Global News Podcast - Iran considering US proposal to end the war

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

US media reports say what's being considered is a 14-point memorandum of understanding with Iran, which could set a framework for more detailed nuclear negotiations. A senior member of Iran's parliament has dismissed it as a "wish list", while a foreign ministry spokesman said Tehran would share its views of a US proposal with Pakistani mediators. Pakistan's foreign minister said his country was "endeavouring to convert the current ceasefire into a permanent end to this war". Also: Three women with links to the Islamic State group have been arrested after arriving in Australia with their children after years in detention in Syria. Vigils are held across Australia for a five year old Aboriginal girl who was allegedly murdered. And, Ukraine looks at banning surrogacy for foreign parents - amid concerns that poor vulnerable women in a country at war are being exploited and there are not enough protections for the babies. 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 is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Jean-Ut Jalil and at 15 hours GMT on Thursday the 7th of May, these are our main stories. Iran considers a US proposal to end their war as President Trump predicts it will be over soon. Three women with links to the Islamic State Group who've spent years in a Syrian detention camp are arrested after arriving in Australia. The U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, meets Pope Leo at a time of heightened tensions between the Trump administration and the Vatican. Also in this podcast, most women lose the first 10 pounds within weeks of starting. Every man should start doing military training.

I teach women 50 plus how to burn belly fat. Why AI fitness instructors can be misleading or even bad for you. A day after oil prices fell and stocks served. following President Trump's announcement that good progress was being made on a deal to end the Middle East War, Iran says it's still considering the latest US proposal. US media reports say that a 14-point memorandum of understanding has been presented to Iran, which could set a framework for more detailed nuclear negotiations. Speaking at a virtual campaign event on Wednesday evening,

President Trump described the war as a skirmish and said he was optimistic, it would soon be over. We're dealing with people that want to make a deal very much, and we'll see whether or not they can make a deal that's satisfactory to us. We have it very much under control. The blockade is unbelievable. The Navy's been incredible. The job they did, it's like a wall of steel.

Nobody goes through. In particular, the Iranians are not getting anything through one way or the other, so they're out of business. And we'll see whether or not they are agreeing. And if they don't agree, They'll end up agreeing shortly thereafter. So that's the way it is. Pakistan is playing a key role as a mediator that is trusted by both sides.

Its foreign minister said his country was endeavoring to convert the ceasefire into a permanent end to this war. I asked our Pakistan correspondent, Caroline Davies, what more we know about what's in the memorandum. A lot of this reporting is coming through the news website Axios, but they have said that this is a 14-point memorandum on one page. The suggestion is that this would set up the further discussions for sort of more detailed discussions, particularly around nuclear. And of course, we know that nuclear has been a key sticking point, at least that's what the Vice President J.D. Vance said when he concluded, because the only round of talks we've had so far since this conflict began in Islamabad, that was back in April.

And he said that the sticking point had been that they weren't able to come to the point that the US wanted on Iran having nuclear weapons or having the ability to get to nuclear weapons. We also think that sticking points are likely around the Strait of Hormuz, many analysts look of what had happened in the course of this conflict and seen that Iran has clearly realised how much leverage that they can exercise over the Strait of Hormuz and that it's unlikely that they're going to go back to exactly the way things were there, where there was just free passage through. But what that exactly looks like, we don't know.

At the moment, we are still waiting for an Iranian response to this proposal. Yes, because the Strait of Hormuz was not. not a problem before this war started. And the Iranians have been able to charge, what, $2 million per vessel. So it's hard to see them going back, given all the losses that they've suffered. And a senior Iranian lawmaker has been quoted as saying that this US proposal memorandum is simply a wish list. It's been very difficult to know exactly what Iran would necessarily want in the straightforward moves, how that could be managed, whether that would be done bilaterally with some of the noises suggest that maybe

Amman isn't interested in something like that, whether that would want to be done multilaterally with other countries, how would that work, how would that operate? But yes, given that Iran has seen the leverage, it has, it's hard to think that Iran would want to go back to a position where it didn't have any of that kind of ability and control

anymore. And in terms of the Iranian response, yes, we've heard that it's been described as a wish list, but we've also heard discussions as well from the Iranian side saying that they've still got their finger on the trigger of things deteriorate. which is not totally dissimilar language to the sort of language we've heard from President Trump. Because both sides also have a lot to lose. President Trump's got the midterms limming up.

Iran has huge economic challenges. Pakistan is continuing to play a central role in all this. So perhaps there is a will to come to some kind of deal but without losing face. Yeah, and I think it's interesting. We've just heard from the foreign ministry spokesperson for Pakistan who has a weekly press conference. and he has said that Pakistan expects an agreement sooner rather than later on a US-Iran deal. Now, I point that out because it's slightly unusual in the sense that we haven't really heard Pakistan say many of these things on record before. There's been lots of anonymous sourcing suggesting that they think things are moving and developing differently.

So do we think that things are genuinely moving and in a new direction and that there can be this common ground, or do we think this is sort of discussion that's coming out in the open? People are trying to willing things forward, but could that momentum disappear as quickly as it seems to have appeared? Caroline Davies. Meanwhile, the economic costs of the war are growing daily. The chief executive of the Danish shipping giant, Mesk, says the surge in energy prices is costing the business an extra half a billion dollars a month. In the BBC interview, Vansom Cleek, said cargo shipments had been

massively disrupted by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. And he said some of the burden is going to have to fall on customers. We can do some on pressing the cost agenda further. But for us, what is really important is actually to pass on these cost increases to our customers as much as possible so that we can protect our margin and the operation's integrity going forward. It's been extremely difficult to communicate with people inside Iran for the past couple of months because the authorities have imposed an internet blackout since being attacked by the US and Israel. My colleague, Nico Kel Bakiani from BBC monitoring, has been looking at what's been happening

on the ground. According to the Iranian media, the state-appiliated media, they have dismissed these suggestions of an imminent deal. They've cited Iranian officials who are saying that Iran is still reviewing the latest U.S. offer, so they haven't yet sent their response to Pakistan. At the same time, yes, as you mentioned, there is an internet shutdown in the country, so we are not hearing from most Iranians who don't have access to the internet. However, we still see even from the official Iranian media and state broadcaster, these economic concerns that are existing in the country. For example, the same person, Kualibov, the parliament speaker, argued that the

enemy is pressuring Iran through this economic means to break it after the war. President Pasekhan has warned about this rising prices and selling things at higher than authorized prices. The judiciary announcing its measures to tackle this. So we're seeing these signs that there's a serious economic struggle inside the country, especially for ordinary Iranians. But at the same time, it's a serious economic struggle. seems that the Islamic Republic feels more confident

that it can control the situation inside the country, that it has the geographical advantage, for example, over the Strait of Ormuse. And also it feels that it can withstand this economic pressure better and longer than the US and global markets and also the regional countries. Nico Kel Bakiani of BBC monitoring. And we have more on this on our YouTube channel.

Search for BBC News on YouTube. and you'll find global news podcasts in the podcast section. There's a new story available every weekday. Three women who returned to Australia from Syria today have been arrested on arrival. Two were detained in Melbourne, one in Sydney. They're part of a group of 13 women and children who've spent years in a Syrian detention camp

because of their links to the Islamic State Group, but have managed to return now thanks to their Australian nationality. The Australian government says it won't provide help to any citizens who joined IS. The Assistant Commissioner of Australia's Federal Police, Stephen Nutt, gave this update on one of those arrested. It is expected a 53-year-old woman will be charged tonight or tomorrow with the following four Commonwealth offences. Crimes against humanity, enslavement. Crimes against humanity possess a slave. Crimes against humanity use a slave.

Crimes against humanity engage in slave trading. These offences each carry a maximum penalty of 25 years imprisonment. Our reporter Simon Atkinson was at Melbourne Airport when some of the women and children arrive there. We do know that there's another woman who came into Melbourne. We're not quite sure as yet what is happening with her. We assume that she hasn't been arrested as she's not included in those figures. and also no word is yet on what is happening to the children. There are nine children across these two flights who arrived.

There's no suggestion that they're going to face any kind of legal action, of course. But we're yet to hear whether they've left the airport. We understand that they're going to be going to see extended family, both here in Melbourne and in Sydney. And in fact, at least one of the children was born in the detention camp in Syria, where they've been held in horrible conditions. and some are questioning why the children are being punished for their mother's actions? Absolutely. I think of the nine children who've arrived back today,

the vast majority of them, this is their first time on Australian soil, although they're Australian citizens. They've got valid passports, which has allowed them to come back. They've never actually been to Australia. They were born in Syria either during the war or, as you say, in detention camps after the collapse of Islamic State. But this is it. There's been a lot of kind of split opinion, I say, on whether the women should be allowed back.

Certainly the politicians have been quite vocal on the whole that they shouldn't be, but certainly more sympathy for the children, that they shouldn't be punished for decisions that their mothers made several years ago. And as you say, they've been living in terrible conditions, very basic access to health care, limited education. And so there's already a lot of thought being given

to how life is going to be for them, now they're back in Australia. And briefly, what measures are going to be taken to reintegrate them back into Australian society? Well, we've heard they're going to get some psychological support. I mentioned they've got extended family here who've been lobbying for them to come back. They're also going to be asked to undergo courses to kind of make sure they haven't been radicalised during their time in Syria. Simon Atkinson, my heart is broken into a million pieces. The words of the mother of a five-year-old girl read out at a vigil in Alice Springs.

in Australia. She was My Little Princess, my Princess, who loved the colour pink. Tributes of flowers, toys and messages have piled up outside the town camp near Alice Springs where the little Aboriginal girl was abducted last month. Nala Mansell from the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre led another vigil in Sydney. Aboriginal children and all children have the right to live, to be loved and to be protected. We're here because a child, come and jail, little baby, should still be here. A child who was loved, who deserved safety and who deserved a future. The man accused of killing her, who's also Aboriginal, was attacked by locals before being arrested and charged.

A riot erupted outside the hospital where he was being treated amid reports that concerns about the girl's welfare had been repeatedly raised in the weeks before she died. Our Australia correspondent, Katie Watson, was at the vigil in Alice Springs. She told me more about the little girl, now known as Kumangayi little baby. It's a pseudonym that her family chose because many Aboriginal families, communities, don't want to say the name of somebody who's died because it may disturb their spirit. Now she went missing after her mother put her to bed at an Aboriginal community just outside Alice Springs at the end of last month. And it sparked one of the biggest searches ever here in Australia's Northern Territory.

But unfortunately, five days later, her body was found not far from the town. And it's really broken Alice Springs speaking to people here. I spoke to one person earlier today who said the community was numb. But it's also shocked Australia as a whole. And that's why I'm at a vigil here in Alice Springs. It's just started. But there are other vigils. There's one in Sydney.

in many of the big cities across Australia. And Katie, describe some more for us as seen at the vigil where you are. It's at a sports ground in the centre of Alice Springs. There are hundreds of people. People have been asked to bring a candle and light one, and they've been asked to wear pinks. So there are children with pink balloons, pink ribbons in their hair, dogs with pink bows, people with pink jumpers.

It's getting quite nippy, because in the winter in the outback, it gets quite cold when the sun goes down and the sun's just setting. Now there's a series of talks and speeches, the family's expected to talk or representative of the family, and community leaders. So I think that's something that people have said to me as well is that Alice Springs is often known for crime statistics, for violence. That's kind of the headlines that come out of it. But actually what's happened has brought the community together and has brought, you know, people all came out to sell. for come and I'm going to go and jai little baby. And it has clearly upset people, but has brought people together as well. And this case has also highlighted how poorly Aboriginal children are

protected in Australia. Many Aborigines feel like they're second-class citizens. And I think that's one thing that people here feel constantly let down. I mean, if you look at the number of young Aboriginal men in the jails here in Northern Territory, they far outnumber the proportion of Aboriginal people that, you know, that are here in Australia, they, you know, are overrepresented in prisons, in different social services. And that is what people are saying is a failure of the system. People are not being looked after enough to be able to help vulnerable communities, poorer communities that face more difficult challenges and getting jobs and that sort of thing. And perhaps that could improve things after this step.

