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Inside Geneva

SWI swissinfo.ch

Inside Geneva is a podcast about global politics, humanitarian issues, and international aid, hosted by journalist Imogen Foulkes. It is produced by SWI swissinfo.ch, a multilingual international public service media company from Switzerland.

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Tuesday · 31 min
UN Secretary-General: who wants the world's toughest job?
Send us Fan Mail This week on Inside Geneva, host Imogen Foulkes looks at the race to become the next UN Secretary-General. Antonio Guterres will step down in just six weeks, but the UN Security Council cannot agree on his successor. "The whole process is so strange, completely untransparent," says Louis Charbonneau of Human Rights Watch. He is concerned that some candidates for the UN's top job come from countries with poor human rights records. Richard Gowan of the International Crisis Group warns: "It's a bleak time. It feels as though this selection process has existential implications for the UN." The UN is facing huge financial and political challenges. Can it survive if member states cannot even agree on a leader? Listen now to the full episode. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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Sunday · 29 min
WHO candidate Gevorg Tamamyan: ‘Geography must not decide who lives’
Send us Fan Mail In episode four of our series interviewing candidates for director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), we talk to Gevorg Tamamyan. This series is in partnership with the Global Health Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute. Tamamyan is professor of paediatric oncology at Yerevan state medical university and he has spent his career treating children with cancer. In his native Armenia, he has seen survival rates rise, by raising the funds to ensure his patients have the same access to medicines as those in wealthier countries like Switzerland. If he succeeds in becoming WHO director-general, he wants to tackle health inequity across the board. “People are dying not because of lack of knowledge or science, but because of lack of equity and a lack of access,” he tells us. He sees the Covid-19 pandemic as a prime example of what’s wrong. “In 2021, out of 8 billion vaccine doses, only 3% went to Africa, while other countries were already rolling out booster doses.” He knows the WHO faces big challenges, but believes positive reform can guarantee its future. “I'm convinced that the world is much better with the WHO than without it.” Listen to the full interview and subscribe to our Inside Geneva podcast. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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Saturday · 29 min
WHO candidate Maria Neira: ‘We need to rebuild credibility and trust.’
Send us Fan Mail Inside Geneva has partnered with the Global Health Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute to bring you exclusive interviews with the candidates for director general of the World Health Organization (WHO). Who wants to lead our top public health body? Maria Neira was a doctor for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) as the genocide in Rwanda began. Now she is a WHO insider, serving as its Director of Public Health, Environment and Social Determinants. And she knows public health from the government side; she was vice-minister of health in her native Spain from 2002 until 2005. She’s a passionate advocate for the WHO, telling us “it is one of the most powerful and beautiful ideas ever created by humanity.” She remembers that when she was a medical student, WHO advice was seen as a gold standard. Today, amid funding cuts and widespread disinformation, she says “we need to be very strategic, to rebuild credibility and trust.” But she’s convinced she can inspire member states to rededicate themselves to the WHO, “through healthcare we can change the world. Imagine if we put in place prevention strategies: people will be healthy, their economies will be better.“ Listen to the full interview and subscribe to our Inside Geneva podcast. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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November 1 · 27 min
WHO candidate Budi Sadikin: no country can fight a pandemic alone
Send us Fan Mail Here is episode two of our series in partnership with the Global Health Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute, bringing you exclusive interviews with the candidates for director general of the World Health Organization (WHO). Budi Sadikin is currently Indonesia’s health minister, but has spent most of his career in finance, as a top executive at Indonesia’s biggest bank. “Before, my job was to make my clients wealthy; now my job is to make my people healthy,” he says with a smile. Sadikin believes his experience in finance will help him tackle WHO reform, even as the organisation suffers big cuts in donor funding. But he is also a firm believer in health equity, telling us that during a global pandemic, emergency treatments “should become global public goods.” He says his good relations with the United States will help him encourage Washington to rejoin the WHO, but also warns that “if any country believes it can safeguard its population on its own during the next pandemic, that is scientifically and practically impossible.” Listen to the full interview and subscribe to our Inside Geneva podcast. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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October 31 · 29 min
WHO candidate Hanan Balkhy: ‘The bottom line is that the funding is slimmer’
Send us Fan Mail Inside Geneva has partnered with the Global Health Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute to bring you exclusive interviews with the candidates for director general of the World Health Organization (WHO). Who wants to lead our top public health body? Hanan Balkhy is currently regional director for the WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean regional office, so she’s something of a WHO insider. A native of Saudi Arabia, she was educated in the United States and always wanted to be a doctor. Doing the WHO’s top job, she says, is a way “to serve the broader humanity.” She is especially concerned about antibiotic resistance, about the effects of climate change on health, and healthcare in conflict zones. She also warns about a “normalisation” of attacks on hospitals and healthcare workers. But she is also well aware that the WHO needs to reform and do more with less money. “The bottom line is that the funding is slimmer.” Listen to the full interview and subscribe to our Inside Geneva podcast. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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October 27 · 40 min
Who will defend the International Criminal Court?
