Global News Podcast - US top diplomat holds talks with Turkey on Syria

Episode Date: December 13, 2024

US top diplomat Antony Blinken holds talks with President Erdogan on establishing stability in Syria. Also: an 18-year-old Indian becomes youngest world chess champion, and Kyrgyzstan wants to update its national anthem.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Whether it's Good Bad Billionaire or any of your other favourite BBC World Service podcasts, find the show on your podcast app and then just click follow or subscribe. And if you switch on notifications, you'll get a reminder too. It's that easy. Follow or subscribe and never miss an episode. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Rachel Wright and in the early hours of Friday the 13th of December these are our main stories. Four days after Bashar al-Assad's flight, the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is holding talks in Turkey on establishing stability in Syria.

The funeral is held in the capital Damascus of a prominent critic of the former Syrian regime, whose body was found in the notorious Sednaya prison. Also in this podcast, new research suggests modern humans may not have survived to populate the world without interbreeding with Neanderthals. An 18-year-old Indian man becomes the youngest player ever to win the World Chess Championship. The result has just sent shockwaves around the world. When he won the title, he's been a poker face all the way through the match, 14 games,

and he won and there were just floods of tears of joy. And Kyrgyzstan wants to update its national anthem because it sounds too Soviet. It's now four days since President Assad fled Syria and the collapse of his brutal and repressive regime. Families are continuing to search prisons and hospitals for news of missing loved ones. Meanwhile, Israel has rejected calls to withdraw its troops from the demilitarised buffer zone it shares with Syria. The Israeli Foreign Ministry said

that the seizure of the Syrian-controlled part of the Golan Heights was necessary because of threats posed by jihadist groups operating near the border. Syria's new administration has suspended parliament and the constitution for three months, saying it was necessary to smooth the transfer of power. Our chief international correspondent, Lise Doucet, gave us the latest from the capital

Damascus. With every day that passes, there are more signs about what kind of a new governance is taking shape in Syria after the extraordinary reversal on Sunday when 50 years of the Assad family came crashing down. The new government is taking steps to try to reassure

Syrians that they are working on stability. They said they are going to dissolve the armed forces instead of new security institutions. They are going to shut down the prisons. And as I speak to you, you might hear the sounds. That's we think that's tracer fire in the air. A few hours ago, there were heavy air strikes around Damascus. One was just two kilometers south. There was war

planes, a war plane going across the sky two of them actually which we believe have been israeli airstrikes they continue to strike what they say are strategic installations they say they cannot allow the weapons to fall as they would put it in the wrong hands in other words the islamists who dominate the government and i've just been trying to explain to you that these new authorities helped, backed by the encouraging statements from regional powers, that they say this is getting in the way of them trying to establish their sovereignty. The United Nations, regional countries have been saying that this is illegal. Israel should not be attacking inside Syria now at this delicate moment of transition.

For Syrians now, so many of them, you just feel it is so palpable here that there's this lightness in the air, this heavy weight of repression that is lifted here. I've been coming to Syria for 30 years and every time I would leave I would feel, wow, this is really what repression looks like. You can feel it. And some of this, it's like a cork being being popping for some people, they've erupted in celebration. But there are many people we meet this, when you live in a police state, the police state lives in you. And they still are fearful about speaking out, even still

fearful now because all Syrians grew up being told, face the wall and don't speak. And you can't get rid of that in a matter of days and there are of course those who are fearful because they're being pursued now for accused of war crimes being part of the machinery of torture and repression that was kept in power here for 50 years by the by the Assad family so in other words mixed signals but it is gradually with every day the new pieces are falling into place. Least to set in Damascus. And as you may have heard on our earlier podcast, hundreds of

people have marched through the streets of the Syrian capital in the funeral possession of the activist Mazan al-Hamada. The tortured body of the outspoken regime critic was found in the city's Sadnaya jail on Monday. Yogita Lai reports now from the prison, where many people have been looking for information about their loved ones. We're at a hospital where bodies, the dead bodies that were found in Sadnaya prison, a lot of them have been brought and just as we were here we saw a family that was crying. They've just found out that his dead body has been found. As we've been walking around this hospital more and more people are constantly coming

up to us to tell us about family members, many of them multiple family members who have disappeared some have said 2012, 2013, 2015 and they've had absolutely no information. They don't know if they're dead or alive because the bodies were brought here. They have come here to search to see if they can find any information about their loved ones. My name is Maheen. Tell me who are you searching for? His name is Zahir, Mohammed Zahir Khairullah.

