Global News Podcast - Trump orders India tariff hike to 50% for buying Russian oil

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

US President Donald Trump has issued an executive order hitting India with an additional 25% tariff over its purchases of Russian oil. That raises the total tariff on Indian imports to the US to 50% - among the highest rates imposed by Washington. India has called the taxes unfair, unjustified and unreasonable. Also: Donald Trump says there's a good chance he will meet President Putin of Russia soon to discuss a ceasefire in Ukraine, and Italy gives final approval for world's longest suspension bridge to Sicily. 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]

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I think I might just have solved a murder. And outrageous, a scandalous true story. Seems there's a political extremist in every family these days. See it differently when you stream the best of British TV with Britbox. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Janat Jalil, and in the early hours of Thursday the 7th of August, these are our main stories. Donald Trump hits India with an extra 25% tariff for its Russian oil purchases. But he also says he could be meeting President Putin soon to discuss a ceasefire in Ukraine.

Thousands of French firefighters are struggling to control the country's big. biggest wildfires in decades. Italy says it's going to build the world's longest suspension bridge linking the mainland to Sicily. Also in this podcast, new research from Rwanda indicates friendships formed by female mountain guerrillas are far more important and enduring than previously understood. They were really sticking out groups in which they knew females, and this really tells us that those female-female relationships, they can still continue to matter even after years apart. Donald Trump has inflicted yet another hefty economic blow on India,

announcing an additional 25% tariff on Indian imports because of India's continued purchases of Russian oil. This comes on top of the 25% tariff announced last week, raising the total tariff on Indian imports to the US to 50%, one of the highest rates in the world. The US President's Executive Order came despite his senior envoy, Steve Wickoff, holding talks in Moscow with President Putin, with the Kremlin describing them as productive, and the US President saying great progress had been made,

so much so that Mr Trump says he may soon hold a meeting with a Russian leader to discuss a ceasefire in Ukraine. some very good talks with President Putin today. And there's a very good chance that we could be ending the round, ending the end of that road. That road was long and continues to be long. But there's a good chance that there will be a meeting very soon. Mr. Trump has set a deadline for this Friday for Russia to reach a peace deal with Ukraine. I asked our Washington correspondent, Nomya Iqbal, why Mr. Trump had decided to impose these extra tariffs on India now when the US and Russia appear to be having constructive talks.

He'd been threatening to do so since last week and now he's followed through issuing this executive order and it's among the highest on all of the US's longstanding allies and trading partners. I mean, 50%. We're talking about here and he's basically, I think we can read something into the fact that he's trying to get this ceasefire, which looks like it won't happen on Friday. and he's punishing India for basically, in his words, fueling the Russia war machine by purchasing cheap oil and has been demanding that Prime Minister Modi pick aside. And what should we make of the fact that this announcement was made by the White House

shortly after Mr Trump's invoice, Steve Wickoff, met President Putin in Russia? Well, there's huge pressure on the US to deliver some sort of ceasefire or peace deal. Donald Trump remember famously said that he would end the war in Ukraine on day one. on Steve Wickoff, his envoy, the man who's been set out there to solve all the world's problems by the US, it's its fifth time in Russia, and it sounds like there won't be a ceasefire, there won't be a peace deal, certainly looking at Mr. Trump's social media post. I presume that these sanctions are secondary sanctions, Russia's already heavily sanctioned, to the point where it's questionable if further sanctions directly on the country would take

effect. So I think Mr. Trump is thinking, let's go after the countries Russia does business with, such as India, to put pressure on them in that way. Interestingly, he hasn't said much about China ramped up the rhetoric on China. China is a very important trading partner to Russia. But I think there is just big pressure on Mr. Trump generally to try and end the war as he promised he would. And it's a bit surprising, isn't it, for some observers, because there had been this long-time friendship between Narendra Modi and Donald Trump. And yet, India has been dealt two blows within a matter of days, 25% tariffs because they couldn't strike a trade deal,

and now this additional 25%. I guess those who support President Trump would say it shows that he's just not afraid to get tough on anybody, no matter if they are close allies or not. And yes, both men did seem to get on very well. I mean, Prime Minister Modi was here in the US earlier in the year. I mean, he really does like to appeal to Donald Trump as much as possible, even saying make India great again, adopting Mr. Trump's slogan.

