Global News Podcast - EU approves $100bn loan to Ukraine

Episode Date: April 22, 2026

EU ambassadors approve a promised $100bn loan to Ukraine after Hungary dropped its veto, following Viktor Orban's election defeat. Ukraine has now started pumping Russian oil towards Hungary again. Also: three container ships have been targeted by Iranian gunfire trying to transit the Strait of Hormuz; a new report says Colombian mercenaries backed by the UAE helped Sudanese paramilitary fighters capture the city of el-Fasher last year; why South Korean police are preparing to arrest the mogul who created the Kpop supergroup, BTS; how weather and natural disasters influence elections; a new book gives a voice to the many extraordinary women at the Nuremberg trials; and how an amateur fossil hunter found a rare fragment of the world's oldest marine crocodile.The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight. Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment. Get in touch: [e-mail]

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. How did Pakistan become the key peacemaker in talks to end the war in Iran? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. For decades, the South Asian country has sat on the margins of global diplomacy. But now it's emerging as a key player trusted by both the U.S. and Iran. So how did Pakistan arrive here and can it use this moment to raise its profile on the world stage? To hear more, check out the global story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service.

I'm Celia Hatton, and at 1,500 GMT on Wednesday, the 22nd of April, these are our main stories. A possible game changer for Kiev, a $100 billion loan to Ukraine has been approved by the European Union after Hungary dropped its veto on the money. Three container ships have been targeted by Iranian gunfire trying to transit the Strait of Hormuz, plus why the South Korean police are preparing to arrest the mogul who created the K-pop supergroup BTS. Also in this podcast, The Colombian mercenary help, technical facilitation of drones and other kind of firing techniques, helped the RSF take over the city. A new report says Colombian mercenary help.

mercenaries backed by the United Arab Emirates, helped Sudanese paramilitary fighters capture the city of El Fasher last year. And how climate change might be affecting your ability to vote. Something like an earthquake or blood is going to mean that people are not located, whether they should be located when they need to go to a polling station. We'll start with the development that could be crucial for Ukraine in its battle against Russia. European Union ambassadors have approved a promised $100 billion loan to Ukraine after Hungary dropped its veto. This marks the end to a long process. Budapest had blocked the money when it stopped getting Russian oil through the Druzba pipeline, which crosses Ukraine.

Kiev said the pipeline had been damaged after a Russian strike, but now says the oil has started flowing again. Hungary's departing Prime Minister, Victor Orban, had accused Ukraine of deliberately blocking the oil. by failing to carry out repairs. An accusation Keeb denies. Karin-Karlsbrough is a Swedish MP for the Renew Europe group. She welcomed the decision to release the funds. Ukraine is not only fighting for its own existence. Ukraine is fighting for us.

And finally, the European Union could deliver. But it's painful that some member states have blocked and slowed down the process. But finally, the decision were taken. And now we have to immediately prepare the next step to use the frozen Russian assets in our support to Ukraine. Our Europe correspondent Jessica Parker in Kiev told me both the EU money and the oil will soon start to flow. It seems like both are flowing imminently. So it looks like in terms of the oil along that section of the Drushba pipeline, that's going to get going again today to moment.

not exactly clear, but imminently after President Zelensky last night said repairs have been completed. And look, we need to go back a bit to understand this story. It was late January that Kiev said Russian strikes had damaged this area, an oil hub, and the pipeline that takes Russian oil through Ukrainian territory to Hungary and Slovakia. and the oil stopped. Now, Hungary in particular, Victor Orban, the outgoing Prime Minister, got very angry about this. He accused Keev of basically mounting an oil blockade. As you were mentioning, Victor Orban, yes, he lost the recent election, but his government has maintained close ties with Russia. So his accusation, his government's accusation, was that this was essentially political. Keeve said it was carrying out repairs. It's been. dealing with lots of hits on its energy infrastructure. But the repair has now happened and therefore, Viktor Orban signalled, as I say, the outgoing Prime Minister,

that the block that he had put on this massive EU loan to Ukraine, that he was set to lift it, having previously held up that loan, which required unanimity at a European Council level amongst EU leaders. Interesting. I mean, Jessica, you're speaking to me from Kiev right now. How important is this loan to Ukraine? Very important. It's a big chunk of money in the scheme of things for Ukraine and it's been described by senior government officials as a matter of life and death for Kiev. Of course, we're now into the fifth year of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. And in terms of how that money is going to be divvied up, it's set to be given to Kiev over the next two years, 2026, 2027, two-thirds of it, we understand.

where we've spent on helping bolster Ukrainian's defences. The rest is going to go on kind of broader financial assistance for Ukraine. So I think certainly while for Ukraine, I think they found it difficult in terms of this diplomatic standoff that ended up in with Hungary, they will be celebrating the arrival of this cash, which they say they very much need. Jessica Parker in Kiev. Let's focus on events in the of Hormuz now. Even though a ceasefire is in place in the U.S. war with Iran, the strait remains a flashpoint in that conflict. This is an Iranian state newsreader announcing that two cargo ships were seized in the straits' waters.

One seized ship is Greek-owned, and the other one is flagged to Panama. Three ships in total are confirmed to have been attacked by Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps. the two ships I just mentioned, and a third, another Panama-flagged ship that was attacked just west of Iran. Those attacks have been verified by the UK's maritime trade operations center and the maritime intelligence firm, Vanguard. This development comes after Donald Trump announced he was extending the ceasefire with Tehran indefinitely, but continuing the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports until Tehran came up with a unified proposal for peace. Our Middle East analyst, Sebastian Usher, told me more about the significance of these attacks. Well, it's a message from Iran essentially saying, if President Trump is going to keep up his pressure, they're going to keep up theirs.

I mean, President Trump was keen to say in his announcements overnight after he had said there was going to be an extension of a ceasefire, that the blockade by the US would be kept in place. And Iran has essentially said, but it will, well, it closed down the Strait of Homoos again. It was barely open, but to a degree, and there was some will towards opening it, but did so when that blockade was put in place by President Trump. So, I mean, this is one of the obstacles, obviously, towards getting any kind of process towards talks underway in any kind of momentum. I don't think it will necessarily lead to an immediate escalation, but it just shows the risks that are run when you have a deadlock like this,

and there are so many elements that can lead to a sudden escalation and reigniting of the conflict. So where are we now? We've been talking about whether the talks will happen. We've also been talking about whether outright conflict will take place again. I mean, Donald Trump says the ceasefire will last until peace talks conclude. But if attacks like these continue in the strait, do you think the ceasefire will hold? I mean, the ceasefire will hold as long as President Trump feels that it is in his interest and the interests of the U.S. I think it's more likely, well, it's 100% going to be the US which reignites the war. I mean, obviously, with Israel, they started it. So it's not Iran, I think, who are necessarily going to start their barrages of missiles again. I mean, those were in response to the attacks by the US and Israel. But the trust that obviously is lacking between these two sides over decades of hostility

and bad-mouthing each other, doesn't seem to have been in any sense re-established between them. And what we've been hearing, the little we've been hearing, to be honest, from the Iranian side, has very much focused on that, saying that any trust there might have been is gone. And they keep on harping on this idea that the US has just shown itself not to be serious. Their idea of seriousness in negotiations is we sit down and we're there for the long haul and we kind of talk through everything. And obstacles are in place and we know they're difficult, but we try to work through them and build on that.

That's not President Trump's style. But what about Iran's strategy? What is Iran strategy? Tehran's been putting off a second round of negotiations. Is time in their favor right now? The Iranians are famous for their use of delay tactics. I think the Iranian leadership believes that. And President Trump, I mean, he was talking about time running out.

