Global News Podcast - UK to return some migrants to France in weeks says PM

Episode Date: July 10, 2025

Keir Starmer announces a "one in, one out" pilot scheme to deter illegal migration. Also: The original Jane Birkin handbag sells for millions, and why chimps have been wearing blades of grass.

You're listening to the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. Hello, I'm Oliver Conway. This edition is published in the early hours of Friday, the 11th of July. Britain has reached an agreement with France to return some migrants who cross the English Channel in small boats. Vladimir Zelensky says he's had positive conversations with President Trump about the US providing patriot air defence systems to Ukraine and Palestinian children queuing for nutritional supplements are killed in an Israeli strike

in Gaza. Also in the podcast, the original Birkin handbag has sold at auction for more than $10 million. Repeated efforts to solve the small boats crisis in the English Channel have failed. Already this year, more than 20,000 migrants have made the dangerous crossing from northern France to southern England. Britain and France have now announced a one-in-one-out deal, which will see some of them returned. In exchange, an equivalent number of migrants currently in France will then be allowed to come into Britain legally. A pilot scheme will start in weeks. The British Prime Minister Sakir Starmer said illegal migration was a global crisis.

It is also very acutely a crisis for our two nations, a crisis of law, security, humanity and fairness. We face a sprawling multi-billion pound enterprise run by organised criminal gangs, leading hundreds of people to their death in the channel. So we're determined together to end this vile trade. There is no silver bullet here, but with a united effort, new tactics and a new level of intent, we can finally turn the tables. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, is the first European leader to make a state visit to the UK since Brexit. He said the rise in boat crossings was partly a result of the UK's decision to leave the EU, saying the British people had been quote, sold a lie that it would help cut illegal immigration. He also said it was a problem for France too.

The only way to be efficient is to work together because you should not underestimate the impact the situation have as northern part of France and I think it's very often underestimated in your domestic debates but it's not a gift for Calais, Dunkirk and a lot of cities in France to have all these illegal migrants and even when you go to these migrants, one offers them asylum in France and some solutions they just refuse, they want to cross the channel. So we have no other options than working closely together. So how will this new scheme work? I asked our UK political correspondent Rob Watson The idea is that you would have someone in France who people thought would be a legitimate asylum seeker

Would have a strong claim in the UK. They would be allowed to come to the UK and in return Britain would return someone who had arrived in a boat back across the channel and and the idea is it would be a pilot scheme So they'd see how it would go and we've heard as reporters the idea that it might be something like 50 people a week. Which would be a tiny amount compared to those who arrive here. Absolutely I mean if you think that 44,000 just over 44,000 people have arrived in the last year you'd be talking if it was 50 a week you can do the maths, everyone listening, it would be about two and a half thousand people.

So, you know, a pretty small percentage. And that's why critics have said that, look, would this really be a deterrent if you only had something like a one in 17 chance of being sent back? The other thing I should point out is that, you know, it's possible that there will be all sorts of legal challenges to what it is

that Sikir Starmer and President Macron have agreed today and of course President Macron pointed out this will also need to be agreed with the European Union who have all sorts of kind of concerns about bilateral deals. Nevertheless, the British Prime Minister says it's a ground-breaking agreement. Is it something new that we haven't seen before? I mean it's ground-breaking post-Brexit, right? I mean, other countries have tried this kind of thing. But when Britain left the European Union in 2016,

or voted to leave in 2016, as President Macron pointed out, it lost the right to send people back across the channel because it was no longer part of those sorts of agreements to do with migrants. So I mean, it's groundbreaking, yes, in a post-Brexit sort of agreements to do with migrants. So I mean it's groundbreaking, yes, in a post-Brexit sort of way and obviously what President Macron and Prime Minister Stammer hope is that you know you would begin to deter people from gathering in northern France in the first place and from then making the journey to Britain.

Now of course whether it works is something we might well be looking out for politicians both sides of the channel in the next few months. Yeah the French also say Britain needs to deal with pull factors. I mean does the UK make it too nice for migrants? Are they desperate to get here? It's a very good question. I can only pass on to you what the expert analysis suggests and that is that there are three pull factors. One that quite often migrants on the French side have people that they know in the UK, maybe family members, maybe friends. Second that English is most likely to be the second language that migrants have. And then third is a perception quite

often sold by the people smugglers that somehow, you know, Britain is a sort of friendly welcoming kind of place. So those three call factors. Rob Watson. At least 15 people, including children, queuing for nutritional supplements are reported to have been killed by an Israeli strike near a medical centre in Gaza. Israel said it was targeting a Hamas fighter but is now reviewing the incident. Distressing video footage showed the aftermath of the attack. The children had been waiting at a clinic in Deir el-Bala in the centre of the Palestinian territory.

