Iran hardens demands on Strait of Hormuz

BBC-podcast on suurin jälkeen. Sä oon toivottavasti. Volodomirzolenskii haimit hisi järminen ja poli. Ja järminen ja järminen ja järminen ja järminen ja kriin. Ja järminen ja kriin. Ukranian prosikutus a gathering evidence at the scene and say it could amount to a war crime. Russia also claimed to have struck a missile factory close to Kiev. Ukraine wouldn't confirm it. President Zelenski's warned repeatedly of the need for more US Patriot interceptors to shoot down Russian missiles. But he's also pushing for tougher sanctions. He's concluded a two day visit to Serbia, his first to the traditional Russian ally and one of the few European countries not to impose restrictions on the Kremlin. No, we're not going to do any kind of a fight. We're not going to do any kind of a fight. Supportive statements were exchanged with the Serbian president, but Alexander Vuchich had already ruled out a change of policy towards Moscow. Serbia is pursuing European Union membership and has provided aid to Ukraine. There's talk of a possible trade deal. One of Mr. Zelenski's aids described the visit as a slap in the face for Russia. Ukraine's also hit two more Russian oil refineries in its intensifying campaign of long-range drone attacks targeting fuel supply facilities and online retail warehouses. And Johnson reporting from Kiev. The White House has a new attorney general. On this vote, the Yezor 50, the Naze R49, the nomination is confirmed. The controversial appointment of Todd Blanch, previously Donald Trump's personal lawyer, has sparked criticism that an impartial government department could become an agency that would do his bidding. He had been serving as Acting Attorney General since April, after the sacking of Pam Bondi. And it seemed as a major win for the U.S. President after several Republican senators had threatened to rebel and vote against him. One of the concerned senators was Bill Cassidy, who ended up voting in the way Mr. Trump wanted. He explained why. This is not a referendum on President Trump. It is a decision regarding Mr. Blanch in very specific circumstances. All considered, I will vote for Mr. Blanch. I'll be criticized for this vote, what's new. But, people can be assured that I worked hard to understand the issue. And you make the right decision. So what is the history of the relationship between President Trump and Todd Blanche? I had more from a White House correspondent, Bird DeBouceman. They have a relationship spanning back many years. Todd Blanche was his personal attorney and as such kind of was at Trump's side during many of the legal battles he faced before returning to the White House in January. Since then he's been the deputy attorney-de-general under Pam Bondy until she lost her job not long ago and then that kind of began these weeks of uncertainty about whether he would be confirmed to take the role formally going forward. And that's what the vote was about last night. I guess a lot of people will be wondering then will he do what President Trump asks of him? Well, I think President Trump's detractors, of course, Democrats, but also some Republicans. There is a concern that under Todd Blanche the Justice Department could be used to target President Trump's perceived political opponents and the detractors he has in government and outside of government. Of course, the White House and the Justice Department and Mr. Blanche himself would push back on that saying that his role as the chief law enforcement officer of the United States is independent of the executive branch and the White House. I think it's one of those questions that is highly partisan and very divided opinion here in Washington. So it would depend who you ask. There was criticism of his handling of the Epstein files in the past as well. And will there be criticism coming his way now he's in such a key position or a lot more scrutiny over his decision making? Well, I think in the coming days and weeks we'll very likely hear from members of both parties who criticized his handling of the Epstein file as well as from some of the victims and the representatives who have kind of singled him out as someone they saw as not being particularly supportive to transparency with the Epstein files. He's pushed back very, very strongly and then said he's done everything he can and that if he had seen any sort of potential criminal charges in the the files that he would have filed those criminal charges, but nothing really has come of that. So I think there's quite a lot of dissatisfaction among people that feel very strongly about the Epstein case that he did not perform to the best of his ability. But as I mentioned, the Justice Department kind of dismisses those claims and at the moment there's really kind of no forward movement in terms of any sort of prosecutions that might take place here in the United States at least. What can we make of the support that President Trump holds amongst Republicans? There were two who voted against disappointment. Well there's certainly been a perception here in Washington that in recent months more Republicans are willing to stand up to President Trump before that the kind of consensus had been that President Trump still has enormous power over