From his position, President Trump's position, he's essentially saying there is a deal in place. That's the deal of Iranians going to have to sign up to come to the table and do it. And we're going to keep a ceasefire until they do that. The Iranians see that as bluster. They see that as just a beginning part of what should be a long process. They don't seem ready to commit to even the image of sitting down to a new round of talks until something has been established along those lines. How long they can hold out on that? I think is a big question. I think they must have felt that President Trump wasn't serious about ending the ceasefire,

but it was the likeliest outcome that it would be extended. But how much longer would he do that for how much longer do they think that they considered out and how much more pain do they think that they can have inflicted on them. I don't think they care particularly about their people, as we've seen. They killed thousands of them in the streets. But that is a strategy that seems to be working for them at the moment. Who knows if it will continue to do so for that much longer? Both sides essentially are playing chicken. Sebastian Asher, staying with the war, there's been no formal response yet from Iran on the ceasefire extension at the time of this podcast recording. Our chief international correspondent Lise Doucette is in Tehran, where she's been getting

reaction to the prospect of further talks with the U.S. So it's a warm spring day, and we've come to Sanii Street, named after an Iranian poet, here in central Tehran, and that's just, here's a shoe shop. Let's go in. The owner's putting out the awning. Salam. Salam. Can I ask your first name? I'm Mohammed. Muhammad. And this is your dad. Mustafa. How long have you had the shop? 40 years.

40 years. Wow. Family business. Yes. Well, how is business now? It's not really good, but we are happy right now. You're happy that you can come back to work? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have many customers? Before many. Now not.

And why? Bad economy. The bad economy. People don't have money. And what about the ceasefire, Atashbass? We are happy about war. Really? I don't know. Is your dad? Do you agree? Why are you happy about war?

I can't really say that. Say the reason. And you, what, do you want the war to go on? Chant's the situation that's worsening every day and we're really tired of them. So that is what some people believe that if there is going to, a bit of war, maybe after war, things will dramatically change for the better. Hello. What's your name? Shala.

Shala, and you've got a loaf of bread. You've got some hamburger buns and a list. Here's your shopping list. Yeah. What's it like shopping now during the ceasefire? It's not ceasefire. I mean, it's supposed to be, but it's not. Well, there's no missiles.

I take so much money for something like a bread like this, but 35. two months, about three months ago, now it's three times more. People go through hell right now to be able to pay for a loaf of bread. If you were to send a message to the negotiators, what would you say? Stop negotiating as well because I don't think that is going to happen something good for us because the way that Trump is talking about it is just threatening people, you know. And here's a young man just walking past us and he is, what do you? you holding? It's a

Valak butter, Kareewalak, local herb north of Tehran from Tajvish. Do you work here in Tehran? Well, yes. I have an architect and also I teach. What is with the ceasefire is in place? Negotiations may or may not be going on. Are you hopeful?

Well, I'm trying to be hopeful. I mean, you know politics in Iran and also the whole region is super complicated and to have to grasp an idea what's going to happen is super so we are just. So we are just, living everyday life. Making things to enjoy, like, you know, they call it lipstick effects. But you could have a life outside of Iran if you wanted, but you stay.

Why? Well, I just moved back one year ago. I lived in Berlin for 16 years. And I just moved back because I love Iran. And I thought, if I'm not here now, when should I be here? If there could be one change in your life, which would make a big difference. What would it be? I think that would be freedom.

freedom of thought, freedom in the prospect of future in a long time. So I think that would give hope to everyone if even the situation is difficult. Some of these sentiments may surprise you, but Iranians are exhausted, exhausted by nuclear negotiations which have dominated their lives for decades, by international sanctions, by tensions with the wider world. As you've been hearing, they just want to get on with their lives. Lise Doucette in Tehran. And we'll note, Lees is reporting from inside Iran

on condition that none of her material is used on the BBC's Persian service. Similar restrictions apply to all international media organizations operating there. To Sudan now, in its continuing civil war, new evidence has emerged about the fall of the key city of El Fasher in late October, to the RSF, or rapid support forces, thousands of civilians died in horrific circumstances in the battle for control of that city.

A report by the Security Analysis Organization, the Conflict Insights Group, says the fighters involved in that battle included soldiers for hire from Colombia, who were backed by the United Arab Emirates. The takeover of the city of El Fasher followed an 18-month siege that isolated civilians, often depriving them of food, water,

humanitarian assistance. The report says the Emirates and the Colombian soldiers share responsibility for RSF atrocities committed during the takeover, one of the most brutal chapters of Sudan's Civil War. Justin Lynch is the co-director of the Conflict Insights Group that produced today's report. We can tell that there were multiple Colombian mercenaries who were there. There was one mercenary in particular that we focus on. His phone was set to Colombian Spanish and they were present in Al Thasher during the atrocities. We don't know if this person was advising, if this person was fighting, because we can only see their kind of phone movements.

But in general, what these mercenaries were often doing was flying drones. I heard more from our Africa correspondent Barbara Plet Usher about what the report says about the Colombian mercenaries' involvement in Sudan. Well, Celia, the Conflict Insights Group is a data analysis private entity, which basically researches conflict. And it got hold of access to the mobile phones of more than 50, it says, Colombian mercenaries, and it tracked them using commercially available technology

that is designed to make advertising more personal. So it was able to follow them from Colombia to Sudan, noting stops along the way. One of those stops, for example, for some of them, being a military training site in the United Arab Emirates, then going to some other connecting countries, sometimes in Libya, sometimes in Chad, and then getting to RSF held territory in Sudan. There they tracked some of those mercenaries in Njala, which is the de facto capital of the RSF, the rapid support forces, and which the CIG has also found great evidence, a lot of evidence,

of drone activity. But crucially, they were able to track some phones to Elfasher during that period in October when the RSF took over the city. You remember that was an extremely violent event that the RSF was accused of atrocities during that period. And so what the report is saying is that the Colombian mercenary help with a technical facilitation of drones and other kind of firing techniques helped the RSF take over the city and therefore the Colombians and the report says the UAE are responsible for at least share in some of the responsibility for what happened there. It's incredible to think about the global nature of this conflict. What does the report say about the alleged links to the UAE? Well, first of all, I should say that the UAE

has been for quite a long time, widely reported to be providing military support to the RSF, and it has always denied that, quite emphatically, saying that it categorically rejects allegations that it provided, finance, transported, or facilitated any weapons, ammo, drones, vehicles, and so on and so on. So it continually denies this evidence. But that evidence has mostly been, by the CIG, but also other organizations and newspaper reports, has been looking at satellite, or has been tracking flights, I should say, that are like military cargo planes, which they believe carry weapons and tracking the flight patterns that usually involve. the UAE to places where these weapons then get sent to the RSF.

This report says it has quite concrete evidence of UAE links. So, for example, what I mentioned earlier, traced these phones of the Colombian mercenaries, some of them, to this training site in the United Arab Emirates. It also traced, found some of these Colombian mercenary phones in a port in northern Somalia, where the UAE has a military presence. So those were quite key, according to the report. also mentioned that these mercenaries or some of them had logged into a Wi-Fi network named after a unit that is apparently operated by a UAE private company with very close links to the state

and it cited other research for that connection. So these were some of the things that were mentioned in the report. Our Africa correspondent Barbara Pled Usher, and you can find Barbara's full story on the BBC News website. Still to come in this podcast. She was an Ammonite, which are an extinct type of squid-type creature that lived in a shell. And that's what she was hoping to find. I mean, this is a thousand, a million times better than that.

How an amateur fossil hunter found a rare fragment of the world's oldest marine crocodile. How did Pakistan become the key peacemaker in talks to end the war in Iran? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. The South Asian country has set on the margins of global diplomacy. But now it's emerging as a key player trusted by both the U.S. and Iran. So how did Pakistan arrive here? And can it use this moment to raise its profile on the world stage? To hear more, check out the global story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.

This is the Global News podcast. To South Korea now, the K-pop supergroup, BTS, is one of the biggest bands in the world. they're so successful that they're responsible for boosting South Korea's economy in past years. And they've just kicked off a huge global comeback tour, after a four-year break while the band's seven members were doing their mandatory military service in South Korea. But now a twist. The man who created the band and was instrumental in its success globally, Bangxi-Huk, faces arrest on charges of fraudulent trading.

Our correspondent in Seoul, Jake Kwan, told me more. Back in 2019, there was a lot of speculation around when and if Pang Shi'ihek's record label, what is now known as Hib, will do the IPO, which means getting listed in South Korea's biggest stock exchange and possibly making its investors very, very wealthy. Now, here's the allegation. When the original investors asked Bang when the IPO is happening, Bang told them the timing isn't good and he doesn't know if IPO will even happen. And then the disappointed investors sold off their shares to a couple of firms which have some connection to Bang. Now, what the investors did not know was that two months before that, Bang had already taken what is often the first step in IPO, which is starting an account audit of his own company. Now, the next year, his company indeed has an IPO and it's a hit. So he also takes about a 30% cut of the profit from those firms that bought the shares from his old investors, which is around $130 million.

Now, what the investigators are accusing him is that he knew all along that he would take his company to IPO. He had lied to the investors. And Bang is saying that this is not true. He's denying that. He's saying that back in 2019, his business was nowhere near as profitable as today. And the ban's military service was looming. And then several months later, the pandemic was happening.

So IPO, you know, wasn't really in the plans. he only realized that later. But this is a very serious charge, and it carries a penalty of five or more years if the judge decides that there aren't any circumstances to calls for leniency. Jake Kwan in Seoul. Here's a question.

How does weather and extreme weather at that affect your ability to make it to the polls on election day? Researchers say that increasingly, that's becoming an issue. Floods, fires, and other examples of extreme weather are threatening people's right to vote. A report, from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance

has found that elections and referendums around the world have been disrupted by intense weather conditions and natural disasters. It's the first time a global analysis has looked at how climate change is impacting elections. Helena Burke has more details. That's the sound of flooding in London in June 2016, on the day that people in the UK voted on whether to leave the European Union. Tarrantial rain in the southeast of England and Northern Ireland, flooded polling stations and caused transport disruption.

Research by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance has found that over the past two decades, at least 94 elections and referendums across 52 countries have been disrupted by climate-related factors. Professor Sarah Birch from King's College London is one of the authors of the study. Different types of events will have different impacts on elections. For example, a heat wave, is the type of thing that is likely to keep some people at home.

Elderly people, pregnant women, for example, who are more vulnerable to the heat, might be less willing to go out to the polling station if it's extremely hot. On the other hand, something like an earthquake or blood is going to mean that people are not located, they should be located when they need to go to the polling session. Some of the recent examples highlighted in the report include a cyclone that displaced thousands of people ahead of Mozambique's election in 2019,

flooding during Senegal's election in 2024 and extreme heat on voting day in the Philippines last year. Professor Birch says there are things that can be done to mitigate these issues. In some cases it's possible for countries to regularly change the date that they hold elections in some Canadian provinces that has been put into place in order to hold elections on a regular basis

at a time of year that's less vulnerable to a particular type of hazard. However, if that can't be done, and there are measures that can be put in place to make it more flexible for people to vote. For example, allowing people to go to the polling station over more than one day. So if it's really, really hot on one day and it's a little bit less hot on the next day, when the polls are open, then people can decide to go on the second day. Or having early voting as they practice in the United States,

but also countries such as Mexico, Colombia. As the impact of climate change increases, Professor Birch says governments must recognise elections, as critical infrastructure and create plans to make voting possible for everyone, no matter the weather. Helena Burke reporting. Let's take a moment to take a fresh look at a key point in modern history. 80 years after Nazi leaders were put on trial in the German city of Nuremberg at the end of World War II, most books and films focus on the part played by men in those trials.

But what of the women who witnessed and reported on them for the rest of the world? One of those women is the British painter and war artist Lauren Knight, who was sent to Nuremberg to document the trials. Here she is being interviewed in 1963. Gering, everybody admitted he was a sort of mesmeric character that in spite of being the devil he was, he did attract attention in a most extraordinary degree. But after all, when you're painting, it is what people look like. that's all you can do. It's what you can see and how deeply you understand what you see. Natalie Livingstone is the author of the new book, The Nuremberg Women.

This is the 80th anniversary of the Nuremberg trials, a momentous legal event which has inspired stories about men, paintings of men, books about men, and as many listeners would have seen last year's Hollywood film, Nuremberg, all about men. This is wildly misleading. I've spent, in the last four years uncovering the stories of the Nuremberg women. It's important to understand the trial was so much more than men in robes administering justice. It was a huge ecosystem spread across the city, an event that required lawyers, journalists, translators, witnesses and so many more. I've shone alight on eight of this vital female cast. They came from across the world, from both sides of the conflict. My youngest character is,

a Russian translator who had a front row seat to the onset of the Cold War as she translated Nazi crimes in real time. One was a brilliant lawyer who wrote the dossier which led to the conviction of Hans Frank, the butcher of Poland. Yet she was forbidden from speaking in court because of her gender. In order to have spoken in court, she would have had to obtain a waiver of disability. That disability was that she was a woman. I've also got the pivotal witness to the trial. She was the first female witness. Her name was

Marie Claude Vallian Couturey, a fearless French resistance fighter who survived Auschwitz and made it her mission to tell the world the truth about the horrors of the concentration camp. You spoke about Laura Knight. She painted this iconic painting of the dock at Courtroom 600. But if when you look at it, It is a sea of men, male judges, male defendants. And that is representing what she could see, but you have to lean in very closely to see it is painted by a woman. So these women had pivotal, crucial roles, but they've been pushed to the margins of history because the men's voices have been louder. Natalie Livingston. And last, a fossil hunter in the UK has stumbled across a rare fragment from the world's oldest marine crocodile.

Heather Salt, who found the 200 million-year-old fossil in Lime Regis on the UK's Jurassic Coast, initially thought it was a piece of wood with nails in it. My colleague James Menendez has been speaking with Dr. Paul Davis, paleontologist and geology curator at the Lime Regis Museum in Dorset. So this fragment is a piece of the jaw, the upper jaw, of creatures called Thalachisukians. They're a group that belongs to the crocodile group because we have to remember that today the crocodiles and alligators are just a small portion of what was available in the past.

And these Thalatosukians were truly marine crocodile-like animals that were ocean-going. There aren't very many traces of this creature, are there in the world? No, no. So this is a part of one of the world's oldest of the Thalatosucan groups. So we get them here in Dorset. We've got about 11 specimens in total, one partial skeleton, and quite a number of 10 isolated fragments from this creature.

And tell us a bit more about how it's found. Heather Salt. She's what, an amateur fossil hunter, and she came across it, well, not far from you. Well, that's right. Heather was actually taking part of one of our guided fossil walks where we take people onto the beach, and she found it and showed it to the guide, and the guy recognised it as something interesting, put a picture on our group chat.

I spotted the picture, immediately rushed down because I recognised what it was, and spoke to Heather, and she kindly donated it to the museum. Yeah, she was actually after something else, I think, wasn't she, though? That's right. An ammonite. She was an ammonite, which are an extinct type of squid-type creature that lived in a shell. And that's what she was hoping to find. I mean, this is a thousand, a million times.

better than that. How long did it take you to work out exactly what it was and sort of, you know, prove what it was? Pretty much as soon as I saw it in person. Really? I've got a very good idea from the photograph, but as soon as I saw it in person, it just 100% confirmed what I thought it was.

Yeah, how often do these sort of level of fines happen? Well, surprisingly often. You've got to remember the number of eyes that are on our Jurassic Coast, our World Heritage Site for its paleontology down here. There's large numbers of people who go fossil collecting. So they do these rare, unusual finds turn up far more frequently than you might expect. And usually to people who are not professional paleontologists.

Yeah, well, it's good that they don't put them in their pocket and they hand them to people like you who can identify them. Paleontologist, Dr. Paul Davis. And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can email us at Global Podcast at BBC. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag Global News Pod. And don't forget our sister podcast, the global story,

which goes in depth and beyond the headlines on one big story. This edition of the Global News podcast was mixed by Joe McCartney, and the producer was Helena Burke. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Celia Hatton. Until next time, goodbye. How did Pakistan become the key peacemaker in talks to end the war in Iran? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC.

For decades, the South Asian country has sat on the margins of global diplomacy. But now it's emerging as a key player trusted by both the U.S. and Iran. So how did Pakistan arrive here? And can it use this moment to raise its profile on the world stage? To hear more, check out the global story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.