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BBC World Service

Where the world and America meet, with episodes each weekday. The world is changing. Decisions made in the US and by the second Trump administration are accelerating that change. But they are also a symptom of it.

With Asma Khalid in DC, Tristan Redman in London, and the backing of the BBC’s international newsroom, The Global Story brings clarity to politics, business and foreign policy in a time of connection and disruption.

The Global Story

When China began cracking down on the spiritual movement Falun Gong in the 1990s, its leader and some followers moved to the United States. From there, they started the Epoch Times, a free newsletter.

But in the past decade, the organisation has grown to become a conservative media empire – with a Pentagon press pass, a slick TV arm, and many millions of dollars in revenue. How did they do it? The story involves a mysterious spiritual leader, a dance troupe, and even a federal indictment.

What does the meteoric rise of the Epoch Times say about how media and politics in the United States have changed in the last decade? We speak to Brandy Zadrozny, who has investigated the Epoch Times for NBC News.

Producer: Lucy Pawle and Cat Farnsworth

Sound engineer: Martin Peralta and Travis Evans

Senior news editor: China Collins

Photo: Members of the Falun Gong protesting in New York. Credit: Alex Segre/BBC Images)

How did a Chinese spiritual movement build a US media empire?

President Donald Trump has pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, a former president of Honduras who was serving a 45-year sentence for drug trafficking and weapons offences.

It was only last year that Hernández was convicted in a New York courtroom of being part of a huge drug trafficking conspiracy, after being extradited to the US. Prosecutors said the operation flooded America with cocaine and turned Honduras into a “narco-state”. But Trump has claimed the investigation was a Biden administration “set up”, and Hernández is now a free man. 

As the Trump administration ramps up its military threats against Latin American drug cartels, including multiple strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean, why has it pardoned Hernández? Will Grant reports. 

Producer: Xandra Ellin, Hannah Moore and Viv Jones

Executive producer: James Shield 

Sound engineer: Travis Evans 

Senior news editor: China Collins 

(Photo: Juan Orlando Hernandez being escorted by US agents for extradition in 2022. Credit: Fredy Rodriguez/Reuters)

Why has Trump pardoned Honduras’s drug trafficker ex-president?

Are we living through the slow death of reading - replaced by an addictive screen culture that fragments our attention and floods us with trivial or unreliable information? Writer and voracious reader James Marriott believes we are entering a post-literate age with profoundly negative consequences for education, culture and democracy itself. In today's episode, James traces how an 18th century ‘reading revolution’ shaped the modern-world - and what might follow its sudden decline.
Producers: Aron Keller and Sam Chantarasak 
Editor: James Shield 
Mix: Travis Evans 
Senior news editor: China Collins 
Photo: The al-Nahda al-Arabiya library in central Baghdad. (Credit: Ahmed Jalil/EPA)

The death of reading

Last June, Israel and the United States carried out coordinated strikes on nuclear and military sites across Iran in what became known as the 12-day war. 
 
The aim was clear: destroy Iran’s nuclear-enrichment facilities amid warnings that Tehran was dangerously close to developing a nuclear weapon. But conflicting reports in the immediate aftermath left the public uncertain about how effective the operation really was. 
 
Six months after the bombings, we speak with Parham Ghobadi, senior reporter for BBC Persian, about what the war actually achieved, the current state of Iran’s nuclear programme, and what daily life inside Iran looks like today. 
 
Producer: Viv Jones and Valerio Esposito 
 
Executive producer: James Shield 
 
Sound engineer: Travis Evans 
 
Senior news editor: China Collins 
 
(Photo: A US Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bomber. Credit: US Air Force)

Whatever happened to Iran’s nuclear programme?

Pope Leo is on his first official visit abroad, and there are already signs he’s willing to use his position to speak out on controversial matters. His recent comments about abortion and the rights of migrants have created headlines in the United States, and raised eyebrows from some conservatives who see the first American pope challenging President Trump’s policies. 

It wouldn't be the first time that a pope has weighed in on politics. From Nazism to communism and the Cold War, from refugees to climate change, popes have used their position to influence global affairs. 

In this episode we speak to author and presenter Edward Stourton, who has covered religious affairs and the USA extensively for the BBC, about what power Pope Leo XIV has, and what lessons he can learn from his predecessors. 

Producers: Lucy Pawle and Sam Chantarasak

Executive producers: James Shield and Bridget Harney

Senior news editor: China Collins 

Mix: Travis Evans 

Image: Pope Leo XIV visits Ankara, Turkey on 27 November. Vatican Media Handout/EPA/Shutterstock

When popes get political

The backlash over the opening of Shein’s first brick and mortar store in Paris this month is just one in a series of controversies and complaints over the ultra-fast fashion retailer. As the company looks to go public, we explore whether its business model can withstand the world’s scrutiny. 