the party as a whole. I think one of the main turning points was the war in Iran. We saw the Senate and then the House passed kind of a symbolic war powers resolution, which in practice means little, but it really was kind of a rebuke of President Trump by members of both parties. Many of them will be hearing from their constituents about the high price of petrol that they're paying for, about the high prices of fertilizer. And I think that really weighs on some members of the party ahead of the November midterm elections and their longer term concerns for any sort of erodean support for Republicans. Ben DeBouceman in Washington. FIFA has denounced what it's called a concerted and ongoing effort to undermine its President Gianni Infantino. He's fighting for his future after his aborted plan to sell stakes in the World Cup and other football competitions to private investors led to calls for him to resign. He's a sports correspondent Dale Johnson. This statement follows a daily telegraph report that a woman who's a legister of being in a relationship with Mr Infantino was given a severance payment by European football's governing body, UEFA. Mr. Antfantino has strongly denied those allegations. He's been under increasing pressure since he abandoned the plan to sell off stakes in competitions, including the World Cup, to a private investment company. In a statement issued tonight, FIFA hit out what it called unsubstantiated assertions and demonstrably false claims, but did not specify the report he was referring to. It added that the future of his President should be decided by established democratic processes and not be the subject of allegation, insinuation or misinformation. Mr. Infantino is due to stand for election for a fourth term as FIFA President next March. Dale Johnson. Still to come in this podcast. There's definitely a stigma, but becoming a father, being present, that was more important for me. The Japanese men breaking gender stereotypes to take paternity leave. This is the Global News Podcast. Now to Canada, where thousands of people are fleeing their homes as a raging wildfire in British Columbia has doubled in size and is spreading quickly. The authorities say they're doing everything they can, but say the blaze is out of control. The province's premier is David Eby. Conditions are extremely dangerous and changing minute by minute. The fires are moving incredibly quickly. Please follow the directions of local officials. I know many families are facing an unimaginable day today. People have lost their homes and many people have been displaced. Members are waiting for news about loved ones. Support is being mobilized, including emergency accommodation and other essential services. I've got more details from our reporter Alfie Habishar. The footage that is coming out of British Columbia is truly, truly chilling. We've seen videos of the night sky completely lit up in red with these enormous and ferocious blazing flames. They're reaching far, far above the height of the top of the trees. And as you mentioned, it really speaks to how fast this is moving, how out of control it really seems. The regional fire service have sort of confirmed this by saying it may be the quickest moving wildfire they've ever seen. It started on Friday. It's now twice as big. It shows no signs of calming down. And in terms of size, it's now at this point about 9,500 hectares. For context, that's about the size of Paris. So we are in an official state of emergency now. OK, and Alfie, people are being urged to get out fast as well. Yes, we've been hearing that homes are being lost. Things are getting destroyed, although we don't know what the scale of the damage really is right now. More than 20,000 people have been evacuated as the firefighters and the first responders are trying to rush in and turn this around. The authorities are saying they are really trying to do everything they can here. But people are also getting trapped in the blazers. They try to get out, and that's making this rescue effort much, much more complicated. And don't forget this part of Western Canada. It's a rural area. There's a lot of farm animals and particularly horses that are living here. And people are left with this dilemma that when they try to escape, they cannot take these animals with them. So they're having to just in kind of desperation throw the gates open and hope that these animals are going to escape by themselves or find their own way back. And some people are even resorted to putting specific markings on their animals to hope that they might be able to identify them at some time later on. So for the people who have actually managed to get out safely, it's a really distressing situation because they just don't know what they're going to return to. I don't know whether my house is the goners, still there or not, but that fire came so fast and curious. It was the fire went from 50 hectares to 400 to 1000 to 5000 within two or three hours. And what was 15 kilometers away is now right here at the hill. It sounds more and more depressing and distressing when you hear these stories, especially what we've been hearing over Europe in recent weeks and what you've just talked about there. So therefore I can imagine a lot of