get a parking space anywhere, which is unusual. And so in the industry, we want this settled. Now for consumers, what's happened is Warner Brothers got into financial trouble because they made some mergers which turned out not to be such good mergers. So now they're up for grabs. There's been a tussle between Netflix and Paramount. Neither of them are ideal purchasers, but Paramount has now won with more money on the boards. Better for, of course, superior for shareholders. We have to think of the shareholders. So now what's going to happen? It's pretty much a done deal. They think it's going to be finished off and made official in the third quarter. Now, what it means for consumers, probably not going to be any immediate changes, but over the next one to three years, you'll see changes in streaming prices and bundles. Libraries will change. Things that you wanted will be gone and new things will be, will be introduced. There's going to be a big impact on cinemas and theatrical windows, meaning, and the exhibitors are very worried about this. And also news, CNN and cable subscribers will also see a knock on effect. So basically it's going to be a change in competition and a change in our long term choice of what we can see.
- [56:05]
A
I wonder what the deal means for who now controls Hollywood's biggest assets and if this is a turning point for the era of mega media mergers.
- [56:15]
J
Well, it is. I mean, it just feels like there's going to be just one or two companies now. And that's always a worry when you come to a creative industry. Even though they do silo these things and they do have different arms for, you know, independent films or animation or whatever. It means that there's going to be less, fewer choices, let's put it that way. And I think that that's what everybody's worried about. But hopefully that will be countered, particularly with some independent films like Sinners and Others, which is showing Hollywood studios that new stories can still make money and that's what they're interested in.
- [56:52]
A
I sense an opportunity here for me just to shoehorn in a quick plug for Meet the Writers because the latest episode is the former head of of Paramount. He was a man that started mtv, Tom Fresner, and he speaks to me about his book From MTV to Timbuktu, which is a fantastic book and he's a great person to speak to. So you can get that online now.
- [57:13]
J
And we forget that MTV was really, really pivotal and still is actually absolutely.
- [57:18]
A
Now something else, an awards ceremony which, which has changed its name because it's the acronym is kind of unattractive.
- [57:27]
H
Right?
- [57:27]
F
Yes.
- [57:29]
J
Okay. Last night, well, we're were sleeping. We had the 2026 actor awards. What kind of awards are they? They're for actors. They were formerly called the SAG Awards. And I guess because nobody knows, nobody likes the word sag. Yes, yes. The earth and the gravity can be a terrible thing. So they've changed it. Basically. It was streamed over Netflix last night and SAG aft after, after Wake up rebranded the song ceremony so people would know what it was for. But it's supported by them, which is great. So this is honoring actors in film and television and the voting body and the categories are exactly the same. But now people go, oh, I know what it is. So is this a bellwether for the Oscars now the Oscar window voting for voting is the fifth. So yes, now we know that there's no best performance because this isn't, this is not, we're not weighing things here. So people are going to be looking at, voters are going to be looking at who gave the nicest acceptance speech and that could influence the voting.
- [58:33]
A
And in the next 20 seconds. Give us who those winners are now and who they might be.
- [58:38]
J
Okay. Well, Sinners won the best film prize for best ensemble. Michael B. Jordan beat out Timothee Chalamet for best actor. And Jesse Buckley, who also won the the bafta, won best female actor. But look out for Amy Madigan, who won best supporting in Weapons with a great speech.
- [58:53]
A
And I love the fact that Catherine o' Hara won a posthumous best actress.
- [58:57]
J
Wonderful. She is wonderful.
- [58:59]
A
So wonderful and so sadly missed. Karen, thank you very much indeed. That's Karen Krasanovich, film critic and regular Monocle Radio contributor. And that's all for today's show. Thanks to our producers, Anita Riota and Hassan Anderson. Our researchers, Anneliese Maynard our studio manager, Mariella Bevan with editing assistant by Steph Chungu. THE BRIEFING the Globalists will return same time tomorrow. I'll be back with you at the briefing at noon. I'm Georgina Godwin. Thanks for listening. With ubs, you have a truly global partner incorporating new technologies, innovative approach and unexpected opportunities, leading you to insights that help answer the questions that matter. Delivered with passion, care and unmatched expertise. Because it's about rising with the dawn each day, knowing that we can do even better. That's what banking is to us. Not just work, but a craft. UBS advice is our craft.