Do you believe you will find him alive? I don't know. That's from God. I don't know. I hope, but I don't know. Who are you searching for today? I am searching for my two sons. We were confined for 11 years. So they told us they died. Have you come here and hoped that you might find their bodies? I can't find many skeletons here.

It's a tragedy this. How can you find a person as a skeleton? It is a tragedy. One of the bodies identified was that of activist Mazen al-Hamada. Today it was returned to his family for his funeral. A very rousing funeral procession for activist Mazen Hamada is underway on the streets of Damascus right now. He's someone who participated in the anti-regime protests in 2011, was arrested, tortured. And when he was released the first time, he was able to go to Europe.

And while he was there, he spoke repeatedly and in detail about the first time, he was able to go to Europe and while he was there, he spoke repeatedly and in detail about the kind of torture he faced. Rape, breaking of ribs, breaking of bones, and it was largely because of testimony of people like him that came out of Syria. The world was able to understand the scale of the brutality that was being inflicted by the regime on anyone who spoke against Assad. His body was found in the Sadaneya prison along with dozens of other prisoners in a horrific condition. We spoke to a doctor who examined the body and he said it bore the marks of brutal torture.

And his family believes that he was killed just shortly before Bashar Assad fled, his regime fell. His sister Lamia told us that she's happy the regime fell, but wishes he was alive to see it. He paid the price for our freedom. I want his killers to be brought to court for justice, she said. This is a country where the people, the families of the missing, did not even have the right to come and ask where their loved ones are, for fear that they would be arrested and tortured. It is a dramatic turn of events that today you are seeing a funeral freely on the streets, a procession. Yogita Lamai at Sadnaya prison near Damascus.

Among the people freed from prisons in Syria was a man claiming to be from the US state of Missouri. He was found wandering the streets of Damascus and identified himself as Travis Timmerman, a US citizen who went missing seven months ago. Our correspondent Lucy Williamson reports. Prisoner of the old Syria. Post a child for the new one.

Travis Timmerman, an American from Missouri, released by rebel forces on Monday as they swept President Assad from power. In the middle of the night or early morning, they came with a hammer and knocked my door in. And there was two men with guns and then there was another man named Heavey. And they helped me get out of prison and helped me get into Damascus. The men who found him put this video on social media, saying he was in safe hands and had been checked by a doctor after seven months in the custody of Assad's military intelligence. It wasn't too bad. It wasn't bad. I was never beaten. The only really bad part was that

I couldn't go to the bathroom when I wanted to. Timerman was found wandering through this Damascus suburb today by Syrians celebrating freedom themselves. Locals here in this neighbourhood are telling us that they found a foreigner wandering in the street outside. They said he was in fairly good condition, but they brought him here and gave him some food and some water. They said he was very hungry and talking in English, but they couldn't understand what he was saying and they didn't know exactly who he was. They showed us the selfies they'd taken with him as the militia now in charge here looked on.

They found him barefoot on the road. He kept repeating that he was held by military intelligence in Damascus. We helped him, offered him food, treated him well as a human being without any consideration of his American citizenship. Travis Timmerman's story is one among tens of thousands from Assad's notorious prison system. Many, more brutal, will never be told. Silenced by the man many Syrians see as the biggest criminal of them all. Lucy Williamson.

The international community is watching the new Syrian leadership with caution because of its former links to al-Qaeda. The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who's touring the region, is now in the Turkish capital Ankara. The Israelis have been clear about what they're doing and why they're doing it. I think across the board when it comes to any actors who have real interests in Syria, it's also really important at this time that we all try to make sure that we're not sparking any additional conflicts.