people are then raising questions. So how well prepared are countries and now they are more intense and more frequent these wildfires? Yeah, well, this is something that governments around the world are really going to have to sit with now. Is it acceptable for people to be losing their homes, possibly losing their lives over something that could in theory be preventable? We know these wildfires are getting more common and this particular case is a good example of how they are becoming faster and more ferocious. We'll make the point that we've known about this trend for a while now and they're starting to say that we are simply evidently just not prepared for it. Alfie Habeson reporting. In the occupied West Bank, thousands of ancient sites remain unexcavated, but Palestinians say Israel is expropriating land to solidify its control of the territory. Israel disputes that, saying it's simply protecting and preserving its heritage. Once a UNESCO move to add Sebastian, Nenables, to both its world heritage list and its list of world heritage in danger has brought the dispute into sharper focus. Sebastian Usher has this special report from Sebastian. Up in the hills about the Roman columns of Sebastian are olive fields, but it has been cultivated for generations by Palestinian families. It's a vital income for them, of course, but it goes deeper than that as one of those landowners, Abumadith explains. "Every tree has received more of my attention than my children, more than my family, and more than myself." Abumadith says he's now received notification that his land is part of the tranche of around 450 acres that the Israeli authorities are taking possession of in order to develop a new national park in the archaeological site. Standing on a path between the car park at the ancient side of Sebastian where the Roman era four and one stood, and the columns of the Basilica, the mayor of Sebastian, Muhammad Azem, looks down to his right at some rubbish left in the ruins. He says that as Israeli-controlled titans, local people no longer feel free to clean the site. Sakahua. a local restaurant that is under threat of demolition, says the Israeli plan seems to be to cut Palestinian residents off from the archaeological site. In the middle of the ancient Roman theatre, an Israeli activist Alan Arad, who heads a group of names to ensure that the ancient heritage of a region belongs to all communities, says the Israeli authorities have bypassed consultation with the local administration and residents of Sebastian. The thing is that Israel is not the owner of this place. This is a Palestinian heritage site and in order to do it in a positive way, it has to be done with the local community, with the municipality in order for them to benefit. Further to the south in the west bank and just in sight of Jerusalem, a man made hill rises at Herodium with an extraordinary palace built on its summit by King Herod, who ruled these lands more than 2,000 years ago before the birth of Christ. Recently here too, Israel has begun to expropriate land. This time around 80 acres, for what it says, is the preservation and development of the site. For small browns who's worked on excavations here and leads deeply infused tours when there's a call, it's vital for Israeli archaeologists and officials to be able to oversee and protect places that are so freighted with significance. The way we decide whether Herod was here is by finding a coin from Herod or pottery that can be dated to the time of Herod right here. A new law was proposed earlier this year that would have given the Heritage Ministry sweeping powers to take control of land across the whole of the west bank. It's now unhold as elections are coming up in Israel and it may never re-emerge. Back in Sebastia, the Israeli activist Alon Arah says the very fact that the bill was put forward shows how even the extraordinary archaeological riches of the west bank have been weaponized. This is exactly how the mechanism works. You'd use archaeology in order to do excavations to rewrite history, but you also use it in order to re-allocate lands from Palestinian to Israeli. Despite the new law being on hold and the intervention by UNESCO, their owners fear their fortunes may never revive if the Israeli authorities increase their control of the site effectively removing it from the custodianship of its local Palestinian population. Sebastia Nasha. Despite men in Japan being allowed to take time off work when their children are born, deep-rooted gender stereotypes have largely stopped them doing so. Until recently, the latest figures show that for the first time more than half of Japanese men now take paternity leave. One early adapter was the writer Shou Matsuo Post, who also challenged convention by taking his wife's name when he got married. He told my colleague, or in Bennett Jones, about his decision to take paternity leave. All the stories that I was making up in my head made it more difficult than it actually was, but when I actually opened up to my boss, he was super understanding and the process was very simple and straightforward, so I'm very grateful to have understanding boss at the time. Yeah, because I guess most men at that time and maybe some now would think that would