Thousands flee as rebels close in on key DR Congo city
en
January 27, 2025
TLDR: UN Secretary General António Guterres urges Rwanda to withdraw forces from DR Congo's territory and the M23 rebel group to halt advancement on Goma.

In this episode of the Global News Podcast, significant developments in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) unfold as reports show thousands fleeing their homes due to advancing M23 rebels from Rwanda. UN Secretary General António Guterres calls for Rwanda to adhere to international peace standards, intensifying calls for the cessation of hostilities in the region.
Key Issues Discussed
The Humanitarian Crisis in Goma
- Escalating Conflict: The DRC government accuses Rwanda of "declaring war" by supporting the M23 rebels, with reports of gunfire ringing out as Rwandan troops allegedly bolster the rebel advance towards Goma, an eastern city crucial for local dynamics.
- Displacement of Civilians: Thousands are displaced, with horrific accounts from residents who feel unsafe due to the ongoing bombings and violence. Many express deep concerns for their children's safety amid the chaos.
- Government Response: Amidst the turmoil, voices arise questioning the effectiveness of President Félix Tshisekedi’s leadership, emphasizing the need for immediate solutions to restore peace and order.
International Involvement and Reactions
- UN Security Council Meeting: An urgent session highlights the international community's demand for Rwanda to withdraw its forces and cease backing for M23. This response marks an important moment as major Western powers join in urging action.
- Accusation Against Rwanda: The conflict roots back to historical ethnic tensions, particularly regarding Tutsi and Hutu groups, complicating the narrative and linking Rwanda's actions to regional security concerns rather than purely internal politics.
Explaining the Roots of the Conflict
- Ethnic Tensions: The M23 rebel group consists primarily of Tutsi individuals and has voiced grievances regarding safety and treatment in eastern Congo, exacerbating ethnic divisions that trace back to the Rwandan genocide.
- Mineral Wealth: Discussions suggest that the underlying motivations may also include the DRC’s vast mineral resources, with accusations that Rwanda seeks control over these valuable assets.
Expert Insights
- Analysis by Will Ross: Reports from the field reveal a dire humanitarian situation, with families unable to find safety as rebel forces close in. Ross provides a nuanced perspective on the chaos in Goma, emphasizing the desperation of those displaced.
- Political Narrative: Rwanda's representative at the UN acknowledges support for the rebels while framing the situation as a necessity for national security in light of threats posed by Hutu militias, tying the ongoing conflict to broader regional issues.
Social and Political Reflections
- Future of Congolese Leadership: Public sentiment is growing regarding the need for changes in leadership if existing authorities cannot manage the crisis effectively. Calls for accountability and effective governance resonate loudly among the populace.
- Potential for Continued Violence: The risks are high as international pressure mounts against Rwanda, making future engagements and military actions unpredictable, further endangering local civilians.
Concluding Thoughts
The podcast episode highlights an escalating humanitarian crisis that requires urgent international attention and resolution. As humanitarian conditions worsen, the episode reflects on the deep-rooted geopolitical complexities shaping the conflict in the DRC and the dire consequences faced by innocent civilians caught in the crossfire.
This situation underscores the significant role that historical grievances, ethnic divisions, and international dynamics play in ongoing conflicts in the region. Key takeaways emphasize the necessity for comprehensive diplomatic solutions to not only address the immediate crisis but also to mitigate future conflicts in the area.
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I'm Johnny Diamond from the Global Story podcast where we're looking at DeepSeek, the Chinese company shaking up artificial intelligence. It claims its AI model has been made without the most advanced chips and at a fraction of the cost, wiping billions off the value of US tech giants in the process. That's on the Global Story, wherever you get your BBC podcast.
This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.
I'm Janet Joliele and in the early hours of Monday, the 27th of January, these are our main stories. The Democratic Republic of Congo has accused Rwanda of declaring war by sending troops across the border to support a rebel advance on the city of Goma. President Trump says he'll impose emergency tariffs and sanctions on Colombia after it turned back two migrant deportation flights.
