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You're listening to the Monocle Daily, first.
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Broadcast on 29 July 2025 on Monocle Radio.
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The UK attempts an unorthodox diplomatic manoeuvre in the Middle East. The US and China attempt to avoid a trade war. And why are Americans apparently unable to cope without ice? I'm Andrew Muller. The Monocle Daily starts. Hello, and welcome to the Monocle Daily. Coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London. I'm Andrew Muller. My guests, Latika Burke and Rainbow Murray will discuss the day's big stories. And we'll hear from Mstislav Chanov, director of the Oscar winner 20 days in Mariupol, about his new film chronicling Ukraine's war for survival. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Latika Burke, writer at large for Australian publication the Knightly and expert associate at the Australian National University's National Security College, and by Rainbow Murray, professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London. Easy for me to say hello to you both. Hello. Good afternoon, Rainbow. You have recently been in an escape room. And at the risk of giving away the ending, seeing as how you're here, you got out.
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D
I did get out, thanks to some excellent teamwork, huge skill, and not at all thanks to the many hints dropped to us by the escape room staff.
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C
Was it actually fun? Bear in mind you are speaking to someone with an absolute horror of all forms of immersive entertainment or organised jollity.
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D
It was genuine fun. We had a good time.
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C
Okay, and where is this place?
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D
It's in Bournemouth. And it described itself as a little bit Sherlock Holmes and a little bit the Crystal Ma. And it lived up to both Billings.
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C
Okay, Latika, by way of contrast, and by way of also topping and tailing the show, because we will be finishing by hearing from a Ukrainian film director. You have just returned from that very country indeed.
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A week and a half in Kyiv, I joined the British Ukrainian aid organisation, Ukrainian Action and a couple of British MPs and a whole group of volunteers from all walks of life and all over the UK who decided to drive some A trucks all the way from London to Kyiv. And that took about three and a half days. A couple of breakdowns on the way, some nice stopovers and some German beer in between. Not for me, though, but for the rest of the crew. And I stayed in Kyiv for about a half of the best part of a week. And it was my first time in Ukraine and of course, obviously given the amount that I report on Ukraine and discuss its implications for security, it was an absolute privilege to be there.
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C
What did you take out of being there that you hadn't maybe grasped from considering it from afar? Because it's the same with any story as you know, when you see it up close, all of a sudden there's a wealth of sort of nuance that might not otherwise have been apparent.
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B
There were lots. But I think for the purposes of this show and that question, I think the impression of Volodymyr Zelenskyy domestically versus the impression we have of him abroad was the biggest standout I was there for the week of protests they started on, I think the Tuesday night went through to. By the time of Friday they had really dissipated down to around 200 people. But I went to those protests on the Wednesday night in the Ivan Franco Theatre Square. Thousands, thousands upon thousands of young Ukrainians and we are talking 19, 20 year old students mostly there to warn him that what Ukraine is fighting for is not the style of government he was proposing with the proposed abolition of the independence of the countries to anti corruption boards. So this was a big surprise for me. Obviously it's something I think we experience a lot in our work, that world leaders are far more popular abroad than they are at home. But just the extent to which Ukrainians, I would say, are now tolerating Zelenskyy as opposed to enthusiastically backing him, that was made very clear to me and it's not something I think I would have really understood as well if I hadn't been there.
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C
Well, we begin tonight's show in Israel where there are dramatic developments overseas, but where calls for the country to dramatically downscale its vengeance for October 7, 2023. Also coming from inside the house, two Israeli NGOs, Betsalam and Physicians for Human Rights Israel have each released reports suggesting that Israel's actions in Gaza meet the threshold of genocide. PHRI in particular measured Israeli actions against Article 2 of the 1948 Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime Genocide, to which Israel is a signatory and declared themselves unpersuaded by persistent claims by Israel's government that Palestinian civilian casualties have been a regrettable byproduct of war. In related breaking news, the UK's Prime Minister Sakiya Starmer has announced plans to recognize Palestine terms and conditions apply. I've always said that we will recognize a Palestinian state as a contribution to a proper peace process at the moment of maximum impact for the two state solution. With that solution now under threat, this is the moment to act. Rainbow. This is only breaking in the last hour or so. Still struggling, I think, like many people, to make sense of it elsewhere. In Starmer's statement, he said, and I quote, we are determined to protect the viability of the two state solution unless the Israeli government takes substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza. So, as I understand it, he's saying either Israel does something positive or the United Kingdom will recognize Palestine. Is that a. A weird stick to wield?
