Global News Podcast - Russia's chemical weapons chief killed in Moscow bomb blast

Episode Date: December 17, 2024

Igor Kirillov was killed in the explosion on Tuesday. Also; a powerful earthquake flattens buildings and cuts communications in Vanuatu, and how one letter was delivered to the wrong address thousands of kilometres away.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Are we not fighting for us? Just for the people back home? Purple Heart Warriors. Listen now by searching for dramas wherever you get your BBC podcasts. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Chris Burrow and at 14 GMT on Tuesday 17th December these are our main stories. A Russian general sanctioned for using banned chemical weapons in Ukraine has been killed

in a bomb blast. Kiev said they carried it out. We have the latest. A powerful earthquake flattens buildings and cuts communications on the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu. And the pop star Adele has been accused of copying a Brazilian composer. Also in the podcast, Christian worship continues in Syria but how are people feeling after a tumultuous week in the Middle East? We start in Moscow, in an ordinary neighbourhood just a few kilometres south-east of the Kremlin, where in the early hours of this morning a remote-controlled bomb, hidden in a scooter, went off outside the entrance to an apartment block. This local resident, Yulia, was nearby.

The explosion was so powerful, I was terribly afraid to look out the window. People started coming out of this house to see what happened. Thankfully, my building wasn't damaged, but it's very scary. The blast killed a senior Russian general, Igor Kirillov, who was in charge of Russia's chemical weapons, as well as his assistant. The attack comes a day after Ukrainian prosecutors accuse the general of using banned chemical weapons. The BBC's Russia editor Steve Rosenberg is in Moscow and gave me the latest. I was there earlier this morning and the apartment block had been cordoned off. There were police

lines and Russian investigators outside the entrance still clearing things away and looking for evidence. Quite a bit of damage to that particular entrance way, clearly, and a lot of shock. I mean, we spoke to residents nearby and the sense was that, you know, suddenly this war, which for many people has been a war on television or a war they've looked at on their phones, something that doesn't really concern them, you know, what happened today was a real jolt to the system when you have a top Russian general being assassinated in a residential district of Moscow. It brings it home, certainly to people living around there, that actually the war in Ukraine is not happening a long way away.

It's actually very real and very close to home. And one thing the Russian authorities, I think, have been quite successful at to this point has been to normalise the war so that people think, well, you know, it's going on, but we'll get on with our own lives. As I say, this was a jolt to the system and a reminder that actually it's very close to home.

Is the assumption by residents there that Ukraine did this? Because I know there are claims from within the security forces of Ukraine that this was carried out by the Ukrainian side. Well, certainly the feeling from Moscow is, yes, Russia is pretty convinced that Ukraine was behind this. Russian officials have been pointing the finger at Ukraine, also at the West, suggesting that somehow Western countries orchestrated this attack.

There's almost certain to be a response from Moscow. Retaliation already calls from some quarters for retaliation. It is a very high-profile killing in Moscow, a very high-ranked Lieutenant General, and as I say we're still trying to piece together exactly what happened in the circumstances here but yeah I think a sense of shock would be the right way to describe things. And is this it sounds like a significant blow to Russia's war effort and an organization at the top? Well it is a blow certainly but I mean when you look back over the last what nearly three years of what the

Kremlin called originally and still calls the special military operation, something that was only going to last a few days or a few weeks maximum and has dragged on for three years. There have been so many blows. This is an operation, a war, which has not gone at all according to plan for Moscow, even though Vladimir Putin only yesterday, when he was addressing army chiefs was very upbeat and saying things were going Russia's way and Russia had the strategic initiative in this war, when you look back at what has happened and so much has happened and so much

has gone wrong for the Kremlin in three years. What happened today, early this morning, this bomb attack, is the latest in a long line of incidents that Moscow did not prepare for when Vladimir Putin ordered Russian troops across the border into Ukraine nearly three years ago. Steve Rosenberg in Moscow. A powerful earthquake has hit the Pacific Island nation of Vanuatu, damaging and even flattening some buildings in the capital port villa. Communications have also been affected after the magnitude 7.3 quake, which was followed by tremors.