Lebanon says Israeli troops have killed 22 people, as thousands of villagers tried to return to their homes in the south. Also in this podcast, the text sent to a made-up mobile number that resulted in marriage. First forward did it's the same as mine and then the last three did it's random and then didn't think anything of it. Did you say it? Just the most you say hello.
We begin in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the government has accused Rwanda of declaring war by sending its forces to support rebels advancing on the eastern city of Goma, forcing thousands of people to flee their homes.
Gunfire has been heard in the city centre as the Rwandan-backed rebels close in, despite attempts by the Congolese government forces to fight them off. Large numbers of Rwandan troops are reported to be pouring across the border to help the M23 rebels, who in recent weeks have made significant territorial gains, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, including these residents.
We're especially afraid for our children because if the situation ever gets worse, it will be difficult for them, so we want to spare them. We hear bombs from all sides of our campford displaced people. That's why I decided to flee, so as not to die there. We're going to Goma, but I heard that there are bombs in Goma too, so now we don't know where to go.
If President Chissikeidi is no longer able to lead, he should go and make way for those who can. We can't run away every day. He must find a solution so we can go home. Western nations and the head of the UN and Tonya Guterres have called on Rwanda to withdraw its forces from eastern Congo and halt its support for M23 fighters.
The calls were made at a special UN Security Council session. Congo's foreign minister, Teres Kaikwamba Wagner, spoke afterwards. Rwanda has been permitted by the international community, by its donors, by its partners, to Rick havoc in the DRC, in particular in North Kivu, even in the presence of United Nations peacekeeping troops with one of the most robust mandates of the United Nations. Our Africa region editor, Will Ross, gave us this update.
We've been looking at videos and reports coming out of Goma and it's quite difficult to get a picture right across what is a large city of one to two million people but certainly some videos showing people moving with whatever they can carry along roads
A lot of the people are moving from the outskirts outside Goma where there are these huge displacement camps. People have already been pushed out of their homes and they're having to move again because they fear that they're not safe where they are as the rebels get closer and closer to the city. It's difficult to know
exactly how close they are and in what kind of numbers, but certainly the sounds of war are there. You can hear gunfire and shelling, but it doesn't look as though the moment that there's been an all-out assault over the last day on Goma itself. Tell us about these rebels, why they will be trying to seize Goma and what Rwanda's had to say about this.
So it's a complicated picture but basically these are a Tutsi dominated rebel group which has long complained that Tutsi people living in eastern Congo are not treated fairly and in fact in some cases are attacked by Hutu militia and this is at the root cause of Rwanda's complaint. So earlier we just heard from the Congolese foreign minister and
She was really blaming Rwanda for everything. Rwanda also had a turn at the Security Council, and its representative Ernest Ramucho did not deny backing these M23 rebels, but said the root causes of the conflict have never been addressed, and that's Rwanda's security concerns. Rwanda says that the presence of these Hutu rebels in eastern Congo, rebels that are linked in some way to the Rwandan genocide,
is of grave security concern to Rwanda. And in fact, what's been happening is the Congolese armies been working with these Hutu rebels. So that sort of has enabled Rwanda to say these Hutu rebels are against us as a government. Therefore, the Congolese governments against us and even the UN peacekeepers are working with the Congolese army. So the UN is against us as well.
But there have been accusations that Rwanda is partly backing these rebels because of Congo's mineral wealth. And we've heard, not just from the head of the UN but the US, France and Britain at this UN Security Council meeting, putting pressure on Rwanda to do more to stop this.
That's right. Well, the minerals really are at the root of a lot of the conflict across eastern Congo. And the M23 is just one of dozens and dozens of armed groups. But you're right, there is pressure now. It's come pretty late, but there's now this sudden pressure, this UN Security Council meeting, called forward because Goma seemed to be under such threat.