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D
It is a weird stick to wield, but it's one from a. A, I guess a difficult situation in the sense that Israel is not necessarily going to base its entire policy on what the British Prime Minister says. So I think what Starmer is doing is partly talking to Israel and trying to put pressure on them to keep alive the reality of Palestinian statehood. But Starmer is also talking to the international community. This comes in the wake of Emmanuel Macron making similar statements. It comes whilst President Trump is in the uk. So I think Starmer is also saying to other people, we cannot continue to stand back, give unconditional support to Israel and ignore this growing crisis. We have to try to do something to make Israel take greater responsibility for this situation.
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C
Latika, if I can switch metaphor from the stick being waved at Israel to the brush with which the Prime Minister may have painted himself into a corner, is the problem with this statement not that if Israel does respond to this by adjusting its behaviour, is he saying then the UK won't recognise Palestine?
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B
No, I don't think so. I think what is clear from today's statement is that the path towards recognition is probably now one that's inevitable. And I don't think we would have necessarily said that five years ago, four years ago, maybe not even at the start of the October 7th attacks. There are plenty of caveats here and plenty of, I think, conditions that really won't be met. So one of them, for example, is calling on Hamas to disarm, to release all the hostages and agree to a ceasefire. I don't think we're likely to see that. We haven't seen it so far. But I think really what all this does is underline that there's only one country that can bend Benjamin Netanyahu, that's the United States. Have a look very carefully at the meeting. That or the comments actually from Donald Trump after his meetings with the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Scotland on Sunday, and then yesterday after his talks with Sir Keir Starmer, where he directly repudiates Benjamin Netanyahu's claim that there's no starvation in Gaza and says, well, they look pretty hungry to me, in his very Trumpian way. Just saying what is clearly obvious and really calling out what is, I think, a gaslighting by the government of Israel for so long now.
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C
I mean, is Donald Trump really the major audience for Starmer's statement? Rainbow? Because he is also aware that the US has never recognized Palestine, and it would be, it seems, a fairly unlikely prospect from where we presently are. Is he concerned that if he had just flat out said the United Kingdom now recognizes Palestine, that that would have ruined the relationship he is trying to build with the president?
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D
It's a delicate relationship with the US President, especially now that the UK is no longer part of the European Union. So they're perhaps more reliant on that special relationship than ever before. But you asked, is Donald Trump the only audience? No. Obviously, Starmer also has his eye on domestic politics, not least the fact that his own party are, for a large part, desperate to see greater recognition of the Palestinian state, greater repudiation of the actions of Israel. So Starmer is always also trying to placate his backbenchers, trying to placate his own voters, trying to show that he is taking some action on this. But the way that it has been phrased, with all of the conditions and all of the caveats, is still trying to make it sound reasonable to both sides that he's not put all the conditionality on one side and he's trying to make it sound like something that is reasonable, even if it isn't very plausible.
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C
Latika, we began this item talking about these two Israeli NGOs who've issued reports making a case that they believe that Israel is now perpetrating genocide in Gaza. There is obviously international opinion seeming to shift in the last few weeks, but when this is domestic opinion, does that start to register at all with Benjamin Netanyahu, or is he so reliant on the hardcore, even to his right, that he, well, he's now ride or die with them?