That's also an important objective and goal. Our State Department correspondent Tom Bateman is travelling with Mr Blinken and sent this report. These are crucial discussions between Mr Blinken and President Erdogan here in Ankara. There have long been tensions between Turkey and the Americans, specifically over the role of the Syrian Democratic Forces. What the Americans see as the moderate, mostly Kurdish but also Arab fighters, particularly in the east and parts of the north of Syria, backed by the Americans, equipped and trained

by the Americans, holding territory there in which it is part of the official American operation there to counter Islamic State group. There are also camps in which IS fighters and their families are held. Now with the sudden change of the situation in Syria, what we've seen over the last week is Turkish-backed groups pushing back and fighting some areas, fighting against the SDF in some of the areas held by the SDF, including a strategically important town called Manbij. Now the Americans and the Turks have been talking about this. They've come to some agreements in places. But those tensions are going to continue. President Erdogan regards Kurdish militias close to his border as terrorist organisations,

has long sought to push them back, has long been unhappy at the American backing of Kurds in parts of Syria. So a lot to work through there. And at the same time Anthony Blinken here is trying to rally support for what the Americans see as their vision for the future of Syria. In effect a set of conditions to try and get a government that would be amenable to American interests in the region. The Americans are trying to get Turkey and also there are our partners in the

region to buy into that and to agree with those conditions before they would effectively recognise a future government of Syria. Tom Bateman. Other news now and we've known for some time that Neanderthals and modern humans lived alongside each other and into bread. But what we didn't know was exactly how long ago the two groups came together. Well, according to new research published in the journals Science and Nature, that was around 48,000 years ago. The findings also show that our species was able to survive thanks to key genetic traits inherited from Neanderthals. Our science correspondent Pallab

Ghosh told me more. In 2010 we were shocked by results that all people who lived outside of Africa had a small amount of Neanderthal DNA in. We're all part Neanderthal and that is only because the human group that left Africa around 60,000 years ago must have at some point interbred with Neanderthals. We didn't know where, when and what the significance of that was, and now we have that result. Using DNA analysis of ancient bones, which is a remarkable thing in itself, to be able to not only extract DNA but read it with such great precision, they pinned it down to around 48,000 years ago around the Middle East. And the significance of this finding is that the humans that had

left earlier went extinct. And so this idea of humans triumphing overall wherever they went and not having a hard time like many of the other human groups has to be rewritten. We've got to think again about what makes us so special. In fact, the humans that did survive are the ones that the offspring of those that interbred with Neanderthals. So they may well have given something in their DNA that helps our ancestors survive. And what are the characteristics that maybe helped those humans that bred with them survive? There were some genes that were inherited from Neanderthals, such as their immune system and such as their metabolism, that did seem to give our kind some sort of evolutionary

advantage. So for example, our ancestors were used to the diseases in Africa and the ones that didn't interbreed probably fell prey to things they hadn't come across. Whereas the offspring of those that did interbreed were given a quick fix because they inherited their immune systems. Pallabgosh speaking to me earlier. Still to come. A female Iranian singer is facing prosecution after live streaming a concert where she appeared without the traditional headscarf. 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. The US rapper Sean Diddy Combs has been sued by three more men in New York alleging he drugged and raped them. The separate lawsuits were filed anonymously in New York and add to the string of civil cases from both men and women against the music mogul. Sean Combs is currently being held in custody while he awaits trial on criminal charges of racketeering, sex trafficking and transportation to engage

in prostitution. Neda Taufik reports from New York. The three men all alleged that between 2019 and 2022 Sean Diddy Combs offered them drinks that were laced with drugs and made them unconscious. And then he raped them. Sean Combs' lawyers said the complaints were full of lies and they would prove them false. The men's lawyer Thomas Jra, said he was struck by how similar the described pattern of abuse was in their allegations and told the BBC why they wanted to remain anonymous. I think the main reason is fear. They're afraid that if their identities get out there that they'll find themselves with a target on their back.