But what we don't know is whether Rwanda will listen to this, whether the assault will be called off, or whether this pressure's kind of come too late. But it certainly is an uncomfortable kind of a message for Rwanda and President Paul Kagami, the spotlight very much on Rwanda's involvement in eastern Congo and its contribution to what is a really dire humanitarian situation.
Will Ross President Donald Trump has threatened Colombia with harsh retaliatory measures after its leader Gustavo Petro turned back two military planes carrying deported migrants. Mr Trump said he would impose hefty tariffs as well as a travel ban on Colombian officials.
Mr. Petro had objected to migrants being sent back on U.S. military planes instead of civilian ones, saying they were not criminals and should be returned with dignity. He has now said he'll send the presidential plane to the U.S. to repatriate the migrants.
Brazil has also complained about the treatment of its citizens on U.S. deportation flights after some arrived in handcuffs in Manaus. Our America's regional editor Leonardo Rosha told me more about what the Colombian leader had to say.
He published a note on social media saying exactly that, that migration is not a crime, that Colombian nationals should have been returned on civilian planes, and he wouldn't accept them otherwise. So those two flights, apparently one of them took off and had to return shortly after, and the other didn't even take off from the United States.
But one thing that needs to be said here is this it's nothing really new. What's new here is the use of military planes. That's new from the United States. But last year under the Biden administration, there's a record number of people deported from the US. 271,000 people were deported and Colombia came as number five on that list. Most of them to Latin America. It's no way. It's just the way that's being done and the perception that there's more to come that is creating these problems here.
But Mr Trump is not responding well to this. He seems to be in a bit of a collision course with Colombia. He's been making threats against it. Soon after President Pedro said that he wouldn't take this migrants back, President Trump announced sanctions against Colombia. Very stiff sanctions. He said he will impose emergency tariffs of 25% on all Colombian imports. For the first week, we'll go up to 50% the second week. Also, travel ban on government officials and their families.
visa sanctions as well and the American consulate in in Colombia will stop dealing with visas for Monday. So it's very strong response and in present Trump's statement, he called Mr. Petro socialist and unpopular leader.
Leonardo-Russia. While the U.S. President has been threatening countries that won't take back migrants, his Vice President, J.D. Vance, has been talking about how he hopes measures back home will have a chilling effect on undocumented workers. Speaking to CBS News, he defended the Trump administration's decision to raid schools and churches as part of its drive to expel millions of illegal immigrants.
We empowered law enforcement to enforce the law everywhere to protect Americans. But that also has an knock on effect, a chilling effect, arguably, to people to not send their cards to school. I desperately hope it has a chilling effect on legal immigrants coming into our country. In the churches, you think the U.S. Conference of Catholics bishops are actively hiding criminals? I think the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has frankly not been a good partner in common sense immigration enforcement that the American people voted for. And I hope, again, as a devout Catholic, that they'll do better.
A correspondent in Washington, David Willis, told me more about what Mr Vance had to say. This was his first interview since taking office, and J.D. Vance defended the flurry of executive orders, genetic surrounding illegal immigration that have come from this new administration over the course of its first week in office, as well as addressing Donald Trump's controversial pardoning of hundreds of January the 6th defendants and the confirmation
of the former Fox News commentator Pete Hexseth as Defense Secretary. Mr Vance was asked by CBS about the impact of lifting a ban on federal agents, arresting immigrants near schools and places of worship. Could it have
a chilling effect on parents who might now be hesitant to send their children to school, he was asked, to which he responded, I desperately hope it has a chilling effect on illegal immigrants coming into this country. Under US law, children have a right to public education regardless of immigration status, and schools, hospitals, and churches have previously all been deemed
to be sensitive areas, and therefore off limits, if you like, to immigration officials. But a statement released by the US Department of Homeland Security, just the day after Donald Trump was sworn into office, said that no longer would criminals be able to hide, as it put it, in America's schools and churches. So what's the reaction been to this?