Interestingly, he was asked about tariffs during his conference with Mr. Trump earlier in the year. Mr. Trump didn't say anything. I don't think there was any expectation that he would hit India with tariffs. They were trying to come up with some sort of trade deal. But like I said, he wanted Mr. Modi to pick aside. But India has said, look, we're acting in our interests and justifies the purchase of Russian oil by saying that it began to do that after traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the war began. And India says it was a move that was actively encouraged by the US at the time.

Nomia Iqbal. Gaza's Hamas-run civil defence agency says at least 20 people were killed and dozens more injured when four lorries taking supplies into the territory overturned on Tuesday evening. Medical officials have said they're struggling to deal with the casualties. John Donison sent this report from Jerusalem. At the Alaksa Martas Hospital in Daryl Bala, grief as they brought the bodies in. Local journalists told the BBC, crowds of desperate people rushed towards the lorries. Some climbed on top, causing the drivers to lose control.

Four vehicles overturned. Dr Khalil al-Dakran is a spokesperson at the hospital. There were more than 20 people killed and more than 100 injured. This was due to the trucks of a turning onto civilians, which happened because the occupation did not allow these trucks to enter through safe roads. These were commercial lorries carrying goods for sale, not aid. The Private Transport Association now operating in Gaza said that 26 trucks entered the territory. Six were looted and four of those over the United States.

returned. Separately, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, around 30 Jordanian trucks carrying aid to Gaza were again attacked by Jewish settlers, throwing stones and blocking the road. Jordan accused Israel of not doing enough to protect the convoy. And there's more on this on the BBC website. But did this story of yet more deaths in Gaza of civilians desperately trying to get aid make it onto the Israeli media. There is an emerging debate in Israel over the lack of reporting on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Rebecca Keseb spoke to an independent Israeli journalist Emmanuel Elbas Phelps and Biyamwe asking what coverage of the aid trucks in Gaza they'd been in Israel. This kind of story will have a very little attention also because today Prime Minister is pushing for a full plan to occupy Gaza and so that is the discussion.

and this kind of story is getting very little, if not allowed attention. And more generally about the humanitarian situation, I mean, it's on all the front pages of newspapers across the world, lots of images coming through even though reporters aren't allowed into Gaza. Is much of that being reported on in Israel, the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Gaza? It is talked about, and for the last two weeks, we also have been seeing in mainstream.

media, the pictures of the children and the hunger and the dire situation of Gaza, but it is quite a new development because it's talked about the pictures, the human pictures of the Gaza's trip have not been very shown broadly during the war. I have to say that the pictures of Evatel David and Ramboslavsky, the two hostages held by Hamas in Gaza that we've seen very, very skinny and suffering. That has been shown. shocking to Israelis, and that's the take over the conversation once again. You came to our attention because there was a little bit of confrontation in a broadcast interview you were part of recently, where you clashed with other people on the program

about how much should be shown from Gaza. Do you want to tell us what happened? It's a TV show on one of the main channels in Israel, Channel 13, where I see it as a contributor every week. And we were talking about the tolls of the war, the hostages still being held in the agony of the families. And we were talking about the soldiers that are falling during the war in Gaza. And then the discussion was kind of moving on. And I thought it was also imperative that we talk about the Palestinian victims and we just acknowledge them at least. And people around the table were not really interested in this talk. And it was pretty much representative of the public opinion in Israel

because we know from polls that only around 35% of the population would say that they are interested in the humanitarian situation in Gaza. But I want to claim that 35% is not that little. It needs its voice on mainstream media. and not to be ignored. So they tried to shut you down, didn't they? And you persisted and came back and said, no, we need to talk about this.