I think they're concerned that these are very real threats and they're credible threats and they're afraid for their very safety. It's not just the, I don't want to say typical, but the usual situation where somebody doesn't want their name out there because it's dealing with such a personal, private issue. This one's different in that there's fear and it's a real scary fear that these men have. One of them was hired by the Bad Boys Records CEO and said the abuse occurred during a meeting to discuss the fact that he hadn't been paid. Afterward, he said he was intimidated and threatened into silence. The two others were introduced to the music mogul by men in his orbit. One of them detailed how he allegedly took the offered drink at an after party,

and then the hotel room started spinning, his mouth became very dry, and once he was disoriented, Combs said he was ready to party. During brief moments of consciousness, he said he noticed a man and a woman recording the rape. The next morning, he said he was handed $2,500 in cash. Another John Doe said Didi and his entourage raped him. Neda Taufik. Iranian social media has erupted after a female singer and performer, Parastu Ahmadi, defied the law in Iran and performed a public concert without wearing a traditional headscarf.

She live-streamed Wednesday's performance to her YouTube channel and is now facing prosecution. Performing alone as a woman in Iran is also illegal. Let's hear some of her song. Mark Lowen spoke to Parham Gabbadi from BBC Persian. He told him this is not the first time Parastu Ahmadiyya has defied the law regarding wearing a headscarf and was imprisoned for her part in the Women Life Freedom protests two years ago. What she did last night surprised many people because it's an extraordinary act of courageous act and it takes a huge amount of courage in Iran because she's defined three strict rules. First of all, as you mentioned, she's not wearing mandatory hijab. Second of all,

she's singing because Iranian women are not allowed to sing alone. They are allowed to sing as a back vocal of a male singer, which is really bizarre. But they are allowed to sing as a back vocal but not alone. So this is the second rule she's defying. And the third rule is that she's singing whatever she wants. And she sang the very same song, one of the songs she sang, was the song that she was arrested for a few months ago. So what does she risk now?

So she's risking prosecution immediately after that. Today morning they said that she's facing prosecution and there has been cases open for her in the court. So she's risking arrest. But the point is that the Iranian regime has failed to stop the Iranian women. Since 2017, when Vida Mawahdi, the first Iranian woman who took to one of the busiest streets in Tehran and took off her headscarf, that was the first Iranian woman, she went on one of these electricity boxes and took off her headscarf. Iranian women have been passing the baton one by one. Then we had the woman life freedom movement. Now for example Tarana Ali, you see a worldwide known Iranian actress. She's been appearing in public without a headscarf. She's been banned

from acting. That's you know her art. That's her job and that's her career. They're losing their career but they're not giving up. And Paham, just briefly give us a sense of the reaction both from the regime and from its opponents. I think the regime just had the regular normal reaction of saying that we're going to take her to court. They didn't, you know, go to her house, you know, break door, break down the door and arrest her because that would infuriate the public even furthermore.

So there's a court case for her. We have to see what happens but the reaction of the public has been extraordinary. All the singers, actors, activists, you name it, people have lent their support to this Iranian woman who has shown extraordinary active courage. Parham Gabbadi from BBC Persians speaking to Mark Lowen. If you are the owner of one of the latest iPhone models, Apple is going to start integrating chat GPT onto your device in the latest updates to its operating system. This might sound scary or exciting depending on where you stand on AI. What difference is this going to make

having a chat bot in our pocket? Someone who can tell us is Kate Bevan, a technology journalist. She told Leila Nathoo why Apple has done this. I think it's a case of everybody is using AI in all sorts of ways across all sorts of tech companies and Apple feels it has to be part of that move. So it's catching up as much as anything, I think. Right. It can be useful. And interesting that it's gone for chat GPT rather than trying to develop its own technology.

Yeah, that's right. I mean, Apple hasn't got quite the same capabilities of building its own AI technology as say Google has or Amazon has, you know, it's sensibly to have outsourced it. Okay, so what it's only going to be available, isn't it, to the latest models of iPhones when the updates come? What will noticeably be different in terms of how the phone is able to function? So what it's doing, it's kind of adding to the existing Apple intelligence functions. A lot of the time, if you are sorry for something, it can't necessarily reply.