The clinic is run by a UNICEF partner agency, a private NGO based in the US called Project HOPE. James Menendez spoke to its CEO, Rabi Torbe. It was quite shocking. We had patients lined up in front of our clinic waiting to get care. Most of them are women and children and then a drone attacked in front of the clinic and killed 15 people, including 10 children and two women. So we were devastated. We were shocked. We're angry. This thing should not happen. It shouldn't happen anywhere. It shouldn't continue to happen in Gaza.

Israël says it was targeting a Hamas militant who took part in the October the 7th attacks. I mean, is there any justification for this sort of incident? Nothing justifies killing 15 civilians, including 10 children and two women. You know, I don't know what Israel was targeting. We have no knowledge of that, but there's absolutely nothing that justifies the killing of 10 children. A lot of them were malnourished, waiting for their nutrition ration that morning, and women come in to check on their prenatal care for their unborn children.

What exactly was hit? Was it the clinic itself or was it a building nearby? Do you know? It was not the clinic. It was in front of our clinic and a building nearby. It actually hit the street nearby. And that's why there was a lot of casualties that died because of that attack.

It was the patients waiting outside of the clinic, waiting for it to be open so they could be seen. And you've had to suspend operations at that clinic for what? The foreseeable future? I mean, have you had to do that at all during the course of this war or is this the first time? Unfortunately, I wish I could say it was the first time. Unfortunately, we've had to do it over and over again, whether it was because of certain evacuation orders that we've received or because the population moved because of those evacuation orders or attacks. I mean, we've had a couple of clinics already destroyed in the past.

And for this clinic, we will try to reopen it as soon as possible. People are suffering with no access to health care, with no access to food. So we cannot afford to keep it closed for the foreseeable future. I mean if you're not providing the sort of services that you do provide, what are the consequences? As if there's not enough death in Gaza. I mean if we do not provide the services that we are providing now, we will see more children starving to death. We will see more women dying from simple complications, elderly

dying from simply not having access to their diabetes medicines. I mean, our services are simple. It's primary health care in that clinic and it caters to mainly women and children. And it provides therapeutic food for the children, high energy biscuits for the malnourished children and the pregnant women and give them their medication. Some of them have epilepsy, some of them have problems breathing. So they come to our clinics to get the treatment as well as oxygen. Some of them come on daily basis. So if we stop those services, it's a death sentence for a lot of people in Deir el-Bala. So the clinic's been running for a long time and providing, as you say, services that people need. I mean, it's a well-known location. Would Israel have known that it was there?

Oh, absolutely. We've de-conflicted the location. We've given them the coordinates of the location. They know it's a clinic. There are no doubts about that. Rabbi Torbay, CEO of Project HOPE. Well the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is facing increasing pressure to agree and end the war in Gaza, not least from his close ally President Trump who he's been visiting this week. As he prepared to leave Washington Mr. Netanyahu spoke about the prospects for a permanent ceasefire but he stuck to his long-standing

condition that Hamas must give up all of its weapons and warned that a failure to reach a deal on Israel's terms would plunge the Palestinian territory into further conflict. We are trying to achieve the release of half of the live and the dead hostages in exchange for a temporary 60-day ceasefire. At the beginning of the ceasefire, we will enter negotiations for a permanent end of the war. In order to achieve this, this must be done according to the minimal conditions that we have set.

Hamas lays down its weapons. Gaza will be disarmed. It will have no more government of military capabilities. These are our basic conditions. Well, indirect negotiations have been taking place all week in Qatar. Hamas says it's willing to free 10 of the 20 hostages still alive in Gaza. We heard more about the possibility of a ceasefire from the BBC State Department correspondent Tom Bateman in Washington.

We learned from Mr Netanyahu that he says he is prepared to commit to a permanent end to this war, but the condition is he says Hamas must disarm and Gaza be demilitarised. Now it may well be that that is a condition he believes that the group won't sign up to and I think that's one of the reasons why we're still at this stalemate in the talks. Hamas for their part have demanded a US-backed guarantee that there is a permanent end to the war if negotiations continue during the 60-day truce. Because basically what they're seeking is they want to avoid a repeat of what happened during the last ceasefire when hostages were released, Palestinian prisoners released,

but then Israel returned to the war in Gaza, returned to its military offensive. And it seems we're at a stalemate on that particular point. And Mr Netanyahu has added that if they did the 60 days and Hamas didn't disarm, that he would return to war. So that threat of force remains there. And he leaves Washington tonight, the end of four days, during which the American president had hoped to be able to announce a breakthrough in these talks. That's what he said last week. He said he thought they'd get an agreement. Clearly it hasn't happened. There are signs of frustration from the White House.