And then that sparked a response and you got a lot of criticism from people, but also people contacted you to say, thank you for speaking up on this issue. Yeah, actually, I did not get criticism. That was amazing. I got criticism during the show, but I got so many messages of support of people saying,

I wasn't sure my voice or my opinion was legitimate because I didn't see it on mainstream media. So thank you for that. Now, I want to say again, there is coverage of Gaza and there is a talk about Gaza from day one in Israel, but it's either in a Harris newspaper or on very specific shows, and it's not across the board. That was the Israeli journalist Emmanuel Elbas Phelps. Syria's new Islamist rulers have signed a dozen multi-billion dollar investment deals which will include funding for a new airport and a metro system in the capital, Damascus. The agreements follow the recent lifting of sanctions. Mike Thompson reports. It's all a huge turnaround for a government that had links with Al-Qaeda and was shunned by the West.

In addition to a new airport and metro system for Damascus, the $14 billion of investment, much of it is. from Qatar and Italy could fund high-rise residential towers up to 45 floors tall for as many as 20,000 people. Over recent months, Syria has also secured investment deals with Saudi Arabia, the US and Turkey. The UN has put the cost of rebuilding the country at $400 billion. Mike Thompson. Thousands of French firefighters are battling to contain the country's worst wildfires in nearly 80 years. They've scorched an area in southern France that's larger than the size of Paris, consuming forests and homes and forcing many people to flee. One woman has been killed and about a dozen others have been injured.

On a visit to the affected region of Ode, the French Prime Minister, Francois Bayou, described the fires as a catastrophe on an unprecedented scale. He said they were linked to global warming and drought. Our Europe correspondent James Waterhouse reports. When it comes to wildfires, the conditions in France's old region were described as ripe. Soaring temperatures with little rainfall have allowed these flames to take a firm grip. As emergency teams head in, you wonder where to start. There are fires everywhere. It's a disaster, says this firefighter.

All the vineyards are burning in the area. Those vineyards usually act as natural. barriers, but there are fewer of them now. Crews do what they can, on the ground or in the sky, but wildfires are not contained easily. All possible resources are on the way, says President Macron, for an operation it's feared could take days. Across Europe, the size of burnt areas is already twice the average, according to the EU. These French fires gradually took a hold overnight, as people,

and professionals looked on helplessly. I feel sad. I find it tragic to see so many fires since the beginning of summer. It's terrible for the wildlife, for the people who are losing everything. It's, yeah, I find it really very sad. Similar scenes in Tarifa, southern Spain,

where a forest fire is ripping through the countryside. Tourists are being evacuated. 18,000 people live here. It's extreme weather conditions that can cause such intense, devastating heat. It's climate change that is making wildfires more common across Europe and beyond. James Waterhouse. Italy's government has approved plans to build the world's longest suspension bridge. It would connect the island of Sicily to the mainland and stretch more than three kilometres. The bridge is expected to cost around 15 billion. Critics have voiced concerns about its feasibility and environmental impact,

but the government insists the project will accelerate development in Italy's less developed south. Rachel Wright told us more about it. Currently, if you want to travel between the Italian mainland and Sicily, which is the island off the toe of the boot of Italy, you have to take a ferry, which takes around 30 minutes. Both Sicily and Calabria are very poor regions, And there's been discussions for a long time, in fact, around 50 years, to build a bridge to bring an economic boost to the area. And the transport minister, Mateo Salvini, who's a dominant member of the right-wing government of Georgia Maloney,

has announced the government will build what he called the Metro over the strait. And it's a huge project. It will cost around $15 billion and take around 10 years. And the consortium that's going to build it says it will create more than 100,000. jobs. It'll be the longest suspension bridge in the world at around 3.3 kilometres and will include two railway lines in the middle and three lanes of traffic on either side. So a very ambitious plan but also a very controversial one. There's been plans to build this bridge for many years but it's been rejected before on the grounds of the enormous costs and because an