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B
Benjamin Netanyahu has essentially been given a blank cheque since October 7th. He was on the ropes politically on the way out before this attack. He has managed, obviously, to make great gains in fracturing Iran's influence in the region. And I think that is something that he gets to put on as a mark or a notch as one up, and he will be known for this as well. But it is possible that he may prevail in this regional conflict. He may even lead to some sort of ruination of Hamas, which is, we are told, his total goal. But lose the wider war, which is the world opinion coming down on Israel's side by default if there's a next time.
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Well, there will be much more on this obviously across our shows all tomorrow, but we will move on now. And we will move on specifically to Stockholm, where officials from the US and China have been attempting to talk each other out of a trade war, but have at the very least talked each other into an extension of the 90 day tariff truce agreed in May, which had been due to expire on August 12. Some countries or entities have come to terms with the US since President Trump declared trade war on everybody earlier this year, the uk, EU and Japan among them. But China has as yet not President Trump has gone out of his way to furiously deny that he is seeking to leverage all this to secure a marquee summit with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
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From.
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C
From which we may infer that Trump is seeking to leverage all this to secure a marquee summit with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. Rainbow do we get the impression from what is coming out of Stockholm that everybody is just sort of tacitly agreeing to keep kicking this one down the road because securing some sort of framework or agreement with the uk, EU and Japan, broadly American allies, is one thing. The China US thing is much more complicated.
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D
It is, it's very complicated. Neither side really has anything to gain by imposing huge tariffs on the other. So I think that they both want some kind of resolution. But likewise, neither side has anything particular to gain by standing down, rolling over and letting the other side dominate. So they need to find an exit that allows both of them to protect their own interests and save face. And considering the actors involved, that is not easily achieved at the moment. But what we've seen with Donald Trump's negotiating style generally is that he likes to go in with the absolute worst case scenario, beat people with a huge stick and then offer them a smaller stick with which to beat them, which they gratefully accept because it's not as bad as the first case scenario, even though it's far worse than what they might have accepted if he'd sort of gone in gently at the beginning. So I don't think that we're necessarily going to see the US sticking with the severity of what they originally proposed, but I think it's going to take a while to find something that is mutually acceptable to both sides.
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C
Is it the case here? Latika that given Donald Trump's negotiating style, which Rainbow has described there, it doesn't quite work as much with China because China's not as easy to shove around as some others.
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B
Absolutely. I mean, it was extraordinary what we have seen the last few weeks, government after government, including the European Commission, the second biggest economic bloc in the world, essentially caving into Donald Trump because no one wants to start a trade war. Well, China very well could and it has been stockpiling, so it's prepared if it wants to. I think this is a huge moment of danger for Donald Trump, actually, because the one thing that does unite his very disparate base in MAGA is, is reindustrialization and reasserting American economic superiority over China. Not just in terms of military, which is something sometimes what we focus on a lot, and it gets missed. Really what they are trying to do and Biden was trying to do was restore American manufacturing. Now if Trump comes along and says, you know what, this is all so hard, I'm actually here for some strategic stability, we'll cut a deal. And it's something like what we've seen cut with some of the other world powers over the weekend. I'm not sure that gets past mugger. And I think that's the point. It's not Epstein, it's not some of these other fiores that we've seen. I think the China question is the strand, it is the core that unites them. And if he doesn't get this right, if he does allow, for example, China to keep accessing advanced semiconductors, then the technological race is being gifted to China from the Americans. And there are old school Republicans who I think at this point start to reclaim the party mantle of what it means to be Republicans. So I'm not really sure that Trump and his negotiating style actually matches the moment for what is approaching on the China talks Rainbow.
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C
Is it being untowardly cynical to wonder if a certain amount of manageable tension between the United States and China actually works for the governments in both of them? I mean, I'm sure it's irritating and it is somewhat economically costly, but an organization like the Chinese Communist Party and a demagogue like Donald Trump, they both kind of need an enemy, and so.
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D
They both enjoy having their sort of preferred nemesis to grandstand against at a.
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Manageable sort of level.