Laura Bicker, the BBC’s China Correspondent, tells us what she found in the Guangzhou factories supplying Shein, and co-host Tristan Redman heads to the Paris store. 

Producer: Hannah Moore 

Executive producers: Bridget Harney and James Shield

Mix: Travis Evans

Senior news editor: China Collins

Photo: A customer shops at Shein in Paris, France. Sarah Meyssonnier/Reuters

Shein: How the fast fashion disruptor ran into real world problems

Miss Universe 2025 has been rocked by controversies and chaos, from stage falls and contestants storming out, to judges quitting and allegations of vote rigging – which the organisers deny. 

The pageant – styled as a celebration of women of all backgrounds and nationalities – has suffered waning international attention in recent years, with many questioning the ideals of femininity it seems to espouse. 

Could the drama of this year’s competition get people watching again? 

BBC journalist and Miss Universe expert, William Lee Adams, joins us to discuss. 

Producers: Xandra Ellin and Hannah Moore 

Executive producer: James Shield 

Mix: Travis Evans 

Senior news editor: China Collins

The international drama of Miss Universe

A ceasefire took effect in Gaza just over six weeks ago, and although both sides have accused the other of multiple violations of the agreement, there has not been the return to full-blown war that many feared. But the ceasefire agreement that was signed in early October was not a complete peace settlement. It left many issues still to be negotiated. 

That ceasefire was part of the first phase of President Trump’s peace plan. Last week, that plan came a step closer to reality when a resolution endorsing it was adopted by the UN Security Council. Within that 20-point plan - which covers everything from how to disarm Hamas, to who should govern Gaza – there are many sticking points that are still unresolved. 

We speak to Yolande Knell, the BBC's Middle East correspondent in Jerusalem, and ask whether Trump’s plan can still bring a permanent peace to Gaza. And what could happen if it fails? 

Producer: Viv Jones 

Executive producer: James Shield, China Collins 

Mix: Travis Evans 

Senior news editor: China Collins 

Photo: Hamas militant in Gaza city. Reuters/Dawoud Abu Alkas

Can Trump’s Gaza plan turn a ceasefire into permanent peace?

American, Ukrainian and European negotiators met in Switzerland on Sunday to discuss a US-proposed peace plan to end the Russia-Ukraine war. 

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, was faced with a dilemma last week – either make concessions to Putin, or risk losing US support. But Zelensky said there were "signals that President Trump's team hears us", and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said a "tremendous amount of progress" had been achieved. 

We’re joined by the Oscar-winning Ukrainian film-maker Mstyslav Chernov, and by BBC Ukraine correspondent James Waterhouse, to discuss how Ukrainians feel about the leaked peace plan. 

Producers: Cat Farnsworth and Lucy Pawle 

Executive producer: James Shield 

Mix: Travis Evans 

Senior news editor: China Collins

Photo: Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky sits inside a vehicle. Credit: Susana Vera/Reuters.

The decision facing Zelensky

The US is essentially boycotting this weekend’s G20 summit in South Africa over accusations that the white Afrikaners are ‘being killed and slaughtered’ and that white farmers are having their land ‘illegally confiscated. The South African government say the claims are "widely discredited and unsupported by reliable evidence". 

Today we speak to BBC correspondent Andrew Harding, who lived and worked in South Africa for over a decade, to find out where these claims came from. 

Producers: Sam Chantarasak and Xandra Ellin

Executive producer: China Collins

Senior news editor: China Collins 

Mix: Travis Evans 

Photo: Afrikaner farmers rally to show support for President Trump in Pretoria, South Africa. Credit: Kim Ludbrook/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

Is there a genocide of white South Africans as Trump claims?

In our age of wireless technology, it might be hard to believe that we’re all connected by a few hundred cables running along the sea bed.
From the memes we send to friends, to the intelligence used by the military, virtually all internet data between the continents travels along wires thinner than a human hair. 
If they sound vulnerable, it’s because they are. On average a hundred are accidentally severed each year. 
And security experts are warning they could be a target for military or terrorist sabotage. 

Caitríona Perry speaks to Nicole Starosielski, professor at the University of California, Berkeley and author of The Undersea Network, who guides us through these secretive networks.
And our security correspondent Frank Gardener helps us understand how vulnerable they are. 

Producers: Richard Moran and Alix Pickles

Sound engineers: Mike Regaard and Hannah Montgomery

Assistant editor: Sergi Forcada Freixas

Senior news editor: Sara Wadeson

How vulnerable are the undersea cables connecting us all?

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