The BBC managed to get through to Dan McGarry, a journalist based in Port Vila. It was the most violent earthquake I've experienced in my 21 years living in Vanuatu and in the Pacific islands. I've seen a lot of large earthquakes, never one like this. My wife, who was born in Vanuatu, said it was the worst that she'd experienced in her life. The damage that we've seen in the capital is more extensive than any I've seen in previous earthquakes. Our correspondent Katie Watson is monitoring events from Sydney. It struck at 1247 local time, so just around lunchtime at about 30 kilometres from the capital, Port Villa,

and at depths of up to 57 kilometres. So as we heard just there, I think a lot of people were shocked by the intensity of the quake, and there have been a series of smaller aftershocks in the hours after the initial quake. But very quickly people were jumping on social media and posting images of one flattened building where you could see authorities were looking to see whether there were any people trapped. And there was also the US embassy building that showed pictures of broken windows and that same building, the UK High Commission, the French embassy, the New Zealand High Commission, they're all in the same building.

So the US have said that their people are safe and sound, so if New Zealand were able to evacuate safely during the earthquake, but still it is a massive operation and the communications are still very difficult. On the ground it's a you know a small island nation very much in the middle of the Pacific so you can imagine the logistics of trying to get help. How usual is it for Vanuatu to get extreme weather events because it sounds like from what Dan McGarry was saying that they they do happen but just not to this extent? Absolutely I mean it's in an area of seismic activity, it's a part of the world that's

not unused to natural disasters. Last year there was a series of cyclones that affected the island, there have been earthquakes in recent years, but the extent that, you know, the size of this earthquake and obviously the distance and intensity at which it hit took everybody by surprise and is obviously making people nervous with the aftershocks that we have been seeing and registered on the islands. But it's about 80 islands, an archipelago of just over 80 islands, very low-lying islands and that's why there was concern initially about a potential tsunami threat. It is a part of the world that is very used to natural disasters,

but it's also part of the world that's very vulnerable to them in terms of, you know, getting support, getting help. And Australia, which is one of the closest large nations, has said that it stands by ready to assist Vanuatu and no doubt will be one of the first on the ground when they can get there. Katie Watson, the leader of the rebel group that toppled the Assad regime, is calling for sanctions against the country to be lifted. Ahmed al-Sharah, who is now Syria's de facto leader, told a visiting British envoy that it was important to end restrictions imposed during the rule of Bashar al-Assad so that

displaced Syrians could return home. Some HTS fighters and families are returning to the western city of Homs. Our chief international correspondent, Lise Doucette, made regular trips there throughout the war and has just returned to the city. The church of the Virgin Lady of the girdle in the heart of the old city of Homs, said to be one of the oldest churches in the world. And these streets saw some of the heart of the old city of Homs, said to be one of the oldest churches in the world. And these streets saw some of the worst of the fighting in Syria's war. We came to this church nearly a decade ago when President Assad's forces pushed the rebels out of the old city of Homs and then the church was cold and dark

the pews shattered smashed and scattered across the floor and now the rebels are back in control of Syria. How do you feel today? I feel happy. I hope that even better days are coming. We are proud of our people. We're all together as one. And I hope there will always be a place for Christians in Syria. You're Syrian, you're a Christian, you're a woman. Yes. What is your main worry?

I hope that we Christians will be protected. We need some reassurance about our place here. We deserve to be here like all the other religions. Just listen to the sound of the city. There's a lightness in the air now. It's so different from the darkness of a decade ago when Syrian forces lay siege to the old city and neighborhoods nearby. I have a lot of memories about the destroyed and the explosion.

I have some flashbacks about that. Dr. Hayan Alabrash survived the old city siege, two years treating patients under fire, underground. Now he's back for the first time in 10 years. We're going into this empty charred warehouse now. Dr. Haiyan thinks this is where they had their underground secret makeshift hospital. Going down the stairs. Dark, dank, cold, chilling. The patient you see come from there to here. They come down the stairs. Yes.