What it will do then is say, do you want me to give it ask Jack GPT this? And then it will farm the query out to chat GPT. So it's kind of bolting on something extra onto Apple intelligence which is already built into quite a few Apple products. It's also going to offer you things like the ability to describe photographs to you, or so you can pass what you're looking at. It'll be able to help you write stuff if you want to help with writing an email or something like that. So it's sort of useful assistant type functions if that kind of thing is important to you. Right, so kind of augmenting what's already there rather than completely revolutionizing. I mean, are there any implications for data? Because chat GPT obviously sort of learns from

what's out there, as it were, and doesn't create its own, create its own original material. Is it going to be learning from our phones, our photos, our messages, our notes? Well, Apple says not. Apple says it's going to act effectively as a firewall between you and the OpenAI servers and OpenAI's training data. So it's not going to have access to any identifying data except, you know, except it knows roughly where you are. So it's not going to have access to any identifying data except, you know, except it knows roughly where you are so it can give you location appropriate information but it's not going to have rampant access to your devices and also it's not going to be uploading and crucially saving what you ask it.

Kate Bevan The World Chess Championship has been won by an 18-year-old Indian man, Domaraju Gukesh, the youngest player ever to win the title. He won by beating the defending champion, the Chinese player Ding Liran. India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi described the victory as historic and exemplary. Tim Wall is a FIDE chess master and chess correspondent for the Newcastle Chronicle in Northern England. He told Mark Lowen it was a very exciting match. This last day was an absolute emotional roller coaster and basically this result has just sent shockwaves around the world. You know we've got chess fans are messaging

each other, we've all been watching the results in test tournaments around the world. It's really quite something. And what was incredible was to see the reaction of this young man, Damraju Gukesh, when he won the title. He's been a poker face all the way through the match, 14 games, and he won and there were just floods of tears of joy. You sound excited. We've also got an excited reaction from another fan.

My name is Jatinder. I am originally from India, but have been living in Yorkshire for the last 20 years. I play casual chess. However, my seven and nine-year-old sons play at the top level in their respective age groups. We have seen steady improvement in Indian chess since days of Vishayanand and I believe it is going to continue improving exponentially. We will see not only Indian players but Indian origin players from rest of the world challenge for the top place. This win for Gukesh will give everyone motivation

and hunger to reach for the top place. Tim, what do you think is Gukesh's secret? Well, this is very interesting. I think it comes from his mentality, his philosophy. He's very, very calm. And, you know, he talked about his religious inspiration. He said that he wanted to thank God for this result. But also, of course, it's just he's worked incredibly hard at the game for the last 10

years. He was present at the match where Vishy Anand lost the world title to Magnus Carlsen just over 10 years ago. And he said today that he vowed to retake the world title for Vishwananda for India, and he's done that. He's four years younger than Garry Kasparov was when he was the youngest champion back in 1985, aged 22. So 18 year old Gukesh, now the champion, I mean, is the sky the limit for him, do you think?

I think it really is. I mean, he has all the temperament, he's got this fantastic calculating ability, and of course the youth is on his side. And this is the thing about chess now, it's a young person's game. I mean, the ability of young people to absorb all the chess strategies and the tactics is phenomenal these days. I mean, I play against young people all the chess strategies and the tactics is phenomenal these days. I mean I play against young people all the time and it's incredibly difficult to hold them at bay. Jim Wall of the Newcastle Chronicle speaking to Mark Lowen. Now how well do you know your national anthems? There's La Marseillaise, The Star-Spangled Banner and of course God Save the King.

But how about this one? Here's some lyrics. For ages my people open to amity. They are ready to give their hearts to their friends. These are the opening lines to Kyrgyzstan's national anthem. But for how much longer? The Kyrgyz president is seeking a new version to inspire future generations. Simon Ponsford reports. The current anthem was adopted in 1992, a year after independence. It kept the old Soviet

tune but changed the words. Kyrgyzstan is depicted as a land of snowy mountains, steps and valleys. The banner of freedom is soaring. But the president says the words are too fixed on glorifying independence and failed to reflect a nation with 5,000 years of history. So the task now is for a parliamentary commission to find an alternative. It needs to be easy to sing, with sparkling new words and an inspiring new tune, less reminiscent of Soviet times. Simon Ponsford reporting. 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 in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at BBCc.co.uk. This edition was produced by Alice Adderley and mixed by Chris Kousaris. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Rachel Wright. Until next time, 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.