estimated 4,000 people on either side of the strait will be forced to leave their homes. They will of course be compensated, but that hasn't been enough to stop frequent protests against the bridge's construction. Environmental associations have already filed a complaint with the EU flagging serious risks for the local environment and green MPs are also against it. One more thing to consider is that the area has one of the highest seismic risks in Europe, meaning that it's prone to earthquakes. And of course there's always the issue of the mafia who are still very active in Sicily, though Mr Salvini did say

they would work very hard to stop any criminal infiltration of the project. And there are also doubts about whether this very ambitious project would actually ever be completed. The project has had several false starts already with the first plans drawn up more than 50 years ago. Eurolink, which is a consortium led by the Italian group WeBuild,

won the tender in 2006 to build. the bridge, but the government cancelled it after the Eurozone debt crisis. Now, the consortium remains the contractor on the revived project. And as Italy has agreed, along with other NATO allies, to massively increase its defence expenditure to 5% of GDP at the demand of US President Donald Trump, of this 1.5% can be spent on defence-related areas such as cyber security and infrastructure and the Italian government is hoping the Messina Bridge will qualify, particularly as Sicily hosts a NATO base. Rachel Wright.

Still to come. The recipe on the good food platform describes the dish as a store-goid favourite, with four simple ingredients. Why, a popular British food website has cooked up a storm in Italy with its unorthodox ingredients for a famous pasta dish. You're listening to the Global News podcast. The Army in India says it's using sniffer dogs, drones and heavy machinery to search for dozens of people still missing after flash flooding hit the northern state of Uttarakand

on Tuesday. At least four people are confirmed to have died. Many more are feared to be trapped under Debrose. Residents have been warned to stay away from rivers as levels are still dangerously high and heavy rainfall, damaged roads and phone lines are hampering rescue efforts. Nikki Shiller reports. The moment a torrent of water and mud gushed down the Himalayan mountain site engulfing the remote village of Durrani.

It's a tourist spot with hotels, resorts and restaurants. The sudden nature of the surge just didn't give people the chance to get away. Roads turned into rivers of mud, buildings were swamped. Disaster response officials say the mud was 15 meters or 50 feet deep in places. It's feared many people could be trapped under the debris. The weather and remote location are challenge for rescuers who provided first aid and helped get people to safety. The state chief said teams were on a war footing. doctors and is ensuring the availability of medicine. Provisions for food and other arrangements are being made, and the District's Administration's Police Department has deployed 160 police

officers. The disaster was a result of a cloudburst, an extreme sudden downpour of rain over a small area in a short period of time, which often leads to flash floods. The Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi offered his condolences. posting on social media. I pray for the well-being of all the victims. Relief and rescue teams are engaged in every possible effort. No stone is being left unturned in providing assistance to the people. The sheer amount of sludge has blocked part of the region's main river,

submerging land. Concern is growing that if the water is not drained out quickly, it could pose a serious threat to towns and villages downstream. Nikki Schiller, MRNA vaccines are credited with having saved millions of lives. But the US Health Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a long-time vaccine skeptic, has announced the Trump administration is to cancel $500 million in funding allocated to them. Mr. Kennedy has cancelled 22 projects for tackling infections such as COVID and flu. But health experts warn this is a dangerous step that could harm efforts to prepare for

the next pandemic. Here's our health and science correspondent, James Gallagher. Messenger RNA vaccines were heralded as a medical marvel that saved lives during the COVID pandemic. They used tiny snippets of genetic code to temporarily tell the body to make viral proteins. This trains the immune system to fight infection. Now, the US Health Secretary and arguably America's most famous vaccine skeptic, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is pulling the plug on half a billion dollars of funding. Let me be absolutely clear. HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them. That's why we're moving beyond the limitations of MRNA for respiratory viruses and investing in better solutions. He argues other