Well, Catholic groups have warned that these moves to allow federal agents into schools and churches could foster a climate of what they called fear and uncertainty for those in need. And J.D. Vance said that as a practicing Catholic himself, he was heartbroken by the group's statement, but he went on to accuse them of having ulterior motives. The Vice President suggested
that the Catholic Church might be more concerned about the millions of dollars that it receives every year to help resettle illegal immigrants than it was worried about humanitarian concerns. Are they merely worried about the bottom line he asked? So already this controversial policy promised by Donald Trump is bringing it into conflict with bodies such as the Catholic Church.
David Willis. Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon have been accused of killing at least 22 people who were trying to return home. Lebanon's health ministry also reported that more than 120 others were wounded when Israeli forces opened fire at multiple locations.
Beirut says Israeli forces have violated Sunday's ceasefire deadline for withdrawing from southern Lebanon. Israel says its forces are staying on because its ceasefire deal with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah hasn't been fully implemented. Hugo Bishayger reports from Beirut.
Revolutionary songs were played at Hezbollah flags waived as residents returned to Eitel Shab in southern Lebanon. For the first time, they were seen for themselves the destruction caused by more than a year of war. They began travelling back after the end of a deadline for the Israeli withdrawal from the area and the removal of Hezbollah fighters and weapons from there.
but not all invading troops have left. Israel says Lebanon has not fully implemented the deal, which also includes the deployment of Lebanese soldiers to a part of the country long dominated by Hezbollah. Lebanon has accused Israel of delaying its withdrawal.
Hezbollah's TV station had encouraged people to return, despite warnings from both the Lebanese and Israeli armies that it was not safe. In several locations, Israeli soldiers opened fire. The Israeli army said those had been warning shots and did not give details of the incidents.
It's not clear how many Israeli troops remain in Lebanon and how long they're planning to stay. This is a country with memories of past foreign occupations. The presence of Israeli troops here is seen as unacceptable and a reason for concern.
Hugo Bishayga in Lebanon. Staying in the Middle East, a suggestion by Donald Trump that Egypt and Jordan should take in most of the population of Gaza has been roundly rejected by both countries and by Palestinian leaders. Mr Trump said that it was time to, in his words, clean out Gaza, much of which has been reduced to rubble by Israeli forces in the 15-month war that has claimed tens of thousands of lives.
Last week, Mr Trump praised Gaza's potential as a real estate project, given its beautiful seaside location and climate. These gardens expressed their outrage at his proposal.
We will never leave our homeland and we will not give away a single grain of sand in it for anyone, even if we are all killed. It is the land of our ancestors. Death is better than leaving Palestine.
They have tried to displace us since 1948. We want to tell the whole world that despite the genocide we have witnessed, despite the pain we have gone through, we are the owners of this land and we will never leave it." In Israel, far-right politicians have praised Mr Trump's comments. Ohad Tal chairs a religious Zionist party in the Israeli parliament.
he wants to solve the problem and not to keep fooling ourselves as we've all done in the past 30 years, like maybe if you will build high fences and we will improve their economy and then that will bring stability and prosperity. Well, that has been proven that it doesn't work. And I think what President Trump has done in the past and is doing now is to think outside of the box and to try and bring new alternative ideas of how to really solve the problem.
A correspondent in Jerusalem, Nick Beak, says Mr Trump's remarks seem to be upending decades of US foreign policy.
And now President Trump has been talking about Gaza this week, basically talking about it in terms of being a piece of real estate. He said it was a phenomenal location on the sea. It had the best weather. But now this weekend, he's saying that it's
a demolition site, it's over, that it should be cleaned out and that Palestinians should be given the chance to live somewhere else in peace. And that has prompted these accusations that what he's suggesting is tantamount to ethnic cleansing. And so there's been a lot of condemnation of what he said, notwithstanding the fact these might be musings that the President gave journalists on Air Force One rather than any sort of fully formed policy idea.