His own envoy, Steve Wyckoff, was due to fly to Doha to finalise the final pieces of the discussions. It's not even clear now that he is flying, certainly not necessarily today, so we don't know when that's going to happen either. What is Hamas's position and how likely are they to budge? There's a few different intractable issues. One is around the control of the food supply. What the Israelis and the Americans want is the continuation of this new project, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which basically means that the Israeli military

has full control of the food supply to Palestinians. Then there is a question about Israeli troop withdrawals and where they're going to be. The Israelis are demanding to keep an area that is known as what they call the Morag Corridor in the south, which they basically have troops lined along the corridor. That is because they want to kettle in Palestinians to a small area in the south. That may well be because they want to further force them out and displace them into Egypt and further into the Arab world. And then you have what happens at the end of the 60 days.

You get the release of 10 living hostages, a number of the remains of dead hostages, an unknown number of Palestinian prisoners released by Israel. What Hamas is saying is if there are still negotiations during that time, they must continue beyond the 60 days so you negotiate a permanent end to the war and there you have a stalemate really I think on all of these issues at the moment. Tom Bateman talking to Alex Ritzen. Now for something rather different a new record for a handbag. A black leather ermes bag made for the late British-French actress Jane Birkin in the 1980s, has sold at auction in Paris for 8.6 million euros, just over 10 million dollars.

So why is this, the original Birkin bag, so valuable? Eben Davis asked accessories expert Carol Walton. Arguably, it's the most recognised bag in the world. You could say it's become even more famous than the woman after whom it was named. And it's gradually got this kind of iconic status. Will Barron Why is it iconic? It's just a bag with handles into which you put things. Anna Chalmers One of the episodes of Sex and the City,

she went in to get a Birkin bag and could not believe the wait list that was years to be able to buy one of these. It's four thousand. I know. And there's a waiting list. I assumed. Five years. For a bag? It's not a bag. It's a Birkin. I've just been googling them. You can pay, well here's one, used £85,000. can pay, well here's one, used £85,000. Is that an investment? Would you ever take that out? Certainly Jane Birkin took hers out because I saw it two days ago at Sotheby's being displayed in Paris and it's really battered. You can see she used it on a daily basis. So I think there's a sort of huge percentage of women who use their Birkin every day and then there's a small percentage who now see it as a big investment. Jane Birkin died a couple of years ago and I wonder whether the Birkin bag in 50 years time,

will that still be a thing? Diamonds are forever, will Birkin bags be the same? Jane Birkin is a legend to all of us. These iconic women are few and far between, so people will know who she is. Bags, if they're not well cared for, aren't incorruptible like diamonds or gold. But it's very interesting when you look at the gold price rises and rises and rises. And I read something the other day that said the average return for gold over the last five years has been 13.2%. But the Birkin bag, the annual increase over five years is 14.2 in value. Accessories expert Carol Walton. And still to come on the Global News podcast, why chimpanzees have been adorning themselves with blades of grass.

Putting grass in your ear does not serve a clear purpose, but it might serve some kind of social bonding experience for them. By adopting this similar behaviour and copying others, it shows that they're doing something that they indicate to the others that they like them and that they are part of the same community. In recent weeks, Ukraine has suffered some of the heaviest attacks of the war, as Russia has fired barrage after barrage of drones and missiles. Many of them have been shot down but some get through, causing death and destruction. The Ukrainian president, Vladimir Zelensky, has been talking to Donald Trump about the US supplying Ukraine with Patriot missile air defences. We'll hear more about that in a moment. But even as Russia carried out its latest attack, Ukraine's allies were meeting in

Rome to discuss reconstruction and bolstering the Ukrainian economy. The German Chancellor Friedrich Mertz had this message for the Americans. To Washington D.C. and to President Donald Trump, stay with us and stay with the Europeans. We are on the same page and we are looking for a stable political order in this world. We are both, the Americans and the Europeans, are part of, with us. Stay with us on this side.