Send us Fan Mail This week on Inside Geneva, host Imogen Foulkes asks whether the International Criminal Court (ICC) can survive Washington’s brutal sanctions. James Goldston of Open Society tells us the sanctions mean a “financial death sentence” for the court’s judges and lawyers, who can no longer use credit cards and even US based systems like Microsoft. Philippe Bolopion of Human Rights Watch says the court is a last resort for the victims of terrible atrocities, such as war crimes and genocide. But Richard Goldberg of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies describes the ICC as a “kangaroo court”, which he believes is intent on prosecuting US and Israeli citizens. Tune in for a lively debate. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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October 13 · 31 min
Is Afghanistan guilty of gender apartheid?
Send us Fan Mail This week on our Inside Geneva podcast, we ask whether the world has forgotten women in Afghanistan. Under Taliban rule, they cannot work, go to secondary school, leave the house alone or even visit a public park. Human rights defenders say the world is looking away. Some argue that what’s happening in Afghanistan amounts to gender apartheid and want it recognised as a crime under international law. They also warn that if the repression of women in Afghanistan is not challenged, it could happen in other countries too. Listen now to the full episode. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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September 29 · 29 min
From Kabul to Fiji in the fight for gender equality
Send us Fan Mail What takes a woman from a law career in Australia to Somalia, Afghanistan and then…Fiji? On our Inside Geneva podcast, host Imogen Foulkes talks to UN Women’s Alison Davidian about being in Kabul when the Taliban returned and about the effects of climate change and rising sea levels on women’s livelihoods. They also discuss why men and boys should never feel threatened by gender equality. Listen to the full episode now. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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September 15 · 35 min
International Gender Champions speak out
Send us Fan Mail Diversity, equality, inclusion, woke: are these concepts now toxic? The past two years have seen a pushback against gender equality, and it is having real-world consequences for women and girls. Yet in Geneva, the International Gender Champions, led by senior diplomats, are not giving up. “I embrace wokeness,” one ambassador tells us. The data shows that equality benefits everyone, socially, economically and politically. So why is it so out of fashion? Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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September 1 · 30 min
Gaza: Ceasefire, sort of. Reconstruction, no.