vaccine technologies are safer, offer better protection against mutations, and that MRNA vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory tract infections like COVID and flu. That runs contrary to the scientific consensus. The Pfizer-Biontac COVID vaccine is estimated to save nearly 6 million lives in its first year during the pandemic. There is a legitimate debate around which vaccine technology is best for which disease, but there are major concerns about funding being taken away from areas that MRNA is streets ahead of the competition, particularly when it comes to dealing with new infections and outbreaks. Dr. Paul Offutt, the director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia,

is concerned. So there's a concern that bird flu virus, so-called H5N1 virus, may become a pandemic. It might not, but it might. And if it does, you want to have a technology, in this case, messenger RNA, that can respond quickly. The advantage of the MRNA vaccines is that the production cycle is only about three months. There are still many unanswered questions. Will the move lead the world more susceptible to the next pandemic? Will it prove to be an opportunity for other countries like the UK to take the lead on MRNA research?

Or will the US's decision, as one of the biggest markets for pharmaceuticals, lead to vaccine research being focused elsewhere? James Gallagher reporting. Just like us humans, Mountain Gorillas move. in and out of different social groups throughout their lives. And just like us, it seems they like to seek out a familiar face. Researchers in Rwanda have found that even after many years apart, a female mountain gorilla entering a new group will seek out and join another female she already knows.

What you heard there were two gorillas, tab and rug, playing in Rwanda, giving each other what looks like a high five in the video footage. This new research on social activity comes from the Diane Fosse Gorilla Fund, an organisation that's been observing gorillas in Rwanda for about 20 years. For more on this, Krupa Paddy spoke to Victoire Martignac, a lead researcher from the University of Zurich in Switzerland. We wanted to focus on female gorillas dispersal. And essentially this is because in gorillas, both males and female disperses,

But males, they usually become solitary, and then they try to establish their own group by attracting females. But females, they go from one group to another. So we wanted to better understand how they make these decisions. And the result were very interesting because we found that females were avoiding groups that contained males they had grown up with. And this, we think, might be due to some in-breeding avoidance strategy. So the rule being that if you grew up with a male, it's quite likely that you related to him. And so it would make sense to avoid being in a group with him and reproducing with him because this would have pretty negative consequences for your offspring.

And yet, we find some very different results for the importance of females. So the females, they were very attracted to groups that contained family of females. And this was really unexpected, and this was a pretty exciting discovery for us, because we saw that they were really sticking out groups in which they knew females. And this really tells us that those female-female relationships, they can still continue to matter, even after years apart, long-term relationships might be very beneficial because they can actually help those females integrate better and also faster. It sounds like there's quite simply strength in the sisterhood.

Yeah. I mean, the reason why it's so exciting for us is that, well, first, we don't really know a lot about those female-female relationships in gorillas. When we look at behaviors in research, we always try to look at the cost of those behaviors, but also the benefits. And investing in a social relationship, you know, it takes. time, it takes energy. And so it has often been assumed that females, gorillas, or just individuals that dispersed multiple times, that they will not invest so much in those relationships

because why invest in a relationship if you or the other member might just emigrate at any time? And here we're showing that dispersal does not have to be the end of the social relationships. Actually, through dispersal, they can, you know, maintain old relationship as well as create new relationships. I wonder if there's anything that we as humans can learn from these bonds that clearly stand the test of time between female guerrillas. I guess it's really interesting to see that they can keep in touch. They don't need WhatsApp to do it. They, I mean, they live in a very similar society as the one we live in. And in terms of humans, we know that, you know, movement is such an important part of our lives. And sometimes I guess we do it so easily that

It's an ability that we take for granted, but the fact that it's also there in gorillas, I guess also shows us that it has like a very far evolutionary past. And this is very interesting to see. It's the kind of ability that, you know, does not fossilize. So looking at it in our close evolutionary cousins can also tell us a lot about the context in which those movement decisions take place. Victoire Martine Martiniak from the University of Zurich. A popular recipe website in Britain has drawn the ire of Italians for listing unorthodox ingredients for a famous Roman pasta dish.