Well, on the other side of the world, the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on the sidelines of a regional summit in Malaysia. He confirmed that Washington would continue supplying weapons to Ukraine, but said European allies should also step up. confirmed that Washington would continue supplying weapons to Ukraine, but said European allies should also step up. There are patriot batteries available in multiple countries in Europe, yet no one wants to part with them. If in fact that Ukraine is the priority that so many countries in Europe say it is, they should be willing to share batteries that right now they don't have

a need to use. Our Europe regional editor, Danny Abyhard, told me more about the air defences that Ukraine is hoping to get from the US. It's been a long, long time that Ukraine has wanted more Patriot systems. So President Zelensky says that he's requested 10 such systems. But the big shift here in recent weeks is that there's moves to buy these systems from the US. They're not talking about donations or anything like that.

In the current mood with the current White House, and especially after Donald Trump suspended weapons supplies to Ukraine, there's been a lot of diplomatic activity. And so President Zelensky says that Germany has given assurances that it will buy two Patriot systems with the missiles and that Norway will buy one system. So that's a start. Ukraine needs these because they Patriots are effective, for example, against Russian ballistic missiles that are otherwise very difficult to shoot down. So in these massive attacks that Russia launches on Ukraine, there's huge numbers of drones designed to overwhelm Ukrainian air defences, but there are also these damaging missiles for high-value targets. So, the

patriots are really important, but it's not just that. President Zelensky also says that other things are needed, for example, other artillery. So, what they're trying to design are packages to help Ukraine and make sure these weapons are delivered fast to Ukraine, because there's a lot of talk about this but the fear in Kiev constantly is that President Trump might be sending signals to Russia that unless you move fast on a ceasefire I'll be supplying these but then he doesn't actually supply them. Okay so they're trying to prevent more damage being done to Ukraine with these negotiations meanwhile Ukraine's allies are discussing

rebuilding, but that seems a long way off. It's a very long way off still because there's so little progress on an actual ceasefire, let alone a full peace. And until there is some sort of peace, there's no point in some people's thinking to reconstruct much of Ukraine because the chances are key things will get bombed again as we saw with energy facilities that Russia would repeatedly bomb the same sites even after they've been patched up. So yes there's a lot of willingness to take part in reconstruction there's a lot of interest from companies it could be very lucrative in the long term for some countries and private enterprises but for now the focus is still on

defending Ukraine and also then trying to get Russia, force Russia to agree to a ceasefire. Europe regional editor Danny Eberhardt. The UK is facing a rising and unpredictable threat from Iran according to a report by the British Parliament. The Intelligence and Security Committee says that over a 20-month period until August 2023, there were more than a dozen murder or kidnap attempts. The inquiry also looked at espionage and cyber attacks. Here's our diplomatic correspondent Caroline Hawley. The inquiry's report is more than 240 pages long and it catalogues a host of threats posed by the Iranian regime.

Of particular concern, it says, are those facing Iran's opponents here in the UK. There's been a sharp rise in the threat of physical attacks on them. The report says there's also an increased threat against Jewish and Israeli interests in the UK. According to the committee, the Iranian intelligence services have shown that they are willing and able to attempt assassinations and kidnappings here, often through what it calls third-party agents. The report was written before May, when three alleged Iranian spies were charged with plotting to inflict serious violence on UK-based journalists.

Caroline Hawley, Lord Beamish is Chair of the UK's Intelligence and Security Committee. In terms of the threat to distance, in 2022 to August 2023 there were 15 attempts of either kidnapping or murder of individuals either here or around the world of connection in the UK which were thwarted. I understand it's now another, it's up to 20 by 2024. And what this is, is not only attacking those individuals, but the Iranians use proxies when there's evidence, for example, in Europe where they've used organized crime groups to murder and kidnap individuals. And that makes it very difficult for security services to intercept these plots. For example, the two individuals who were

murdered in the Netherlands and in Turkey, we had Turkish organised crime gangs around drugs involved. It shows the recklessness of the Iranians that they're prepared to use these individuals. Lord Beamish, Chair of the UK's Intelligence and Security Committee. On the 19th of May, people in Ivory Coast woke up to the news that a military coup was underway against the government of Al-Assan Wattara. Videos even emerged of the president under fire. Inevitably people in Ivory Coast were scared but the coup turned out to be fake. It was disinformation spread on YouTube, social media

and various websites by influencers ahead of elections later this year. I heard more from Mungai Ngige of the BBC Global Disinformation Unit. There are those who are saying that the president was missing, that a coup was taking place and that a military general called Lassina Dumbia had been shot dead. So there are quite a number of videos. So some had people on the street protesting. There were some which had gunfire. We fact-checked some of the videos and we saw that one of them was taken from the conflict between India and Pakistan over the Kashmir region. So this was video of gunfire. And the second video was of Ivorian celebrating on the street, which was after the country won the Africa Cup of

Nations last year. So these were fake videos? They were fake videos. They are fake videos taken out of context and the video taken from the Kashmir conflict had the face of Alasdair Notara superimposed and with the caption, coup in Ivory Coast. So this was a video which was shared by a number of these accounts which are spreading these fake claims. Why were people pushing out this information that there was a coup in Ivory Coast when there wasn't?