Send us Fan Mail It’s been ten months since the ceasefire in Gaza. Almost a million people still live in tents. There are 60 million tonnes of rubble to clear. The UN estimates reconstruction will cost at least $70 billion. But the work has not started. Key building materials are being denied entry, there is little clean water, but many rats. Inside Geneva talks to Jehan Salim and Mohammed al Aklouk, aid workers from the Norwegian Refugee Council, about the huge task and the very limited resources. Listen now and subscribe to the podcast. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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August 18 · 28 min
Pushback on human rights: defenders speak out
Send us Fan Mail UN investigations have documented war crimes in Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan. So why is no one being held accountable? Why do some political leaders talk about human rights as though they were an optional nuisance? In this episode of our ‘Inside Geneva’ podcast, we speak with Phil Lynch and Pooja Patel from the International Service for Human Rights. We discuss impunity, scapegoating, funding cuts, standing up for our rights and much more. Listen to the full interview and subscribe to our Inside Geneva podcast! Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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August 4 · 27 min
Inside Geneva’s Summer Profiles: Philippe Stoll
Send us Fan Mail Philippe Stoll, the Red Cross’s ‘techplomat’, is Inside Geneva’s Summer Profile this week. “I studied economics and I think I could have been a banker or something like that. A good Swiss indeed! But my mother was a volunteer at the Red Cross, and I think she influenced me a lot about maybe being human or taking care of humans,” he says. He’s helping the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) develop a new digital emblem to warn cyber warriors against attacking protected structures like hospital software, or confidential data. “Cyber attacks are increasingly carried out by machines. It’s a machine talking to another machine, and this certificate is a way to identify something that the machine will understand and not attack.” Such attacks are already happening. “The ICRC suffered from a cyber attack in 2022. It’s not a question of if, it’s more question of when. We know that the ICRC has access to information that is highly interesting for state or non state armed groups,” says Stoll. And they can cause enormous harm, “[such as] the distress of people not being able to get the information online because it was hacked or the fact that some information might put your family or you at risk because you belong to a tribe or clan that is under attack.” Join host Imogen Foulkes for an in-depth discussion – how do we uphold the Geneva Conventions in 21st-century wars? Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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July 21 · 26 min
Inside Geneva’s Summer Profiles: Trish Newport
Send us Fan Mail Trish Newport of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) Switzerland is Inside Geneva’s first summer profile this year. “My grandma was a humanitarian she had worked in Malawi and I remember when I was about 10 years old she said to me, ‘When you grow up and you become a humanitarian, you should work for MSF because they really have strong values and ethics that you will appreciate,’” says Newport. Originally from Canada, she has worked all over the world, in the most challenging environments. “I worked a lot in acute malnutrition response for a number of years, including in Niger. It’s hard to see, but you can really do something, for example a little malnourished child comes in and, if they get Plumpy Nut and proper care for six weeks, they become a fat little cute kid and they go home,” she says. Now she’s at the heart of MSF’s Ebola response, in Bunia, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). “It’s not just an Ebola outbreak. It’s an Ebola outbreak in a context with massive humanitarian needs, that has high insecurity and where there’s ongoing conflict. We see the outbreak is starting to go into areas with high insecurity, where we hear about community deaths but you don’t have access to them, to be actually sampling to see if it’s Ebola or not, or to have a proper Ebola response.” The World Health Organization (WHO) says this outbreak is spreading at record speed. “A mother had her child, the child was sick, and then the mother died of Ebola. The grandmother took the baby, came to where our project is, and the grandmother died. The baby is now sick with Ebola, none of the family wants to come to the child because everyone that touches the child dies. It just breaks your heart,” says Newport. “And people here they are people and we are all humans and so I have a hard time understanding why we can’t connect that way,” she says. Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full interview. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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July 7 · 34 min
Can a woman lead the UN?
Send us Fan Mail On Inside Geneva this week, we look at the race to be the next UN Secretary-General. Is it time for a change? Susana Malcorra, candidate for UN Secretary-General 2016: 'I am deeply convinced this is a moment that requires a different type of leadership, and we have tested leadership nine leaders throughout 80 years that were all men.' Geneva recently hosted three of the candidates – we hear from them. What are their plans? Rebeca Grynspan, candidate for Secretary-General: 'My criteria of success as secretary general is that nobody will ask me again: Where is the UN?' If that question continues we will be irrelevant.' What are the UN's challenges? María Fernanda Espinosa, candidate for Secretary-General: 'I think the UN does not suffer from a crisis of purpose or principles enshrined in the Charter. It suffers from a crisis of delivery of impact, of accountability, and of inclusion.' And what does it still have to offer? Michelle Bachelet, candidate for Secretary-General: 'Multilateralism has a lot of problems, but if you didn't have a multilateral system, children in the refugee camps wouldn't have vaccines. People displacement wouldn't have support. So there's a lot of things that multilateralism has done and we need to improve.' Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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June 23 · 29 min