Its recipe for caccio-epe told people to use parmesan when the cheese should have been, of course, pecorino, and to add butter when traditionally there isn't any. Olivia Noon takes up the story. The recipe on the good food platform describes the dish as a sauce. store cupboard favourite, with four simple ingredients. But it's here it made the fatal mistake. Italians say the real free ingredient recipe for cacho-epepe contains, like the name suggests, only cheese, more specifically pecorino, black pepper, and of course, pasta. An Italian restaurant association said it had requested an immediate correction and it had even taken up the issue

with the British embassy in Rome. Olivia Noon there. The US Vice President J.D. Vance is said to be on his way to the UK for a family holiday. The latest high-profile American to fall, it is reported for the charms of the Cotswolds area in southern England. There are honey-coloured stone cottages, medieval churches and quaint villages all nestled amongst the rolling hills. Many celebrities and business tycoons from around the world have been buying property there, or simply heading to one of the several luxury country clubs located there. Residents include the former British Prime Minister, David Cameron, the model, Kate Moss, and the US television presenter, Ellen DeGeneres.

Paddy O'Connell went to hiking in the area. One of my favourite walks here is to Turville Church, which stands there with its Saddleback Tower, and has so stood for more than 400 years. So people from all over the world and all over the UK and several names from the United States have left beautiful messages here. Lovely Scott and Susan from Austin in Texas.

All over the Cotswolds, international attention has been spreading in recent years, partly due to a string of celebrities and TV shows, but also, bluntly, just the beauty and charm. of the Cotswolds. I'm crossing from one churchyard to another to meet an American traveller, Lizzie de la Pena, who's chronicling her life in the Cotswolds

to her followers online, having moved here from the US. It's organized, it's proper, people are respectful, and we don't have that in the United States. So you've lived across the United States, You've lived in Mexico City. Do we have some of the nicest people in the world here in the Cotswolds? Absolutely.

Yes, hands down. I've made more friends here in two months than I have decades in both of those other countries. I'm by the river Windrush now in Whitney, one of the big towns. Locals here remind me that Whitney is not the Cotswolds, but it's one of the big towns where people from the Cotswolds come shopping. The area has been famed for a long time, and it is coming. alongside the interest of other Americans. Katie Campbell runs her own property firm here working as a house hunter. There's always been a strong percentage of clients looking to buy

in the Cotswolds coming from America, but it has increased year on year. They're looking for property that they can use as weekenders from London, the equivalent of what you would have in the Hamptons from New York, or they're looking to add to their portfolio globally. They're looking for the Cotswold Dream, which is Cotswold stone properties, stone-tiled roofs, mullioned windows, and views of the rolling landscape. And I went to chat to people at the bus stop. What do you think about the influx of American celebrities? I just hope they don't get as far as Ensham. Is that where you live? It is. Well, you've got the vice president coming soon, J.D. Vance. It's so right-wing. It's unbelievable. Would you welcome Mr. Vance in your village? No.

Is he coming here to live? He's coming here for a holiday. Oh, well, yeah. I think he liked the area a lot. There's lots of places to go, isn't there? And you wish them the best here? Yes, yes, yes. Back in East Leach, these two cars, disturbing the peace,

have just sent a rabbit scurrying across the gravel into the hedge ahead of me. Oh, no, there's another one. Huge, huge rabbit. Look at it. That was Paddy O'Connell there, admiring the beauty of the Cotswolds. And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered, you can send us an email. The address is Global Podcast at BBC.co.com.

This edition was mixed by Rosenwyn Dorrell. The producers were Liam McSheffrey and Charles Sanctuary, the editor, is Karen Martin. I'm Janet Jalil. Until next time. Goodbye.