How does it feel? It's a strange feeling. I remember the people saying here, screaming, we don't have a lot of medicine. We don't have blood. A lot of them, you know, injured and need blood to treat. Must have been cold. Yes, it was very cold. Very cold.

Now it's time to build Syria for everyone, but not who killed us and have blood in his hand. For that we don't forgive. It's impossible for us. And Syrians gathered here at the city's most iconic landmark, the New Clock Tower. It was here in the spring of 2011 that Syrians gathered for peaceful demonstrations to call

for greater freedoms. And now it's a place of pilgrimage. On one side I can see women, little girls, some in head scarves, some not, posing for selfies and around the corner there's men with guns. This is a snapshot of a new Syria. Lise Doucet. Researchers in Germany say they've deciphered an inscription which could be the oldest known evidence of Christianity in Europe. The writing is on a scroll in an 1800 year old silver amulet which the archaeologists digitally unrolled. Sophie Smith reports. Until now it's been hidden inside a silver amulet

wrapped in a wafer-thin piece of foil that's too fragile for archaeologists to unravel by hand. The message comes from a time when Christianity was still spreading across Europe and was taken from the grave of a man found buried in what is now the German city of Frankfurt, in the former Roman city of Nieder. Although the amulet itself was found in 2018, researchers have only now been able to decipher the scroll using computer tomography, which is scans similar to x-rays. Birgit Spahn is one of the conservationists from the Archaeological Museum of Frankfurt and Mainz that deciphered the text. Both the capsule and scroll are made of silver. The scroll consists only of a very, very thin

silver foil with a thickness of only 63 micrometers, which made further rolling impossible. So what does it say? In the name of Jesus Christ, Son of God, it says, may this means of salvation protect the man who surrenders himself to the will of the Lord Jesus Christ. The owner of the scripture is thought to have died between 230 and 270 AD, when Christians were still persecuted. The researchers have said that evidence of Christianity north of the Alps has never existed before this study. But it's not the first time this year that similar technology has been shown to decipher

historical artefacts. In February, researchers used artificial intelligence to digitally unroll charred historical texts in Pompeii, which means that scientific breakthroughs have an important role in helping us understand the past. That was Sophie Smith. Still to come in this podcast? A nice pink envelope and think to myself, right, who's Afron? Because I've got a birthday coming up and obviously you've got Christmas. And you look in and then just confused.

The letter that was delivered to the wrong address 17,000 kilometres away. World of Secrets is where untold stories are exposed, and in this new series we investigate the dark side of the wellness industry, following the story of a woman who joined a yoga school, only to uncover a world she never expected. I feel that I have no other choice. The only thing I can do is to speak about this. Where the hope of spiritual breakthroughs leaves people vulnerable to exploitation. You just get sucked in so gradually and it's done so skillfully that you don't realise.

World of Secrets, The Bad Guru. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Let's turn to Wisconsin now where at least two people have been killed and six others wounded in the latest school shooting in the United States. A female student opened fire inside a classroom of the Abundant Life Christian School in Madison on Monday morning. The police chief, Sean Barnes, gave details about the suspect. The shooter has now been identified as 15-year-old Natalie Rupnow, who went by the name Samantha. She was a student at the school and evidence suggests she died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. At this time, we believe there was only

one shooter involved. We are still working to determine a motive. Detectives have talked to her family members this evening as well as conduct a search of the shooter's home here in Madison. Naomi Ruckham from our partner broadcaster CBS gave us the latest. This is what we know so far. Police in Madison, Wisconsin are searching for answers after a 15-year-old female student opened fire at a small private Christian school yesterday morning. One student and one teacher were killed and half a dozen others were injured. The young woman also died after turning the gun on herself. The details are chilling, involving so many young lives. Police arrived on scene at

the school minutes after a second grader called to report an active shooter just before 11 a.m. A sixth grader said he heard the gunshots while sitting in English class. The teacher who was killed was a substitute for another teacher who had called out sick. Meanwhile police have identified that shooter as 15 year old student Natalie Rupnow who went by the name Samantha. She was pronounced dead on the way to the hospital and police recovered a 9mm handgun from the scene. Investigators have searched her home and say the family is cooperating with the investigation.