Books to make you think
Send us Fan Mail This week, Inside Geneva presents the newest instalment of our “Books to make you think” series. We talk to an author who had a ringside seat as the US development agency USAID was being destroyed. “The people who so recklessly tore down the agency [...] are still sitting in high government positions and have not been held accountable for their actions, so I intentionally named names in the book and explained exactly who was responsible and why,” says Nicholas Enrich, author of Into the Wood Chipper. “USAID was destroyed by people who really had no idea what they were doing, and because of the vindictive ego of Elon Musk,” continues Enrich. And we hear about a forensic analysis of the language used by US media to report the war in Gaza. “The New York Times referred to the killing of Israelis on October 7 as a ‘massacre’ 124 times, and a ‘slaughter’ 53 times. In the same time frame, they used similar language zero times to describe the killing of Palestinians, despite the fact that, in the first 100 days, the death toll was seven or eight times higher than on October 7. Zero, not once, did they describe anything Israel did to the Palestinians in that period as a massacre or a slaughter,” says Adam H. Johnson, author of How to Sell a Genocide. Did the mainstream media sanitise war crimes? “Do you think that it is possible Israel killed 20,000 children at least – that’s the official number that no one disputes – over two years and never once committed a massacre or a slaughter? Does that feel statistically likely to you? I think the answer is, on its face, ‘no’,” says Johnson. Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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June 9 · 1 hr
What’s the point of foreign aid?
Send us Fan Mail On our Inside Geneva podcast this week, we host a debate on a key question: what’s the point of foreign aid? “What’s the point of mobilising taxpayers’ money and sending it to faraway countries to assist vulnerable people? And how do you sell that to your own taxpayers?” says Gilles Carbonnier, former Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). There are more conflicts and greater needs, yet donor countries want to spend less. “What’s the point of mobilising taxpayers’ money and sending it to faraway countries to assist vulnerable people? And how do you sell that to your own taxpayers?” says Gilles Carbonnier, former Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). There are more conflicts and greater needs, yet donor countries want to spend less. Do we think some people’s tragedies are less important than others? If a child is in pain in Khartoum, that’s exactly the same as a child being in pain in New York or London. If a mother is grieving in Gaza, that’s exactly the same as a mother grieving in Geneva,” says Chris Lockyear, former Secretary General of Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF). How can aid agencies better explain what they do? “What defines us is humanity, and humanity means we cannot stay idle when we see others suffering. We have to act and do something to try to protect them, assist them and prevent suffering, regardless of where this happens,” says Carbonnier. Listen to the full episode on Inside Geneva. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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May 26 · 36 min
Is aid failing?
Send us Fan Mail On this week's Inside Geneva podcast episode, we take stock of aid cuts and what they mean for new crises such as Ebola. “It is a catastrophe. It is not an opportunity. But now we have an obligation to transform the system: there’s no other way the humanitarian system can survive this crisis without any change,” says Professor Karl Blanchet from the University of Geneva. A new report says aid delivery must change, but huge cuts are not the way. “The suspension of funding by major donors, not only the United States but also the UK, Germany and others, [means that] there are going to be excess deaths. Millions of people are going to die who should not have died because of these funding cuts,” says Professor Esperanza Martinez from the Australian National University. What happens in a crisis like Ebola if aid funding is driven by ‘anti-diversity’ ideology? “Every process in society follows a gendered pattern, so it is often going to be women who are the caretakers of the sick. It is going to be women who are washing the bodies of the dead and preparing them for burial,” says Hannah Reinl from the Geneva Gender Champions organisation. Who stands to lose the most from the world’s only superpower withdrawing from aid organisations such as the World Health Organization (WHO)? “If the US had not withdrawn from the WHO, then we would have been part of the WHO’s response. Which means that when the WHO learned about this, the US government would have learned about it as well. Instead, [US Secretary of State] Marco Rubio is saying that he did not find out about this until ten days later. Well, maybe we should not have pulled out of the WHO, and we would have found out about it earlier,” says Nicholas Enrich, a former USAID official and author of Into the Wood Chipper. Join Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full interviews. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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May 12 · 32 min
Who controls landmines and drones?
Send us Fan Mail On Inside Geneva, we look at weapons contamination and the harm it causes. “We have at least one casualty every single day in Afghanistan – someone killed or injured –and it is most likely a child,” says Nick Pond, from the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan. From old conflicts to new. “Ukraine is the breadbasket of Europe and billions of square metres of land are suspected to be contaminated, which means they can’t be farmed,” says Paul Heslop, from the UN Mine Action, Ukraine. And from old weapons to new. “This is proliferating well beyond Ukraine. Ukraine and Russia are the two leaders in drone technology, but the level of proliferation is scary,” says Sean Moorhouse, from Mine Action, UN Development Programme. In response to Russian aggression, the Baltic states are pulling out of the landmine convention. “We did not say yes to landmines; we said no to unilateral disarmament constructs,” says Jonatan Vseviov, Secretary General, Estonian Foreign Ministry. But others are joining. “We heard that Lebanon will be joining the convention. This is a massive achievement and a massive push for the convention itself,” says Rana Elias, from the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining. As warfare changes, weapons contamination becomes more complicated. Who is responsible when a weapon fails to hit its target and harms someone years later? Who should pay for the clean‑up? And are we turning away from our opposition to indiscriminate weapons? Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full episode. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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April 28 · 45 min
Challenges to press freedom
Send us Fan Mail On Inside Geneva this week, we mark Press Freedom Day. Is there anything to celebrate? Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression: “The role of journalists has never been under such pressure, and the sector itself is suffering. So these are very, very important times to take a deep breath and make sure that freedom of expression, and media freedom as part of that, is protected, because it is an extremely important pillar of democracy.” Increasingly, journalists are being attacked simply for reporting the facts. Antoine Bernard, Reporters Without Borders: “We are in times where facts have become a target; hence, journalists have become more of a target, and this means that they are the ones who are suffering most from the growing polarisation of the public debate.” And are people manipulating press freedom and freedom of expression? Chris Morris, CEO, Full Fact: “Regulating information is a really difficult thing to do well. Getting the right balance between the absolute need to protect freedom of expression and the need to protect people from harm online is really difficult.” Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression: “You have the First Amendment warriors talking about freedom of speech without any limit. But what they actually mean is freedom of speech for me, but not for you. Because when that happens, when you have freedom of speech without any barriers, then what happens is that we’ve seen a surge of hate speech, attacks against migrants, and terrible misogynist attacks against women politicians.” Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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April 14 · 39 min
Can the UN survive?
Send us Fan Mail On Inside Geneva this week, we ask: in a world of violent conflict, is the UN – which was founded to keep the peace – doing its job? “On many fronts the UN is doing indispensable work every day, bringing food to hungry people and ensuring practical standards for how we cooperate on the planet. Most countries follow the UN’s rules and principles on an everyday basis, so not too bad. [Former UN Secretary-General] Dag Hammarskjöld said that the UN was not made to take us to heaven, but to prevent us from going to hell, and that’s still true: after 1945 there have been no new world wars,” says Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide. But with the big powers causing conflict, does the UN need a different structure? “It’s worth remembering that when the UN Charter was adopted in 1945, 50 countries were present at the table, and today there are 193 member states. So almost three‑quarters of the UN’s membership have not had a say in the rules of the game that they are now bound by, and they are very frustrated by that lack of voice and representation,” says Heba Aly, director of Article 109. Can a new, reformed UN restore some peace in the world before it’s too late? “History shows that after every severe crisis we come together and try to create a better system, which is what happened after the two world wars. First we had the not‑so‑successful attempt of the League of Nations, but then the much more successful UN, learning from what had gone wrong with the League of Nations. I hope we don’t need to relearn this through a third world war or anything like that,” says Eide. “For the UN overall, I think it’s going to go through a very difficult and dark period. You know, sometimes you just have to hit rock bottom. I hope that, coming out of that, we can emerge with a new global social contract. And if that difficult period leads us to something better, then that is something worth fighting for,” says Aly. Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva. Get in touch! Email us at insidegeneva@swissinfo.ch Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_en Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/ Host: Imogen Foulkes Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain Distribution: Sara Pasino Marketing: Xin Zhang
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