Katie Watson in a windy Alice Springs. Still to come in this podcast, the head of the global health body reassures the public that the hanta virus outbreak on board a cruise ship poses a low risk to the public. WHO is working with multiple governments and partners on the response. Our priorities are to ensure the affected patients receive care and to prevent any further spread of the virus. This is the Global News podcast. The U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, has met,

Pope Leo at the Vatican at a time of increasing tension between President Trump and the head of the Roman Catholic Church. Mr Trump has repeatedly criticised the Pope who has expressed his concerns about the US-Israeli war against Iran. Mr Rubio spent more than two hours with the Pope for what were described as friendly and constructive talks in which they discussed the Middle East. Our reporter, David E. Gilione, told us more. I'm standing in St. Peter Square, just a few hundred meters from the Apostolic Palace just behind me where the meeting between the US sector of state, Marco Rubio and the Pope, took place. Now, as usual, as it usually happens at the Vatican with people audiences, the meeting was behind closed doors. But obviously, there's been a lot of speculation around the Vatican on what the two have been discussing. We do know that Rubio, before leaving the United States, said,

There's a lot to talk about at the Vatican. And the US State Department, in a written statement, said that Rubio will meet with Holy See leadership to discuss the situation in the Middle East and mutual interests in the Western Hemisphere. Now, Rubio is also meeting the Vatican's Secretary of State, Parolin. Rubio is also meeting Georgia Meloni,

Italy's prime minister and the Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs. Hopefully, tensions will be ease. But Georgia Meloni has been seen as the Trump whisperer as Trump's closest ally in Europe. This has obviously changed after Meloni defended the Pope and she was, as a consequence, attacked by Trump. So hopefully there will be some clarification and the tensions will be eased. That's what the Italians are hoping for at the very least. David de Guillone. The Israeli military has said that it's investigating after a soldier was photographed,

placing a cigarette in the mouth of a statue of the Virgin Mary in southern Lebanon. This comes weeks after international condemnation of a previous image in which another Israeli soldier was seen smashing a statue of Jesus. From Jerusalem, here's our Middle East correspondent, Yoland Nail. The latest photograph circulating on social media appears to show an Israeli soldier with his arm around a statue of Mary, holding a cigarette up to her mouth. The Israeli army said it views the incident with utmost severity

and that the soldier's conduct completely deviates from the values it expects. It said that an initial review showed the image was taken several weeks ago. Last month, the Israeli military said two soldiers would receive 30 days of military detention and be removed from combat duty due to the destruction of a statue of Jesus in the Lebanese village of Debel. Israeli troops remain in a wide area of southern Lebanon, where they say they are rooting out Hezbollah. fighters and their infrastructure. Residents have been told to leave.

Yoland Nell. The World Health Organization says five of the eight suspected cases of hunter virus linked to a deadly cruise ship outbreak have now been confirmed. The head of the global health body, Ted Roscoe Bresus, gave this update shortly before we recorded this podcast. WHO assesses the public health risk as low. WHO is working with multiple governments and partners on the response our priorities are to ensure the affected patients receive care

that the remaining passengers on the ship are kept safe and treated with dignity and to prevent any further spread of the virus. Meanwhile, health officials from a number of countries are working to trace passengers who left the MV Hondias before the hunter virus outbreak on board was confirmed. Three people have died and several others who were taken ill have been taken off the ship for urgent medical.

treatment. Nearly 150 others remain on board. They're due to disembark in Tenerife in the Canaries this weekend, despite the objections of the local authorities. Our health correspondent Dominic Hughes told James Menendez more. We know that 30 people disembarked from the ship at St Helena on the 24th of April, so contact tracing for those people is underway, so they'll be looking at immediate family members, people who might have sat next to them on a long-haul flight, for example, as they travelled home. We know that around 150 passengers and crew from 23 countries remain on board the ship. There are no new cases on board, as far as we know.

In an update on Thursday, the cruise operator said there were no symptomatic individuals present on board. And the World Health Organisation, in fact, says that no other passengers of crew on board are symptomatic at the moment. We also know that three people were evacuated yesterday and are now being treated in isolation in the Netherlands as well as a British gentleman, there is 41-year-old Dutch crew member and a 65-year-old German passenger as well. Those that they manage to trace,

I mean, what's going to be the advice? Are they going to be asked to isolate at home? Yes, they will be. So they'll be asked to either isolate at home or in some cases they will be put in sort of Pacific quarantine. So when the ship, the MV. docks in Tenerife in a couple of days. Passengers will first be screened for symptoms,

and then if all is well, they'll be flown back to their countries of origin. I know those who coming back to the UK are coming back on a specially chartered flight, for example. Then they'll be asked to self-isolate. Some of those people may need to be put into quarantine, but it depends on when they were last exposed to the virus. And one of the complicating factors is that the incubation period for this and, The Andes strain of the Hantavirus, which is thought to be behind this outbreak. Now, that can be up to eight weeks, so people will be asked to isolate for at least, I think, 42 days, maybe six weeks, in order to make sure that they are through that period.

And are health officials any closer to working out how this outbreak began? They are getting a bit closer, I think. The Andes virus was first identified in 1995 in Argentina, and then in Chile the same year. and it's thought that the initial cause of infection, like all other hantavirus strains, is linked to rodents, particularly in the case of the Andes virus. It comes from the long-tailed pygmy rice rat. Now, in the UK, the health security agency here says

that most hantiruses do not spread between humans, but person-to-person transmission has happened with the Andes virus strain in very rare cases. And there appear to be several different strains of this single virus. And in South America, those cases tend to peak in the spring and summer months when the number of rodents is highest and people are outdoors more, particularly in rural areas where rodents have been active. We know also that the Dutch couple who were the first to fall ill and then sadly die, they've traveled in South America, in Argentina, before joining the cruise. So the idea is that one possible route for the virus to a spread is that one or both of them became infected with the virus or came. into contact with the virus.

Dominic Hughes. A massive mega tsunami wave created when part of an Alaskan mountain crumbled into the sea is the second tallest on record. Last summer, the giant wave swept through a remote fjord in southeastern Alaska, leaving destruction in its wake. The event went largely unreported at the time, but a new scientific analysis shows it was caused by a massive landslide. Scientists are now talking about the risks,

by such events. James Copnell found out more from Brettwood Higman and Alaskan geologist. August 10th, there's a chunk of this mountain up above a fjord called Tracy Arm in Alaska and southeast Alaska that cut loose. It's about 65 million cubic meters of rock. This is very much the bedrock. It's not soil and stuff. It was deep down hundreds of meters in some cases below the surface and fell rapidly into the fjord. It kind of hit the end of the glacier that was below it, carved off some of the glacier, went into the fjord and produced a tsunami. The big impressive number is that it ran 481 meters up the mountain on the opposite side of the

fjord, but it also continued on down the fjord after that, often reaching up 100 meters or more above the water. Quite a few people actually experienced it in different ways. There was one really close call with a campsite where their gear was swept away, but they were just outside the limit of the tsunami. And there was another big vessel that was fortunately in super deep water, so they weren't really affected, but they saw the wave breaking on the shores near them. And so no one ended up being hurt, which was really, really lucky.

But even weeks later, I understand, you saw the damage, the devastation it had caused elsewhere. Absolutely, yeah. It stripped all the brush and forest off the mountain sides for many kilometers down the fjord. And we went, it was almost two months later, I think around two months later, we were out and did a survey of this so that we can better understand how these events play out.

How does such a large chunk of a mountain just crumble into the sea? You know, one way to think about it is that, I mean, the surface of the earth is always changing. And sometimes that happens as lots of little landslides, just a little bit going away each time. And they might not seem little if you were there or if your house was in the way. But there are things that happen quite commonly. But in some places, the way it happens is a big chunk of the mountain will break off all at once.

It sounds like this time might have been something of a lucky escape. But are you concerned that there could be other mega tsunamis of this kind, that there could be risks to humans and others? Yeah, I'm very much concerned about that. We've actually had a surprising number of these recently. If you look back through the 20th century, you might see an event like this in this whole region of the world, like Canada and Alaska might happen once every 20 years or so. So pretty rare events where a big landslide generates a tsunami like this. But we had this one in 2025. There was one in 2024, a little closer to where I live and swept underneath occupied guest cabins at a lodge.

there were tsunamis basically every year going back for the last six, eight years. And so it's a much, much higher frequency than normal. And we have both theoretical reasons and empirical reasons to think that that's linked to glacial retreat related to climate change and also weakening of slopes that have permafrost in them. Some places you might not think of having permafrost. There is permafrost up in the higher mountains, increased visitation by. cruise ships and such to these glacial fjords. They're really a tremendous number of people going up into these places. You have ships that might have thousands of people on them that are going right up near to these glaciers.

So probably not every glacier is the same level of risk. There's good reasons to be worried there might be a subsequent tsunami and Tracy Arm. And so now there's people are pulling back a bit from that place, which is good. But there is quite a large possibility that something will happen somewhere else. and we're not ahead of that curve yet. We're not ready for that next event. The Alaskan geologist, Dr. Brett Wood Hickman. If you're a social media user,

there's a good chance you'll have been offered solutions to transform your body shape. But experts have told BBC Sport they have serious concerns about the widespread and growing trend of AI-generated characters advertising fitness programs online. A BBC investigation has uncovered

false and misleading claims about dramatic body transformations that breach the advertising rules in Britain. Often the disclaimers stating the ads contain AI are obscured or missing altogether. Our sports correspondent Katie Gournell has compiled this report. Most women lose the first 10 pounds within weeks of starting. Every man should start doing military training. I teach women 50 plus how to burn belly fat. They look polished and persuasive and sometimes very realistic. AI-generated characters on social media telling us how to get fit

and promising dramatic results. Some of these claims are problematic and when we showed the videos to the public, it's not always clear what's real and what's not. I don't think that's AI. I mean, it's a good AI. I think this is AI. I don't think the one before was AI.

You're bombarded with it on your feed every day. If you look into something like Telethin Fitness-wise, it just comes on your stream after that, you know? Yeah, once it's got to the one, it never stops, is it? Obviously you see all these fake things where there's people putting things together and it's hard to tell what's real and what's not and I think that's the scary thing you can't tell and

it's like who can you trust really. It just sets unrealistic expectations for everyone on the internet. It's just horrible. It's really bad. Have you ever clicked on those ads? I've downloaded an app once because I thought it was real. Shoulders back, shoulders down. There is though nothing artificial about this. Here at a gym class on the beach in Tyemouth

in the northeast of England, more than 30 people are being put through their paces, watched and encouraged by real instructors. What is quick as we can then up and pull down and pull. AI has its place. And I think with looking at maybe fitness programs, nutrition and all of that, you cannot beat that real person, that real connection. David Fairlam has been a personal trainer for 30 years. He says his concern is not the technology itself, but the messaging. See how they all look on day 28.

It's frightening things have been said there as well that we can do this in that time. In 30 years, I'm telling you now, that just can't happen. Because I know, because I've been in this industry so long, most people won't, and that makes it even more worrying. And people will expect that so that you can think, right, 28 days before I go on holiday, I can look like that. We've got no chance.

We submitted several adverts featuring AI-generated fitness characters to the advertising standards authority. Ads are assessed on whether they're misleading or likely to be harmful. The regulator upheld multiple breaches, stating it was unlikely that the advertisers could provide adequate evidence to substantiate the claims and said they'd be taking steps against them. We also contacted the companies behind the adverts, as well as meta and TikTok. They declined to comment. I think the economics of social media and the kind of attention economy in which we live lend itself towards more AI content. Experts like Professor Andy Meir at the

University of Salford say the trend for this type of content is huge. It's really clearly useful in many, many ways, but where it then misleads people to have perhaps false expectations of things that they do that don't lead to some great outcome that it's promising is where perhaps regulation needs to step in. AI may be changing the face of exercise online, but getting fit still means putting in the hard yards. And in a class like this one in Timemouth, they know who to trust. That report by Katie Gournell.

And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can always email us at global podcast at BBC.co.com. This edition of the Global News podcast was mixed by Rosenwyn Dorrell. The producers were Mazzaffa Shakir and Oliver Berlough. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Jeanette Jalil. Until next time. Goodbye.