Naomi Ruckham from CBS. Now let's see if you can hear the similarity. This is our first song. I only wanted to have fun. That's Adele's hit from 2015, million years ago, and now listen to this. ["Mulheres", by Adel's hit from 2015 million years ago, playing in the background.] That's Mulheres, a Brazilian composer who said Adele had ripped off his earlier Samba hit. A Brazilian judge seems to agree with him. He's just ordered Adele's song to be pulled from all radio stations and streaming services around the world because he deemed it to be plagiarism. Our Americas regional editor Leonardo Rocha told us more about how it's come to

this. Well I've heard about this alleged plagiarism for years. I mean people have been sending these melodies, even mixed versions of them put together for a few years from Brazil. The songwriter Toninho Gerais, he wrote that song for probably Brazil's number one samba singer Martinho da Vila. It was launched in 1995 and it was a big hit in the mid-90s. So I imagine many people when they heard Adele's song they said, oh that sounds similar, but of course that can happen in music. There are many cases where there's just a coincidence, the melody is similar, it's quite a simple melody, but what this songwriter has been saying is that they approached Adele, they tried to reach a deal for compensation and for some of the copyrights and they didn't get any

reply from her or from the label and that's why they decided to go to court. So it's been a long time coming but now it's coming it's a big one it's a global ban isn't it? How does Brazil have such a wide jurisdiction in this? I was surprised with that and what's been said in Brazil the local media is that Brazil is a signatory of the Berne Convention that protects copyright. So as one of the signatories, I think it's 180, 181 countries, if one of the countries issues a ban, a judge, the others have to follow. And the way they will try to enforce that is by imposing a fine on the record label, Adele's record label,

every time someone across the world in New Zealand, in Australia, in Zambia, anywhere, if they hear this song being played or downloaded they could issue a fine. I don't know how effective that will be but it's quite strong. So as far as we know is there any recourse for Adele or her record label now? Can they appeal? They can appeal. In Brazilian courts, a judge can issue an injunction and someone else a day later can just void that. But it just highlights the case that many people who are not in Brazil are probably unaware of. I mean, it's a very similar song song but that doesn't mean anything and it's going to be decided by the experts or maybe in an agreement. Leonardo Rocha speaking to Nick Miles. A BBC investigation has found reports of

at least 565 children being killed or wounded by crude bombs in the Indian state of West Bengal over the last three decades. The homemade devices have been an issue in the region for years as New Persona reports. When election season arrives in West Bengal so does the violence. Bombs, arson, attacks, clashes among political parties seem to be commonplace in West Bengal in election season. And this violence is dominated by crude bombs, homemade explosives packed with shrapnel. Children picked them up, mistaking them for toys. There is some breaking news coming in. We're learning that a minor has been killed in an

explosion. In fact, children, we believe, were playing in that area when the bomb hit. There is no publicly available data on crude bomb child casualties in West Bengal. So the BBC went through the archives of two Bengali newspapers since 1996, unearthing reports of 565 children killed, maimed or injured. On average, one child every 18 days. Cases do go unreported, so the actual number is likely to be higher. 14-year-old Sabina sits on a wooden stool outside her home. She cradles a small black goat on her lap.

Her midnight blue headscarf hides what's left of her right arm. I had taken my goat to the garden, she says, describing how she saw a ball under a tree. She started playing with it, and that's when the explosion happened. Amina Bibi is Sabina's mother. My daughter kept trying saying she would never get her hand back. I kept consoling her but she kept on crying. Crude bombs were first used by revolutionaries in West Bengal in the early 1900s to fight the British. I want to eat everything. bomb making skills have been passed down the generations. Pankaj Datta is West Bengal's former Inspector General of Police. He passed away last month.

