NPR News Now - NPR News: 04-20-2025 7AM EDT

Episode Date: April 20, 2025

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Want to know what's happening in the world? Listen to the State of the World podcast. Every weekday we bring you important stories from around the globe. In just a few minutes you might hear how democracy is holding up in South Korea or meet Indian monkeys that have turned to crime. We don't go around the world. We're already there. Listen to the State of the World podcast from NPR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Giles Snyder. Pope Francis did not lead Easter Sunday services at the Vatican today, but he did draw cheers and applause when he made a brief appearance to bless the thousands gathered in St. Peter's

Square. brothers and sisters. Happy Easter! The Pope wishing the crowd a happy Easter and sounding stronger as he continues to recover from a severe bout with pneumonia. He then asked an aide to read his speech. Earlier today the Pope met with Vice President J.D. Vance in a statement. The Vatican said the two met for a few minutes at the Pope's residence to exchange Easter greetings. The Pope has criticized the Trump administration over immigration policy and funding cuts to foreign aid and domestic welfare programs. Thousands turned out for scores of rallies around the country this weekend to protest the Trump administration.

In Philadelphia, they again gathered in front of Independence Hall. For Member Station WHYY, Emily Neal has more. Protesters chanted no kings and referenced Philadelphia's revolutionary history as they marched in front of the building where the U.S. Constitution was signed in 1787. Kim Jordan says the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and the detention of international students who have participated in campus protests is at the top of her concerns. From graduate students who are having their visas pulled away to people who have immigrated and who are legally here to have the government say whoops we made a mistake and we can't get them back. That's preposterous. It is terrifying.

Speakers also touched on cuts to federal agencies and programs, inaction on climate change, and protection of social security. For NPR News, I'm Emily Neal in Philadelphia. The Trump administration's sweeping staffing cuts at federal lands agencies causing anxiety across the tinder dry southwest. NPR's Kirk Sigler reports that the wildfire threat is already severe. The Trump administration says wildland firefighters continue to be exempt from the federal hiring freeze, but an untold number of Forest Service staffers who hold red cards, meaning they

can leave their day jobs to fight fires, were laid off in February. One of them in New Mexico is Kayla, whose full name we aren't using because she fears retaliation. Yeah, I just feel like if it's a ticking time bomb, like, I feel like we were doing everything in our power to help prevent this catastrophic fire. She recently got her job back after a court ruling but says Forest Service staff are quote walking on eggshells and all the work that goes into protecting communities and wildlife from wildfires is on hold.

Kirk Ziegler, NPR News, Santa Fe. Rick Senzio, NPR News, Santa Fe, Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is accusing Russia of trying to create an impression of a ceasefire. He says Russian forces are continuing to mount attacks following Russian leader Vladimir Putin's unilateral decision to declare a truce for Easter. This is NPR News. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel has no choice but to continue fighting in Gaza. In a pre-recorded message televised last night, Netanyahu said he has instructed the Israeli military to intensify pressure on Hamas, the militant group that carried out the

October 7th attack on Israel. He also repeated his vow to make sure Iran never gets a nuclear weapon. NASA's oldest serving astronaut is back on Earth. Dan Pettit returned from the International Space Station today on his 70th birthday. Pettit returned aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft along with two Russian cosmonauts landing in Kazakhstan. A recent archaeological dig is under the capital of the ancient kingdom of Kabul in West Africa, reporter Ari Daniel has more. When Kabul fell in the 19th century, it was the last of the African kingdoms before European

colonialism. The stories of its reign have been passed down for generations by a group of oral historians known as the Griots. Nino Galisa is one. He says to him, Cabo was a fiction, a story. Then in 2024, a team of Spanish and Senegalese archaeologists began to exhume Consula, the capital, in modern-day Guinea-Bissau. They found physical evidence of the people and places that had been mentioned in the songs of the griots. The researchers asked Elisa if he'd transformed their findings into music. He sings about what touched him so that what the griots have described for generations is real.

This is NPR News. Do you remember when discovering a new artist felt like finding buried treasure? At all generations is real.