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D
It's got to be manageable, though, because there is a huge economic element riding on this. You know, this is not just about the egos of the leaders involved. This is about the health of the economies of their nations and the prosperity of the people within those nations. And obviously China is less democratic. But as has been pointed out in the us, ultimately, people vote based on the economy. You can do a lot of deporting people that you don't like and burning books that you don't like and singling out people for attention that you don't like. But ultimately people will vote for you or not based on the economy. And if, if these trade tariffs start to have a negative impact on American businesses, make it difficult for them to import the materials that they need, force them to push up their prices, prevent them from expanding and hiring and exporting, then that is going to create some significant blowback. So whilst it might be nice, I think, for a certain amount of time to make noise about, you know, being tough on your trading partner, I don't think it's sustainable to the point where it causes economic harm.
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C
Because Latika isn't the bind that Trump finds himself in that supposing taking a hard line with China did bring back lots of manufacturing to America, it then means that his fan club are just going to end up paying way, way more for stuff.
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B
Yes, at the moment, the headline out of tariffs is that they've actually reaped several tens of billions. So the chart looks good, by and.
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C
Large, being paid by American consumers.
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B
Yeah, well, at the moment it looks like they're being paid by American companies. So the flow on is to be to be seen. But obviously that's the inevitable outcome one would expect, and that's what I think is going missing. There's a lot of debate about the EU capitulating to the United States and accepting 15% tariffs on its goods. We should always remember that's a 15% tax increase that Donald Trump just imposed on his own voters. And I think if you start to look at it that way, you think maybe he's not the smartest guy in the room. 15% may be something that a bloc like the EU can absorb for smaller countries, maybe not for China, clearly it can and it can retaliate. But I think going back to my earlier point too, it's important to note or keep in mind that there's an economic frailty to China's model. And this is also what a lot of people who have supported Donald Trump against all the other conditions they don't like about him. But on the hope that he might do something about China and address strategic competition in a way that benefits or reasserts US dominance, they are hoping that the overcapacity the overheating of the Chinese economy that Xi Jinping has presided over could bust. And if Trump gives them a let out clause from that, that is also, I think, a very precarious situation for him domestically.
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C
Well, to New Zealand now, which as a nation and people will be delighted to hear its internal politics discussed by two Australians. Somewhat contrary to the professed aims of most democracies, New Zealand is considering taking steps to make it more difficult to vote. We should stress that these are extremely limited in scope. Nobody is suggesting putting polling stations atop really big hills or posting fiddling trolls outside them. Instead, prisoners will be disbarred from the franchise and allow enrolment to vote a minimum of 13 days before the election. Enrolling to vote is compulsory in New Zealand, but unlike more sensible countries, for example Australia, actually voting is not rainbow, is it? Is the current setup actually quite weird? You can, you can enrol to vote up to and including election day.
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D
Yes, that's quite unusual. And so you can understand actually why they want to get a grip on that. Not least because it causes massive delay in announcing the outcome of the election if you're still.
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C
Which is what happened last time.
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D
Yeah, it took three weeks. And that in itself can cause a certain undermining of democracy because it leads to a sort of lack of transparency in the process. It causes anxiety for everybody who wants to know the outcome and it causes a delay in the formation of a new government. So in the grand scheme of things, this is not the most unreasonable of measures. This is not an obvious attempt, a sort of stealth voter suppression. It's rather trying to get a grip on a situation which was in itself a bit of an anomaly and which was causing problems.
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C
Latika, how big a thing is deciding that imprisoned criminals should not be voting? That seems like a fairly easy win for any government. And I'm not about to sit here and say the issue necessarily keeps me awake nights, but do you have a strong view on whether those who have offended against society should be allowed to participate in the discussion of which way it goes?
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B
I don't personally have a strong view, but I think if you put it to the pub test, most people would say if you're a felon, you probably have suspended. You had your democratic rights suspended for the time that you're in jail. So I think that, yes, it is probably not one that's going to upset too many Kiwis. I actually think this is a sensible round of reforms from the New Zealand government. Voting should be protected and voting schemes that can be manipulated Right up to the point of election day, I think is troubling in the current world we find ourselves in, we know that we need to protect our democracies from forces that would like to interfere with that. And so I do think this is a sensible round of measures from New Zealand.
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C
We did want to broaden this conversation out Rainbow, to sort of like allow you both to be bosses of whichever electoral commission you like and talk about reforms you would implement. I am of the view that the best and safest election, which is one, is one that it is as old school as it can possibly be, that is, everybody makes a mark on a piece of paper with a pen or pencil. These are counted by hand and by golly, you do it actually on the day, unless you can come up with advance reason why you can't. And it should be compulsory.
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D
Why do you think it should be compulsory?
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C
Because that's what we do in Australia and we're right about everything. No, I actually do think I have a number of reasons for this, which I have banged on about in an old school foreign desk explainer, which I'm sure people can find. But I do think it's an insulation against extremism, because to win a plurality of votes you have to engage with actually normal people who don't spend most of their lives obsessing about politics. And I like the idea that it reminds citizens of a democracy that, yes, living in a democracy, democracy is a privilege and you have rights, but you have responsibilities and duties and by golly, walking up the road to the local school once every four years and making a mark on a piece of paper won't kill you.
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D
Sure. I mean, it's worth bearing in mind that abstention is not necessarily a sign of laziness. Sometimes it is a form of political expression.
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C
You can abstain in Australia, you just spoil your ballot.
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D
Yes, and that's what, that's what I was coming to, that when you have compulsory voting, you just have more spoiled ballots because people who wish to register their objection are obliged to do it through spoiling their ballots rather than through staying at home. One argument is that you should motivate people to turn out by making the vote meaningful rather than making it compulsory. And there will always be people who don't vote, even when a vote is compulsory. Because if, for example, you are in hospital on the day of an election and not in a sense of health to cast a vote, then you're still not going to be able to do so. But I think the most, the most important feature of a democracy is giving people a sense that their vote counts, which is partly about the integrity of the process, as you described, and partly about ensuring the meaningfulness of a vote. And so that's partly about the electoral system in place, making sure that different votes count equally, that ballots aren't wasted. So one argument for electoral reform, for example, might be to get rid of single member constituencies, where arguably, if one party is pretty much guaranteed to win, then anyone voting for anyone else has wasted their time.
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C
Latika, which reforms would you enact? I think we should remind listeners that in Australia, at great many polling stations you also get a sausage. Vegetarian options are usually available.
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B
Democracy sausage. I must admit, when I lived in Australia I thought compulsory voting was anti democratic. Since moving to the uk I have had a complete reversal on my views and I think my views are now fixed in much the same way as yours. Not quite as hard line as you, Andrew. I don't think you can ask consequential questions like should we be in or outside of the European Union forevermore without that actually reflecting the entire country and they should be dragged to the voting ballot to express what they really think so that we don't have what happened, which was five years of utter chaos and interpretation about what that result said or meant. It needs to be unequivocal if you are going to ask questions like that. I think that also applies for voting day. I don't think the UK is right to hold it on Thursday. I think it's a really weird day to hold it and I think you should have it on the weekend. I also think early voting is fine as long as those early votes are counted at the same pace as election day votes. But yeah, I'm with you. I think compulsory voting showing up on the day as much as possible. A democracy sausage in your hand is a great addition if you can do it. But actually we laugh. But I think in Australia it has come to be a ritual that we share with each other and it is a celebration of civic duty. And to Rainbow's points earlier, I'm not sure that compulsory voting does lead to a spike in spoiled ballots. In the last election in Australia we saw support for two parties decline to their lowest ever level and a huge increase in a compulsory and proportional representation system. We saw a huge increase in independence. We saw most marginal seats, very safe seats, become marginal indeed. This is actually the best, greatest, strongest result of compulsory voting you could hope for. And you also ensure you get the least worst options voted in because people do have to be sensible to the best degree possible if they are to appeal to the broadest chunk of the population. So I would probably only change for the UK voting on Saturday. I think once you change it to a non working day it does become a bit more of a festival.
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C
Well to Europe now. A decision made by a great many Americans at this time of year, which means endless social media discourse expressing incredulity that human beings can even live on such a continent with its free health care and relatively meager chance of being machine gunned while shopping. Also on the list of European things about which Americans are apparently absolutely baffled, ice or the relative lack thereof. While patrons of American restaurants are accustomed to iced water being delivered without even asking and fist sized chunks of it being deposited in any beverage, prizing any amount of it out of European waiters can be rather more difficult. Rainbow Is it clear to you what the deal is with Americans and ice?
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D
Well the Americans certainly like their ice. They do, and I think this actually goes hand in hand with Americans liking their air conditioning also. Discourse yes, I've been to America a few times and full disclosure, I don't like ice in my drinks.
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C
How very European.
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D
How very European. When offered ice, which I often am, I decline it. And when it's given to me without offering, I will sometimes fish it out because all it does is make me shiver internally, much like overzealous air conditioning. And I don't entirely understand the rationale behind this. If you look at countries, a number of Asian countries for example, they don't drink iced drinks, they drink warm drinks because the physiological response to a warm drink is to encourage you to sweat, which in turn helps you cope with hot weather. Whereas when you drink something that's very cold, your body tells you oh gosh, it's cold, I need to warm myself up. Which is then counterintuitive when you are somewhere hot. So I don't entirely understand why Americans keep messing with their body's natural response to heat by trying to over cool. So I have limited sympathy for the lack of ice in European drinks, I'm afraid.
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C
Sitlatika I think there is a time and a place for ice and that time is usually fairly late at night. That place is in a nice glass of bourbon. But I do think think our American friends are somewhat heavy on the whatever it is you deliver ice with.
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B
No, I'm sorry, I think the Yanks have it completely right here.
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C
Really?
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B
Absolutely.
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C
This is controversial.
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B
Ice is fantastic. It also encourages you to hydrate if you let it dilute and you drink it so I now have my coffee in the morning on ice in the hot weather when I get home after hot yoga. I now just blend ice with strawberries and it's absolutely sensational and delicious and it cools me down.
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C
See, I'm now envisaging a poster having been put up all over London and indeed Europe by, I don't know, the ice marketing board with if such a body exists, with the slogan ice is fantastic and a picture of you beaming at some ice. I have says Latika Burke.
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B
I have taken. I didn't realize this was such a cultural divide, I must say, across the Atlantic, but I have taken recently to just asking for extra ice with everything because it is what I mean. It has been sweltering in London and people do not have air conditioning.
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C
I'm now just wondering which of you is regarded as the bigger lunatic by waiters. Either you for asking for more ice in Europe or you for asking for less ice in the United States.
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D
I will suck an ice lolly in a hot day. I'm not completely anti ice, but I think there's a time and place place, and I don't think that all the time is. Is the right response.
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C
Well, on that reasonable and conciliatory note, Rainbow Murray and Latika Burke, thank you for joining us. Finally, on today's show, celebrated for his Oscar winning documentary, 20 Days in Mariupol, Ukrainian film director Mr. Slav Chernov is a seasoned war correspondent who has reported from some of the most dangerous places on earth, among them Syria, Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan. In 2022, Chernov Swed switched, switched rather his attention to Ukraine. And his latest film, 2000 Meters to Andrivka, follows a Ukrainian platoon as they attempt to liberate a Russian occupied village. Ms. Love spoke earlier to Monocle's Julia Jen. Julia began by asking about the intensity of this film to its international audience compared to 20 days in Mariupol.
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E
We're talking about war. And the last thing we would want to do, regardless of whether we're talking about civilians or military, is to sanitize it, to show it, to show that it's easy or acceptable. War is horrifying, the most horrifying thing that humanity ever done and we should treat it that way. It should be horrible. And if it is brought to screen, it should be horrible. At the same time, of course, we need to treat everyone with respect and I think we held that balance in 20 days in Mariupol and as well as in 2000 meters to Andriivka. But what's Equally important is I wouldn't take the audience anywhere. I wouldn't go myself. I don't ask to watch something that I didn't see or didn't experience. And I think for the audience, it makes it easier if we would just put the audience in front of the screen and say, hey, watch it, experience it, and live with it. That's one thing. But another thing is when you hold in the audience's hands and you say, live through it with me. And that's the different way to tell the story. It's more respectful towards people whose story you're telling, but also so it's more respectful towards the audience you're showing the film to.
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A
And there's something about respect as well. Ukrainians are having an experience that's so totally different to any other Europeans now. There's something almost primeval in it, the film. You're surrounded constantly by mud, by earth. You're focusing on one strip of forest, and at the very end, the closing shots, you've got this fire and light that kind of lighting up everyone's faces, and the soldiers are chanting. Is that important for you to translate this very specific experience that Ukrainians are having in the center of Europe to international audiences? A very different type of experience that others on the continent are having.
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E
It gets into. Right into the heart of it. Again, we're talking about experience that I, as well as a film director and a camera person and a writer, I'm going through the same experience. So I can't be possibly trying to adequately tell the story and the feelings of people who are living through war and fighting for that destroyed, mutilated land without walking on that land, without feeling the bitterness and despair of seeing policies of my own childhood being destroyed. There is a moment in the film where I talk to my colleague, Alex Babenko, and he's with me, hiding in the foxhole from the drones that are dropping bombs. And I say, I feel sometimes that I'm walking on graves, and that's because every meter of that land is familiar to me. And we. I personally, but also everyone in the film is feeling a personal connection to. To this land, to this forest. We were playing hide and seek in the childhood, and now we're hiding from drones. We're feeling personal connections to cities that once were cities where we went to visit our grandmothers. And now it's just rubble. There are not even the photographs in the rubble left. Nothing. Right. So we make this immense efforts to. To try to salvage the memory of those places. But also I am trying to exactly as you said, trying to bring the audience into that experience of connection to the land that the soldiers are fighting for. That connection is so personal that when we hear politicians around the world saying, I'll just give it up. Why don't you just give it to R Russia? If they would just watch this film, if those politicians watched this film, they would not be able to say that because they would feel how connected we are to that land.
- [36:22]
A
And I guess the way you've spoken about it just now, and I guess one of the things that's interesting is you've talked about, you know, when Russia began their full scale invasion of Ukraine, you took up a camera. That was your way of resisting. But then there's also a way of translating and using, I guess, the medium of art. I mean, this is a film, so it's sort of. Does it fall for you into that category of art? Is there something. Are you pursuing art in a way when you're making this film or is it simply your responsibility as a citizen and you're not sort of thinking about those higher things?
- [36:58]
E
Yes, I do think about art. And if 20 days in Mariupol were conceived later, in the beginning there were news dispatches that later became a film. 2000 meters to Andriivka, from its very beginning was conceived as a film and was shot as a film. And the story that was told was quite cinematic. And I hope that words being cinematic or artistic does not undermine the documentary importance of, of the events that are happening, because we are still just documenting reality. But a simple documentation as well as journalism, as well as just like direct information that is being passed to the audience is not enough anymore to make any point to get to truth, because truth has been undermined, that journalism has been attacked. And the only thing that is still getting to the audience is art. Because art is emotional art. Filmmaking, literature, other forms of visual art, performance as well, of course. So all of that is primarily evolving. And regardless of how many people say that and watch news, they still will be perceptive to art. And now there is time for the art to take place that journalism has lost in carrying the truth.
- [38:38]
C
That was Monocle's Julia Jen speaking to Mr. Slavchernyov. 2000 meters to Andriivka is available to watch in US cinemas now and will be released here here in the UK on August 1st. That is all for this edition of the Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Latika Burke and Rainbow Murray. Today's show was produced by Monica Lillis and researched by Henry King. Our sound engineer was Steph Chungu. I'm Andrew Muller here in London. The Daily is back at the same time tomorrow. Thanks for listening.