Ivory Coast is one of the few countries in West Africa which is still allied with France and with the West. So Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, which go by the alliance of Sahel states. So just by them being friendly with France means that they are essentially antagonizing these countries which are trying to move away from France, their former colonial master. So were people actually trying to trigger a coup in Ivory Coast or were they just trying to cause trouble? From the evidence that we saw it was really just trying to cause trouble. Cote d'Ivoire is supposed to go to the election later this year.

So it really caused a lot of tension in the country. And a lot of these people who are putting out these videos call themselves Pan-Africanists. Just tell us more about that. So Pan-Africanist is an ideology that has been actually around for a while. And it's sort of just to simplify, sort of just to urge Africans to stand together and unite against exploitation and neocolonialism. So what this new school of Pan-African Israelis is against is neocolonialism. So there are some countries which they view as exploiting Africa for its resources and its people.

They're really rallying behind the president of Burkina Faso, Captain Ibrahim Traore, who's come up as one of the faces of promoting unity of Africans and just Africa stand up against exploitation. And just tell us what kind of impact all this disinformation has had across Africa. What we found was that there was a lot of anxiety and there's been a lot of voices questioning the need for democracy on the continent

has become really louder because the people who are coming up with rumours such as these are also promoting military hunters and saying this is perhaps the solution that we need on the continent. Mungai Ngige in Nairobi. Europe's top court has ruled that the double Olympic 800 metre champion, Casta Semenya, did not receive a fair trial in 2020 when she lost an appeal against a world athletics decision that in effect barred her from competing.

The European Court of Human Rights has awarded her just over $90,000. The South African described the ruling as overwhelming. Here's our sports editor, Dan Rowan. This is the latest twist in Casta Semenya's long legal battle about rules which in effect ended a career that saw her dominate middle distance running for a decade. Although recorded as female, the South African was born with Differences of Sexual Development or DSD and has an elevated level of testosterone which can increase muscle mass and strength and male XY chromosomes.

She insisted she was a woman but in 2018 the governing body World Athletics said DSD athletes must reduce their testosterone levels to participate in certain female events to ensure fair competition. Semenya unsuccessfully challenged what she said were discriminatory rules at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland and then the Swiss Supreme Court. But that ruling in 2020 violated Semenya's right to a fair hearing, according to the European Court of Human Rights. Shortly afterwards, Semenya gave me her reaction. It's a beautiful feeling. This is bigger than we ever thought. I don't think this is about

competition. It's about human rights. It's about the protection of the athletes. Three other complaints that Semenya submitted were ruled inadmissible. Because the case was brought against the Swiss government rather than world athletics, the judgment will not overturn the rules on DSD athletes. However, the case could now return to court and lead to renewed scrutiny of the way sports approach such regulations. Dan Rowan. Finally, it appears it's not just us humans who are followers of fashion. Researchers studying a group of chimpanzees in Zambia found the primates wore blades of

grass behind their ears and said it was similar to people joining in dance fads on TikTok. Dr Jake Brooker co-authored the study. We were just observing the chimpanzees and one day one of our collaborators reported to us that he noticed one of the chimpanzees was wearing a blade of grass in his ear. And it reminded us of the story that had happened about 15 years ago from the same sanctuary in a whole different group. This behavior had been seen to be a social tradition that everyone had just learned over a period of time. And like trends in humans, it peaked at a point where everybody was doing it and then it died down. And we were fascinated that it happened again in a whole different group. It's well documented now that chimpanzees and many animals have

culture. They have quite diverse culture in fact in a variety of different contexts, but the idea of symbolic culture in animals is still very debated. And there are only a few cases in a select few animals that have shown similar behaviours. But the behaviour itself has no clear survival function. You know, putting grass in your ear does not serve a clear purpose, but it might serve some kind of social bonding experience for them. By adopting this similar behaviour and copying others, it shows that they're doing something that they indicate to the others that they like them and that they are part of the same community. Dr Jake Brooker.

And that's all from us for now, but the Global News podcast will be back very soon. This edition was mixed by Peter Wise and produced by Alison Davis and Peter Goffin. Our editors, Karen Martin, I'm Oliver Conway. Until next time, goodbye.