During any major election here, you will see the rampant use of bombs. The sole purpose of this use is for area dominance and political dominance. If this culture persists, you can never do good for society. In the middle of the 2024 general election, If culture persists, you can never do good for society. In the middle of the 2024 general election, another West Bengal family moans a child killed by a crude bomb. My son is gone, cries the mother of Raj Biswas. The nine-year-old was playing when he found the explosives. The BBC asked West Bengal's four main political parties whether they commissioned crude bombs

for electoral gain. The Communist Party of India Marxist and the Indian National Congress strongly denied doing so. The All India Trinamool Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party did not respond. As family and friends lay raj to rest, chanting from a political rally can be heard in the wind. Hail Bengal! The crowd shouts.

Hail Bengal! New Persona reporting. The Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has said he's devastated by the death of the actor Marisa Paredes, devastated by the death of the actor Marisa Paredes, praising her as one of the most important actresses our country has produced. Paredes, who was 78, started acting as a teenager and appeared in dozens of films. She became an international name after she starred in several films by Pedro Amoldovar, as well as Roberto Benigni's Oscar-winning Life is Beautiful.

Jules Jacob, former president of the Cannes Film Festival, paid tribute to Paredes for her calm grace and that gentle cheerfulness she ignited with one look of her pale eyes. The Spanish Film Academy has said Spanish cinema is left without one of its most iconic actresses. Our Europe Regional Editor, Warren Bull, has more on her life. There is a small chance that we will be saved. has more on her life. Marisa Paredes in one of her most acclaimed roles, Leo Macias in Pedro Amadorva's The Flower of My Secret. It was one of many roles she played in the Spanish director's films that brought her international acclaim. Marisa Paredes was born in Madrid and started acting at the age of 14. Still under the rule of General Franco, Spain in the 1960s was opening up more, and Marisa Paredes was able to make

the most of the wider variety of acting roles for women. With her distinctive gravelly Madrileñan voice, she appeared in major theatre and television roles and more than 70 movies, including all about my mother. There are people who think that children are just things of one day, but it takes a long time. A long time. Her role as the actress Umar Rojo was one of her most memorable parts in an Elmer Dover movie. She also played in Roberto Bernini's Oscar-winning dark wartime comedy Life is Beautiful, which

won several Oscars. Marisa Paredes was a true great of Spanish cinema. Her diversity of range and contribution to world cinema was recognised with numerous accolades, including an honorary Goya Award in 2018. Warren Ball. It's the busiest time of year for many postal services around the world. Presents need to be delivered, Christmas cards sent, and that's alongside all the usual letters and parcels. In the UK, Royal Mail says mistakes are rare but they do happen.

But one letter which arrived in Wales was delivered almost 17,000 kilometres away from its intended destination. It arrived in Penarth in South Wales instead of Penrith in New South Wales, Australia. Here's Keith Georgiou who was a bit confused when it arrived at his house. A nice pink envelope and think to myself, right, who's our friend because I've got a birthday coming up and obviously you've got Christmas and you're looking and then just confused. I mean it's got Australia and it's got NSW for New South Wales on there but it didn't say South Wales. I mean how can anybody from Exeter and the sorting office, then it's gone to another sorting office, then it gets to Pynar's sorting office and Pynar's sorting office

go, oh, of course, that's not for Australia, it's for Glebe Street round the corner. Just think about how many hands that went through and even the postman delivering it on the day. Put a note on it, made it clear that this is supposed to go to Australia. I mean, I shouldn't need to Australia. I mean I shouldn't need to should I? And Keith said he did forward that letter onto its intended recipient. We hope it finds its way there before Christmas. And that's all from us for now but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast

later on. If you'd like to comment on this podcast do send us an email it will arrive we promise our address is global podcast at bbc.co.uk you can also find us on X we're at global news pod this edition was mixed by Stephen Bailey and the producer was David Lewis our editor is Karen Martin I'm Chris Barrow and until next time thanks for listening goodbye World of Secrets is where untold stories are exposed, and in this new series we investigate the dark side of the wellness industry, following the story of a woman who joined a yoga school, only to uncover a world she never expected. I feel that I have no other choice. The only thing I can do is to speak about this.

Where the hope of spiritual breakthroughs leaves people vulnerable to exploitation. You just get sucked in so gradually and it's done so skillfully that you don't realize. World of Secrets, the bad guru. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts.