This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.
I'm Janette Jaleel and at 13 hours GMT on Monday 25th November these are our main stories. Shock in Romania as a little known hard right candidate wins the most votes in the first round of the presidential election. We hear about the fertility scam fueling a black market trade in babies in Nigeria. The Chinese tech firm Huawei launches a phone with its own apps challenging Apple and Google.
Also in this podcast, the Italian Museum dedicated to the flamboyant British poet Byron.
In Romania, a little-known far-right and pro-Russia candidate has won the most votes in the first round of the presidential election. Calendor Jesgu stood as an independent and campaigned largely on the social media platform TikTok. In what could be another unexpected twist, the pro-Europe Prime Minister, Marcel Cholaku, may be knocked out of the election by a centre-right liberal, Elena Laskoni, who's competing with him for a place in next month's runoff vote.
Romania shares a long border with Ukraine and has been a staunch supporter of Kiev during its war with Russia. Adrian Hatos, a senator for the PNL party, one of the two main parties in the governing coalition, gave this reaction.
I have to admit that not only me, but a large part of the country is in shock after these results. A large number of votes, which puts a collanger just in the front line, was totally unexpected. He made his campaign under the radar, not even the exit polls. The sociologist predicted that he even can make it to the fourth place or something like that. Nobody expected him to make it to the finals.
Our central Europe correspondent Nick Thorpe told us more about this surprise result. Mr Georgescu has come from nowhere effectively and on the day he managed to get 23% of the vote in this first round of the Romanian election. That amounts to more than 2.1 million votes with the next candidate, Elene Lasconi,
who's from the Central Right candidate, a Liberal from the Save Romania Union. She appears to have overtaken Marcell Cholaco, but we won't really know, I think, for some time. Who will, because the second and third place is so close, who will actually face Mr. Georgescu? But certainly this is a mammoth event, a mammoth surprise in Romania. And tell us, who is Kellen Georgescu?
Well, you know, I think everyone in Romania and around the world, including me, is sort of struggling to find out more about him. What we know for sure, he's a 62-year-old expert on agriculture, on sustainable development. He's not a total newcomer to public life. He worked briefly in the Romanian Foreign Ministry, but in recent years, he was very close. He was the honorary president for a while of another far-right party called Our or Gold, the Romanian Unity Party,
wanted to reunite Romania with Moldova for the east on the borders with you and parts, indeed, of Ukraine. So he was eventually pushed out of that party for the radicalism of his views. A lot of people are saying a lot of very fierce things about him. In terms of what he says about himself, he says that the first thing is to restore the dignity of the Romanian nation
He was asked whether he's pro NATO or pro EU. He replied that he's pro the dignity of his country and that both being in both organisations was all very well, but they had to be used to serve their deep national interest. There is a lot of fatigue with the war in Ukraine. The huge numbers of refugees coming over the border from Ukraine into Romania. But aren't Romanians worried about the threat from Russia?
They are worried about the threat from Russia, and I think there has been something or what seemed to be a consensus about having NATO bases, about being strongly pro-American, about buying F-35 fighters. That's a recent decision of the Romanian parliament, the Romanian government, and obviously there have been drones from Russian attacks on towns along the Danube Delta, along the border between Romania and Ukraine. On the other hand, I think there is a resentment
of the Ukrainian refugees coming into Romania and of them getting social benefits, especially the children. So that's been played on by Mr. Georgesco in his campaign.
Nick Thorpe On the other side of the Black Sea, in Georgia, Parliament has convened for the first time since disputed elections there last month, despite a boycott by opposition parties and protesters who have gathered outside. The demonstrators, many of whom support closer ties with the European Union, say the vote, which was won by the ruling Georgian Dream Party, was rigged
They shouted Russians and slaves at arriving deputies and threw eggs at the Parliament building. This man said they would not give up.
It's not the parliament what they are doing now, because it's not the choice of the Georgian people. According to the Georgian dream, every second person in our country is rooting the Georgian dream. That's ridiculous. That's not true. Our correspondent, Rehan Dimitri, is among the protesters outside the parliament building in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi.
Everything is going ahead despite the protests and despite the opposition having refused to take up their mandates and the president of this country declaring that this parliament is illegitimate. She is currently contesting in the country's constitutional court
that she brought the lawsuit kind of contesting the illegitimacy of this parliament and specifically talking about widespread allegations of voter fraud that happened on the 26th of October on the election day. I can see a lot of protesters, it's raining, more protesters are coming through this particular road where I'm standing now, they're bringing rain codes,
And there are tents outside the Parliament to large tents and several smaller tents. Some people spend the night outside Parliament and they remain out in the streets. And this is just the latest in a series of protests. As you say, protesters are set up camps. This standoff is likely to continue for some time. How do you think it could play out?
Of course, I guess the biggest kind of fear is that the police and there's a large number of police in the vicinity of the Parliament and also in the main square, not far from the Parliament. They have their water cannons there. And there was a warning from the Ministry of Interior yesterday that they will resort to using special means to disperse the protesters if the protests continue. But there's no sign of these protesters leaving the area.
Rehan Dimitri in Georgia. For much of the time that Angela Merkel led Germany, she was seen as the world's most powerful woman. During her 16 years as German Chancellor, she dealt with the global financial crisis, Europe's migrant crisis and Russia's initial invasion of Ukraine in 2014.
It's a legacy she's now having to defend in her new memoir, Freedom. Our Europe editor, Katja Adler, asked her if she hadn't blocked Ukraine's NATO membership back in 2008, would there be a war there now?
We would have seen military conflict even earlier. It was completely clear to me that President Putin would not have stood idly by and watched Ukraine join NATO. Other European countries were also opposed, and back then Ukraine as a country would certainly not have been as prepared as it was in February 2022.
You say in your memoirs that it became very clear to you that the biggest priority for Vladimir Putin was power and reducing Western influence in Europe that had gained after the Cold War. But despite that, you allow Germany to become energy dependent.
on Russia. How do you respond to those who criticize you and say that you put German business interests before European security? I was motivated by two things. Firstly, Germany's economic interest. Secondly, I believe that despite all the difficulties, we should do everything we can to establish a relationship with Russia that will enable us to coexist peacefully.
I did try to curb the attacks in Ukraine through the Minsk Greens. That worked to an extent for a few years, though not brilliantly. Angela Merkel, we're talking to our Europe editor, Katia Adler, about the growing criticism she's faced since leaving office over how she dealt with the Russian president. I asked Katia what she made of the former German Chancellor's response.
It was interesting because we spoke to former Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi after we'd spoken to Angela Merkel as well, because he worked alongside her for several years. And he said, you know, it's important to bear in mind the norms of the time, because he said, you know, if you look back to 2005, 2006,
Europe in general and the United States wanted to get closer to Vladimir Putin and work and have a better working relationship I think the real criticism comes later on in the day that the second gas pipeline that she you know signed off basically with Vladimir Putin was in 2014 after his initial invasion of Ukraine in the east after his annexation of Crimea and his good friend her good friend Barack Obama then US President begged her
not to open this gas pipeline. Vladimir Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, said he described that cheap gas that Germany was getting from Russia as a geopolitical weapon of the Kremlin. But she ignored that. Now, she says she doesn't regret it, that she did listen to that, that in the end, when President Biden came to office, she agreed that the gas pipeline wouldn't be used if gas was being weaponized. And of course, then came the full-scale invasion. So gas did not flow from the second pipeline.
So she does defend herself, but yes, you're absolutely right. There's been a lot of criticism. So does she admit to any major regrets?
And it's a bit like Edith Piafshana, Regreta Rejana. She defends very strongly her legacy. But it's interesting, if you think about it, 16 years in office. I mean, repeatedly voted again and again. And I mean, it wasn't all the way through. For most part of the time, she had popularity ratings that other leaders really did. They would have, I mean, I say this metaphorically, killed for. You know, it's just really unusual.
One of the things she said she tried to do was get this peaceful cooperation with Russia. And yet, weeks after she left, there was the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. So she does defend her policy, migration policy as well, all of the different things that she's now criticized for. But in the end, she says, well, you know, I was voted by the German people. And at the time, as you say, she was widely admired, what is her advice to world leaders who now have to deal again with President Trump?
Yeah, I asked her if she had some words of advice and she said, I don't want to advise from the sidelines. She said it's very important to know that he doesn't believe in win-win because she's very much about let's everybody try and find a way forward. He believes there has to be one winner. So she said in negotiations with him, you have to express yourself clearly and forcefully and then you can find some kind of mutual respect.
Yes, because they're both leaders who in their different ways think a lot about the economics of their nation. Oh, he was furious in his first time in the office with Europe, particularly with Germany. He criticized Angela Merkel directly because of a trade deficit when it came to German imports to the United States, but also for lack of defence spending. And she admits Germany hasn't been spending enough on defence. He has the same gripes now with Europe when he comes to office. That's why it's quite interesting to listen to her about how she handled him.
Katia Adler talking there about Angela Merkel. A BBC investigation has exposed a fertility scam fueling a black market trade in babies in Nigeria. Women who are desperate to be mothers pay hundreds of dollars for drugs that they're told will guarantee that they conceive. They're then duped into believing that they're pregnant. The MSC Adegoke reports.
That's the sound of government officials raiding a building near Umunya, a town in Anambara, southeastern Nigeria. It's mobile phone footage from the state's Ministry of Health. Women with pregnant bellies stare blankly at the camera.
It looks like an average health clinic, but it's a place where cryptic pregnancy scammers get their babies. Cryptic pregnancy is a medical term. It's when a woman is unaware she's pregnant until late in the pregnancy. It's a rare phenomenon, but here it refers to something completely different, a miracle fertility treatment. It's big business, and it's a scam.
The women are taken to a nearby hospital. One of them agreed to speak to us if we didn't use her real name and changed her voice. She looks scared and confused. In her arms, it's a baby girl. Now looking back, do you regret that decision?
I am still confused. I'm still confused. It's okay. Abortion is a criminal offence in Nigeria. Women faced up to seven years in prison. It's only permitted if the mother's life is in danger.
Some of these girls wouldn't want their parents to know. Then after giving birth, they would be giving money. Ify or Bionable is a number state's commission of a women's affairs. Crypto pregnancy cannot exist without child trafficking. Anybody that tells you you have a child through crypto pregnancy is a liar. You are going to be giving another person's child a traffic child.
My colleagues from the BBC and Lagos, Cheagosier and a Berry, find another so-called cryptic pregnancy clinic. This one is also in a number.
A secret camera shows dozens of women waiting inside a small hotel. Cheers of joy come from the consultation. Someone has been told she's pregnant. They meet a woman who calls herself Dr Ruth. For $200, she hands over a bag of unlabeled drugs, which she says will guarantee Ebere gets pregnant.
When Iberia returns four weeks later, the miracle happens. She claims Iberia's pregnant, but it's a lie. Iberia did a pregnancy test at the hospital. It was negative.
Dr Ruth explains the baby can't be delivered until she's given another drug. This one costs around a thousand dollars. We've heard numerous reports of how women do actually believe they've given birth. Some say they're given drugs and told to push. Others talk of waking up with a cesarean-like incision.
This woman got her baby through the cryptic pregnancy clinic that was raided in February.
Throughout all of this, I couldn't take my eyes away from the tiny baby. I don't know what the man is doing there. I went to hospital like, oh, that's went to hospital. The commissioner makes the couple agree. If the biological parents come forward to claim the child, they would have to give him up. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I still felt that empathy towards these parents. They believe that they went through this process and this is their child.
There are still many women, knowingly or not, falling for the cryptic pregnancy scam in Nigeria, fueling an underground trade in babies. The BBC asked Dr Ruth to respond to the allegations made in this investigation, but did not receive any response. That report by Yemisee Adegoke in Nigeria.
Still to come in this podcast, can the world unite to deal with the plague of plastic pollution? We find them from our highest mountains, some of our studies near the top of Mount Everest, right down to our deepest oceans. We find them from the poles to the equator. Talks to try to agree a global treaty resume in South Korea.
You're listening to the Global News Podcast. In yet another sign of how the technology relationship between the US and China is splintering, as the world waits to see what a second Trump term will mean for trade between the world's two biggest economies, Huawei is launching a phone with its own software and apps, posing a challenge to the dominance of Apple and Google, the only two companies that currently run apps. Our business correspondent, Sir Anjana Teiwari, told us more.
It wasn't so long ago that Huawei was in the news very often. It is, of course, China's National Technology Champion, fell out of favor with many governments around the world because the US accused Huawei of trying to target the US national security network. Well, the company is now poised to launch its first flagship phone that can run its own apps on a fully homegrown operating system. Now, this is no mean feat.
There are only two major mobile operating systems in the world, of course we will know them, Apple and Google. Huawei's Mate 70 smartphone will feature what's called Harmony OS Next, which Huawei hopes to establish as the world's third major mobile operating system. And this is
partly the result of US sanctions that were supposed to make the company weaker but in fact have spurred it to try to develop its own system so that it's not reliant on the US. This is the latest demonstration that the US sanctions which were designed to hinder the company have instead cemented Huawei's status as a technological juggernaut.
And this software launch builds on momentum in its hardware as well from last year when the group unveiled the Mate 60, which was powered by a self-developed and domestically made processor capable of near 5G speeds. And that's something that Washington believed was not possible. And it could be being driven by the fear that the US could cut off everything from China in terms of advancement in these types of technologies.
And how much of a threat is this to the dominance of Google and Apple? Obviously Apple and Google are very dominant in the market and what is interesting especially here in Asia is that Huawei is able
to sell its products, its hardware, and its software to Asian customers who might be using a Google or an Android phone. And despite all of the sanctions and all of the attempts to try and hinder its business and its development office technology, it seems to be succeeding. For example, there's lots of places in Asia that rely on Huawei's 5G network. It has a very advanced 5G network.
So it's not so much how much it will hinder Google and Apple, for example. But what we are seeing is a splintering. Perhaps there will be two separate ecosystems in the world, one sort of led by America and one led by Chinese. And it's anyone's guess as to where the customer is in the end flock to.
Surinjana Tawari. More than 50 people are reported to have been killed in violent street demonstrations in Mozambique following last month's disputed presidential election. Human rights watchers accused the police of using excessive force, including live bullets fired to disperse demonstrators. Ian Mafula reports from one such protest in Mozambique's capital, Maputo.
This is a show for station like nothing I've ever seen before. People are banging pots and pans, blowing whistles, vehicles passing by and putting. And the message is simple. They are saying that the recent elections are not free and fair, and they want their candidate, the 90-month-old Lane, to be declared as winner. They are also saying that if they can't join the streets to go and protest, they will go from the coast of the house. And this is happening all across the country.
As we're moving around the city, we came across this group of young people who are holding a vigil on behalf of one of them who they say was shot by the police officers. The United Machado is a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. I wouldn't know what is the rationale behind killing children. There is no possible way of justifying that children are children, even if they are part of a protest.
That should be one more reason why a security forces should take extra precautions when handling those crowds. It's important also to remind the Muslim because security forces are children. Like adults, they have the right to protest, to peacefully protest. And when they do so, they are required to have extra protection from the authorities that pledge to protect them.
Police say they're investigating cases of alleged police brutality while also acknowledging losses within their own ranks. Here is Bernadine Rafael, the commander of policing, Mozambique. We recorded 103 injured people and 69 of those were police officers. The demonstrators are using the children as a shield in front of them, and they themselves are behind. Consequently, they don't pay the price.
Children should not be used because they are innocent. This is not a demonstration and it is not about the elections, but it is about subversion and competition for terrorism in our country. Mozambique stands at crossroads amid political uncertainty and rising tensions. The Constitutional Council faces the critical task of deciding whether to uphold the contested election results or call for fresh polls.
process complicated by the lack of set timelines. President Felipe Nusi has urged unity in inviting the four presidential candidates, including Montlani, to discuss the crisis, warning that the unrest is taking a toll on the nation's fragile economy. Meanwhile, families like that of young Antonio Joaquim, a casualty of violence, can only hope for a return to peace in the pursuit of justice.
Ian Wafula in Maputo. Plastic pollution is a worldwide problem. Millions of tons of plastic waste are dumped into our oceans, rivers and lakes every year. Richard Thompson is a professor of marine biology at Plymouth University and says action on plastic pollution is urgently needed.
We find them from our highest mountains, some of our studies near the top of Mount Everest, right down to our deepest oceans. We find them from the poles to the equator. We need to be concerned because it will be incredibly difficult to remove microplastics from the environment. Once they've entered the environment, they're going to stay there and they're going to persist. What the science is telling us is that we need to take action now to prevent further accumulation of microplastics.
Well, UN talks are taking place in South Korea to try to agree a global treaty on curbing plastic pollution. Activists are calling for an ambitious agreement that restricts production and waste. But as our environment correspondent Jonah Fisher reports, countries remain at loggerheads.
Now, I'm sure we've all seen the horrible images of marine creatures like turtles getting caught up in pieces of plastic. Indeed, we've probably all seen bits of plastic washed up on our beaches. While the global figures from the United Nations are pretty horrific, they estimate that about 20 million tonnes of plastic every year is ending up in our seas and oceans.
That's roughly the equivalent of a very large rubbish truck dumping its load into the water every minute of every day and night. It's a lot of plastic. And the tiny pieces, the microplastics, are getting everywhere. Whether from our clothes, car tires, or just broken off from bigger pieces. Microplastics have been spotted just about everywhere, from the top of Everest to the snow in Antarctica, even inside the bodies of fish.
And with all estimates suggesting that we're going to be producing even more plastic, well, the idea of having a global treaty to tackle the problem was born. So for the last two years, negotiators have been looking at topics such as how to reduce or simplify plastic production and how to better reuse and recycle plastic. So it's not just used once and thrown away.
These talks are starting in Busan in South Korea and are supposed to finalize a first ever global treaty to tackle plastic pollution. But I'll let you into something of an open secret. Things have not been going well so far. It's looking very unlikely there'll be agreement on things like cutting plastic production. Most plastic is made from fossil fuels and in a very similar way to the climate talks if you're a country with lots of
oil, well, it will be bad for business. Those negotiators and observers that I've been speaking to say that the best we can hope for is some sort of agreement, however weak and vague. It can then act as a foundation for tougher commitments that really make a difference in the years to come.
Jonah Fisher. A museum dedicated to the flamboyant British romantic poet Lord Byron is opening in the northern Italian city of Ravenna in Palazzo Guicholi, where he had one of his most passionate affairs with the wife of an Italian aristocrat. His years in Italy in the early 19th century was some of the most productive of his short life. Vanessa Heaney reports.
George Gordon Byron was one of the major figures of the romantic movement, famous for his elegant prose, as well as his scandalous lifestyle. In the early 1800s, he travelled widely across the Mediterranean. More than just a journey, his travels influenced his writing and his philosophy. He fled England in 1816 for Europe, leaving behind a trail of debt and love affairs. Italy offered freedom, inspiration and adventure.
In Venice he met Countess Teresa Gricholi. She'd only been married three days, but it was love at first sight, and the pair began a passionate affair, one of the most important and enduring of his life. Byron followed Teresa to Ravenna, and despite the social scandal, he moved into her husband's house, Palazzo Gricholi, where she became his muse.
During this time, the poet wrote some of his most famous works, such as parts of Don Juan and Charles Harold's pilgrimage. Visitors will be able to wander through the rooms of the palazzo where the affair took place. One of them contains love tokens kept by Byron's lover, including letters, jewelry, locks of his curly hair, and slithers of his sunburned skin.
The museum will also be partly dedicated to the Resor gimento, the 19th century Italian movement for unification. Tereza was instrumental in Byron's involvement with a secret revolutionary society fighting for Italian independence known as the Carabinari. In 1823, he left Italy for Greece to join insurgents fighting in the war of independence against the Ottoman Empire. Byron died of a fever the following year, aged 36.
During his life, he had several affairs, but Countess Teresa was his final great love. Vanessa Heaney. An author known as the Grand Dame of Blockbusters, Barbara Taylor Bradford has died. She was 91. During her career, she sold more than 90 million books, including her debut novel A Woman of Substance. Charlotte Gallagher looks back at her life.
A woman of substance was and is a sensation. The novel has sold more than 30 million copies and the television adaptation pulled in record audiences.
Its main character Emma Hart is a Yorkshire woman who rises from humble beginnings to become hugely successful. And in some ways that mirrors the author's own life. Born in Leeds in 1933, Barbara Taylor Bradford knew from a young age that she wanted to be a writer. One of her classmates was another aspiring writer who would also become hugely successful, Alan Bennett.
By the age of 15 Barbara Taylor Bradford had a job at a local paper. By 18 she was editing the women's pages and at just 20 years old she became a columnist at London's Evening Standard Paper. A Woman of Substance was published in 1979. That novel and all of Taylor Bradford's subsequent books are global bestsellers. She told the BBC why a woman of substance had resonated so much with readers.
at book signings or they wrote to me and it was always the same thing. She is my role model. Every woman said that if she could do it, starting with nothing, I can. Barbara Taylor Bradford once said that she wrote about mostly ordinary women who go on to achieve the extraordinary, a bit like the author herself. Charlotte Gallagher on the life and career of Barbara Taylor Bradford, who has died at the age of 91.
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, you can send us an email, the address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at Global NewsPod. This edition was mixed by Sydney Dunden, the producer was Oliver Berlau, the editor is Karen Martin. I'm Janet Gillio, until next time, goodbye.