Yes, Jordan's already reacted very strongly after that conversation with King Abdullah. Imagine other Arab countries will come out very strongly too. And for Palestinians, this raises yet another nightmare scenario after 15 months of war.
It does absolutely and all through that time many Palestinians have said that they will not leave what is their homeland. The fact that they may be forced or asked to leave is completely unacceptable. We had Hamas today saying that from their point of view they will continue to oppose any sort of
move to remove Palestinians from Gaza. And as you say, Jordan already has 2.3 million registered Palestinian refugees. Egypt has said many times before that any sort of forced displacement of Palestinians could in fact jeopardize the whole peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. That was signed back in 1979. So that's the strength of the feeling on the Egyptian side.
So given all that, we know that in Israel the reaction from the far right to Mr Trump's comments has been very positive, but what's the wider reaction among Israelis to what he's had to say?
I think for a lot of Israelis, this is not the priority at the moment. I was in Tel Aviv where there was another huge rally and the focus there was on getting the remaining hostages home and ensuring there is a lasting ceasefire. As you say, the far right, though, and what President Trump's saying is music to their ears because far right politicians, they would like to see Jewish settlers return to Gaza to call that place home. But I think other people along the political spectrum is not registering in the same way.
And that's adding to the anxieties of the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have still been blocked by Israel from returning to northern Gaza. Yes, hundreds of thousands of Palestinian families have been told that they'd be able to travel to the north and find out what remains of their houses, their communities. But they've been blocked so far from doing that by the Israeli government. That's because they're saying that Hamas has basically broken part of the ceasefire arrangement by not
releasing one particular Israeli civilian. One militant group, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, has said that they have now agreed that Abel Yehud will be released on Friday in exchange for other Palestinian prisoners being released from Israeli jails.
And a quick reminder that if there's anything you want to know about Donald Trump's first week back in the White House, then do get in touch as we're recording a Q&A special this week. If you'd like to ask about his actions on immigration, tariffs, pardons, climate change, cryptocurrencies or anything else, then email us. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. And it will be great if you could record your question as a voice note.
Thanks. Still to come, we are standing right now in the loft of the Magdeburg barracks in Theresienstadt, or Theresien, that hosted the famous Theresien Cabaret. On this international Holocaust Memorial Day, a Czech-Canadian singer remembers her grandmother, who was imprisoned by the Nazis during the Second World War.
I'm Johnny Diamond from the Global Story podcast where we're looking at Deepseek, the Chinese company shaking up artificial intelligence. It claims its AI model has been made without the most advanced chips and at a fraction of the cost, wiping billions off the value of US tech giants in the process. That's on the Global Story, wherever you get your BBC podcast.
You're listening to the Global News Podcast. Let's turn now to Belarus. An exit poll on state media suggests that the authoritarian leader, Alexander Lukashenko, has won the presidential election with 87% of the vote.
The outcome was never in doubt in what the exiled opposition leader, Svetlana Tikonovsky, described as a farce. Mr Lukashenko, who's been in power for more than 30 years, dismissed speculation that he might hand over power to one of his three sons. Although he said a new generation should emerge to lead Belarus by the year 2030. The BBC's Steve Rosenberg, who's in the capital Minsk, told Owen Bennett-Jones more about the election.
It was very bizarre actually. I've reported on many elections in many different places and I've seen prime ministers and presidents rolling up at polling stations and casting their ballots and taking a few questions from reporters. But I've never seen anything quite like the scene I witnessed at the polling station in Minsk. So Alexander Lukashenko cast his ballot and then from another room in the building,
He gave a four and a half hour press conference live on state television. You know, while the voting was going on, Belarusians were still voting. And here you had candidate Lukashenko dominating state television on the day of the election. But it was an opportunity to sort of ask him, well, some questions about this controversial vote. So I asked him, the first thing he said to me was, what wretched question have you prepared like you always do? Yes, OK. To which I reply, good morning.