affect their promotion prospects. It could be difficult to ask and damaging to their career. Yeah, there's definitely a stigma at least six years ago when I went through it. I thought about that as well, but becoming a father, being present, and going through the process with my wife together, that was more important for me than a immediate career, I guess. Well, many have followed your example and one of the striking things is how rapidly sentiment is changing on this issue in Japan. Why is that, do you think? I think one of the biggest reasons is that many companies have to disclose a number or percentage of male workers to paternity leave, and I think that's really pushing holding those companies accountable. Also, at the personal level, I think more people are just talking about it. You see that on the newspapers, but I think that's holding more man accountable, and it's really good to see that. Yeah, it's interesting. The government really is supportive of this, isn't it? You can get as much as 12 months paid parental leave as a father. Correct. Yeah. Many people will be listening to this in countries where these rights are just not this sort of thing just never happens. What would you say to people living in no societies about the value of taking paternity leave? I'm going to speak from my personal experience. It was overall very, very positive. It gave me a lot of new perspective as a new father. You know, my parents' generations, they grew up believing that, you know, men were supposed to go to work and women are supposed to stay back home and, you know, raise kids. And I think many people still do. So that really challenged my belief and being a provider doesn't necessarily mean just making money. You know, you can actually be present with your child. Shumatsu post with AI companies having already scraped the internet for training data, they're now turning towards physical literature. There's growing concern over old books being bought, scanned and destroyed to improve artificial intelligence as an Aslam reports. In an effort to improve AI for the future, tech companies are looking to the past. The practice of destructive scanning where old books are bought in bulk, scanned to train large language models and then destroyed is now understood to be widespread in the industry. Booksellers from around the world have recently reported unusual orders for hundreds of old obscure books at a time, Annemarie Thorby, who has a bookshop in New Zealand, said she was suspicious after a strange request from the US. "Awards coming minutes apart, one of them put 71 books, New Zealand local history books, New Zealand Māori books, biographies, cartoons, political cartoon books, and we were that naive, we actually thought, oh, this bookshop's been hacked. And so we emailed them, they never got back to us. So we did a little bit of research, it was obviously not human, it was impossible to believe that these books were being bought for anything other than something like a project Panama." Project Panama refers to a copyright lawsuit brought by authors against anthropic AI, in which unsealed court documents revealed the company's aim was to "destructively scan all the books in the world." A US judge ruled the practice is fair use, and recent reports suggest intermediaries are now stepping up to facilitate the process. But many people, especially artists, feel uneasy about literature being repurposed in this way. "I think instinctively all of us are not in to use the idea of anyone destroying books, I would count myself among these people, but I'm also not surprised that the companies are doing it, as long as it's not sort of regulated away, they will be looking for any kind of edge." It's just another example of how the AI boom or bubble you might even call it, is just extracting all the resources that we have to fuel the development of this technology, and that includes water, it includes energy, and apparently it also includes rebuks. Anthropic and other companies deny destroying rear books. Tech journalist Immanuel Mayberg explains that for AI training, a 1970s manual on soil mechanics is more valuable than the Gutenberg Bible. "I think when you say rare book people imagine like a first edition of Oliver Twist, or the Dead Sea Scrolls, or something like that. The content that is in them, it exists online, it exists in other physical copies, it exists in digital copies. What is rare, literally rare, is for example, I don't know, like a 1994 walking tour guidebook of Denver. That is not valuable to most people, it is not emotionally resonant, it's not culturally resonant, but it is valuable as training data." So yet another ethical dilemma posed by AI is sacrificing old books to set up the next digital era, a technological leap, or a cultural loss. And an Aslan. And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can email us at Global Podcasts at BBC.co.uk. You can also find us on ex@bbcworldservice, use the hashtag #GlobalNewsPod. And don't forget our sister podcast, The Global Story, which goes in depth and beyond the headlines on one big story. This edition of The Global News Podcast was mixed by Derek Clarke. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Uncle Decide. Until next time, goodbye.