And then I kicked off with, how can you call this a democratic election when your main rivals are either in prison or in exile? And he replied by saying, well, some are in prison and some are in exile, but you're here. Everyone is the right to choose. That is democracy. But of course, if you go back to 2020 and the brutal crackdown launched by the authorities on protesters who are accusing Mr. Lukashenko of stealing the 2020 presidential election,
Personal choice didn't come into it. Some were arrested and jailed, others forced into political exile. And then I pointed out that just a few days ago, Mr Lukashenko had said, we mustn't shut people's mouths. In other words, we mustn't silence people. But I said, your rivals haven't just been kept off the ballot. Some of them have been jailed. And in fact, there are more than 1200 political prisoners in Belarus.
right now. I told him, isn't it time to open the prison cells and release them? And I listed some of the most prominent political prisoners, people like Victor Babarico and Maria Colestnikova and Sergey Tikonovsky.
And he said, well, he said, mouths are one thing, but prison is for people who have opened their mouths too wide and broken the law. Don't you have prisons in Britain and America? I see another quote here. I don't give a damn about the West. I'm willing to talk to the EU, but not to bow before you or crawl on our knees.
Yes, one of my questions to him was, you know, America, the EU, Britain, do not recognize you as the legitimate president of Belarus after what happened after the 2020 election. And I asked him whether he had any hopes that that situation, that attitude would change with the Trump administration.
And he basically said, I don't care. I don't care what you think of me. The most important thing to me is what the people of Belarus think and whether they recognise the election. This is a theme he's come out with for several years now, basically rejecting, dismissing the criticism coming from the West of his government and of his actions. Steve Rosenberg in Belarus.
Today is International Holocaust Memorial Day, it's a date on which the Soviet army entered the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland 80 years ago. During their time in power, the Nazis also confined Jews in many countries to heavily controlled ghettos. One such ghetto was in Turezienstadt, also known as Terezin, in what had been Czechoslovakia.
Lenke Lichtenberg, a Czech-Canadian singer whose grandmother was imprisoned, was able to bring the poem she wrote to be performed openly in the place they'd been written in secret eight decades ago.
We are standing right now in the loft of the Magdeburg Barracks, which is a building in Theresienstadt, or Theresien, that hosted the famous Theresien Cabaret, and it turned itself into a hub of culture and a place to both create new works and escape from reality. My mother, who was between the ages of 14 and 17 when she was here,
and my grandmother, Hannah, and her husband Richard, they were all incarcerated in Theresien for two and a half years. And I do have a feeling that they would have come here. What is this place? Where have we come to?
Those are words by Anna Hannah Frisova, a Czech poet who was imprisoned in the Nazi ghetto of Terezinstadt, or Terezin as it's known in Czech. Lanka was able to return with the poems of her grandmother, and those poems she set to music.
the Nazis infamously created propaganda films at Terrazine. To give the impression that it was a spa town full of relaxation and culture using the camp's actual rich cultural life to pretend to the visiting Red Cross that they treated the Jewish inmates well. Petarich, a guide at Terrazine, describes the reality.
In the first moment when people came here were brought here and they were split into the two categories, able to work, unable to work. And said thing is that wood didn't work. Sick people, old people, kids. So especially sick people and young kids were sent to extermination camps very often, I suppose.
Lenka Lichtenberg's grandparents' relationship was broken by the war. Something that is reflected in the poems and in the songs.
My grandfather Richard was arrested by the Gestapo, and he was in prison for six months. By the time they were leaving, going, actually, to Terrazine, things were already bad like this. They do tell a story so much. Why would she be memorizing and adapting a poem about saying goodbye to someone leaving the next morning? That sounds very much to me like that would be her husband. It is a very powerful
picture into her world and into her emotions. For Lenka Lichtenberg, returning to sing her grandmother's poems at Terrazine is deeply meaningful. Finding the poems in her booklets already made everything very real. I have felt that my grandma and my mom have just come back to me even though they have both passed.
Linker Liechtenberg, a Czech-Canadian singer, ending that report by Michael Rossi.
America's foreign intelligence agency, the CIA, has adjusted its official stance on the origins of COVID-19, saying it now believes the virus was more likely to have leaked from a Chinese laboratory. The new assessment is not the result of any new intelligence and comes just days after Donald Trump's appointee, John Ratcliffe, was confirmed as the CIA's new director. Tom Bailey reports.
Until now, the CIA had remained on the fence, but now says it favours a lab leak theory, though described it as a low-confidence judgement. It means the agency has now joined other bodies, including the FBI and U.S. Energy Department, in this assessment. An official said the shift was based on new analysis of existing intelligence. China has previously dismissed speculation about Covid's origins as unhelpful and motivated by politics. Tom Bailey reporting.
Now, picture the scene. It's 1998. A teenager has just discovered text messaging after being given his first mobile phone for his 18th birthday. So, he makes up a few random numbers and sends off the message, hello. Well, that one word message resulted in Donovan Shears from Coventry in Central England meeting his future wife, Kirsty, from Clythorps.
Now, after more than 20 years of love and laughter, they're planning to renew their vows on Valentine's Day. They've been speaking to Richard Williams. Showing off to my friends going, oh look, I can page other phones. I started sending out random text messages. So I picked first four digits the same as mine and then the last three digits random, probably about five or six different numbers. And then didn't think anything of it. What did you say?
Just to mostly say, hello. Kirsty, you just got a mobile phone and this ping comes through. What happened then? Because I'd only just got them all by and I assumed it was someone I'd give my number to. So I just responded to it like, hi, who's this? And then it came back, done. And then we started chatting from there. Initially,
it was just SMS, we would text through the day and then it obviously become more and more frequent and then at one point we decided we should phone each other and you can talk to someone but to actually hear their voice is different isn't it rather than by SMS. So we did, we started speaking over the phone as well as SMSing during the day and then eventually it come up to the August Bank holiday in 98 and I was like right said to my stepsister I've got to go meet this guy and she was like you could be anyone and I was like yep I know but I was 18 and you know
didn't really think about consequences and just got on a train and came to quarantine to meet Don. So you were quite literally playing the numbers game. Yeah, yeah, quite literally, yeah. And then you've got two beautiful kids now. Yep, yeah. And they're going to be with you on the Friday, aren't they? They will be. We've told the school all about what we're doing and they were like, yep, it's an exceptional circumstance. Of course your children should be there. So they're getting an authorised absence and they'll be there on the day. So let's talk about, obviously Valentine's Day, renewing your vows. Why did you want to do it?
We've always spoken about doing it, and this is going to be our 23rd year married. When we had the kids, we would want the kids to be there, etc. And then when this came up, it was just like, COV Cathedral. Shall we try for it? And it was like, yeah, what a cool venue. We put our story in, and yeah, here we are. And what are you looking forward to most about the day, Donna? Many of the kids, just to see them see us, we knew our vowels, and the whole ceremony, and I've heard stories, but for them to actually be there and be part of it, I think would be magical.
Donovan and Kirsty Shears talking about the random text message that led to love and marriage many years ago. And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast later. This edition was mixed by Caroline Driscoll, the producer was Liam McSheffery, the editor is Karen Martin. I'm Janet Gillil, and until next time, goodbye.
I'm Johnny Diamond from the Global Story podcast where we're looking at DeepSeek, the Chinese company shaking up artificial intelligence. It claims its AI model has been made without the most advanced chips and at a fraction of the cost, wiping billions off the value of US tech giants in the process. That's on the Global Story, wherever you get your BBC podcast.
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