Global News Podcast - Myanmar declares week of mourning as death toll rises following earthquake

Episode Date: April 1, 2025

A religious leader in Mandalay says the situation is dire following Myanmar's earthquake. Also: shock Le Pen verdict rocks French far right; Nasa's Butch and Suni adapt to life back on Earth.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Good Bad Billionaire is back. Yes, the podcast uncovering the lives and livelihoods of some of the world's richest people is back for a new season. I'm Simon Jack. And I'm Zing Zing. Join us each week for a closer look at the lives of some of the world's billionaires from Minecraft creator Marcus Person to basketball star LeBron James.

Zing and I have more intriguing billionaires lined up for a new season. Good bad billionaire from the BBC World Service. Listen now wherever you get your BBC podcasts. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Nick Miles and in the early hours of Tuesday the 1st of April these are our main stories. The situation in the Burmese city of Mandalay is said to be dire, four days after a devastating earthquake. Hopes of finding people alive under the rubble are fading.

The US has called on all sides in Gaza to respect international humanitarian law after Israeli forces killed 15 Palestinian medics and aid workers, but it blamed Hamas for everything that's happened in the territory. France's far-right leader, Marine Le Pen, the strongest candidate in the polls for the elections in 2027, has strongly attacked her conviction for embezzlement. Also in this podcast... Do you know a girl called Katie Leonard? Yeah? Describe each other as friends then.

Is she dead then? How a TV drama looking at online misogyny is causing political debate in the UK and beyond. We begin in Myanmar. A religious leader in Mandalay says the humanitarian situation in the country's second city following Friday's earthquake is dire. People camped out in the streets for a fourth night. One rescue worker in Mandalay has been in touch with the BBC. He wanted to remain anonymous because of fear of the military authorities. He says that some villages around the city are even worse affected than the city itself.

The rescue worker described pulling out more than a hundred dead bodies in one small village alone. One of our producers has voiced his words. People are using their hands to remove the debris. We found a child trapped under the rubble. his words. Even if we manage to get them out and bring them to the hospital, they can't treat them. There's no electricity or water. There's a shortage of fuels so we can't get any water from the water pumps or transport the injured. Normally, there'd be many more young people to support us in the rescue efforts. Because of the conscription law, many young people have left the country or joined resistance groups.

If they come back to the cities, they'll be arrested. So there aren't too many young helping hands. Another aftershock happened and people are trying to rescue as good as they can. The problem is that some of the buildings are nearly collapsed and nobody can help. The real need is to get the machinery to clear all of this. We need the help of the international community. Meanwhile the military rulers in Myanmar have declared a week of national mourning as the death toll from the earthquake rises. The judge has said on Monday that around 2,000 people are

confirmed dead but the number of those killed is difficult to verify and is predicted to be much higher. As aid workers struggle to reach many areas the military has continued to launch ground attacks against rebel groups in the region worst affected by the quake Saigang. The UN Assistant Secretary General Kani Wignarajah said a ceasefire is needed for relief efforts to go ahead. You've got to look at this as a moment to actually push for peace. And I would urge the countries of ASEAN and the bordering region countries to really urge a moment now for mediation and peace. This population just cannot take any more hits.

For more on the extent of the devastation, our correspondent Anna Foster sent this report from the Thai-Myanmar border. What is coming out of the country is very limited. The military junta that runs Myanmar has made it very clear. They issued a statement saying that they weren't going to give working visas to international journalists to go into the country and report. They said that they were too busy to process those and too busy to do that. So it means that we don't have that usual flow of information. And the death toll is particularly notable because it wasn't updated for several days. It went to just over 1,700. It's risen to more than 2,000 today, but it took three days to have that relatively small

jump in numbers. Now, the US Geological Survey said, if you look at the size of the earthquake, 7.7 magnitude this was, and the areas that were affected, they said perhaps a death toll of something in the region of 10,000 could be expected from something like this. And what we do see, the times that we're able to speak to people, make contact, see videos that people have filmed. The BBC Burmese service are obviously doing a lot of important work in the country as well. We see collapsed buildings. We see those little moments of hope where people are being pulled out, occasionally still alive. But we do see these scenes of devastation in different places, particularly around Mandalay, which is the second biggest

city. And I'm in May Sok right on the border because we can't go any further than this. But this is a real hub. It's one of the busiest crossing points on the whole of the border between Thailand and Myanmar. And this is actually a really big home to members of the Burmese diaspora as well. Tens of thousands of them live here. Many of them have come here because they disagree with the military junta. They describe themselves as activists. They're against the people who control the country and they are struggling to get information about friends and family as well. Well, as we heard from Hannah, the BBC's Burmese service in Myanmar is providing us with a picture of the destruction.

Several of our journalists travelled from the capital, Nippador, to Mandalay and working with our colleague, Sohwin Tan in London, helped compile this report.ippador, to Mandalay. And working with our colleague, Sohwin Tan, in London, helped compile this report. On the road to Mandalay, the town of Chaosay is just 30 miles from the epicentre of Friday's quake. This nursery used to teach 70 children, some of the youngest victims of this disaster. Many children on the second floor of the building escaped.

But 12 of the smallest who studied on the ground floor died together with a teacher. The Tahsan was five years old. Her grandfather Chuen Yin has come to where she died to invite her soul to come home with him, a Buddhist ritual for those who die suddenly. He tells us that he had a strange feeling that morning and wanted to tell his daughter not to send his granddaughter to school.

But he didn't. As the quake hit at lunchtime, the little girl's mother ran to the school to find her. Joanyane says they searched together for three hours until they found her body. He knew she would be dead, but he still wanted to find her and he is relieved that she was still in one piece. Dawkins' son is a teacher from the next door school. She was injured during the quake. I was sleeping when it happened. My older son came to wake me up and said, come on, it's an earthquake. I heard the noise bang, bang, bang as I was running out. Because I was half asleep, I didn't know it was a quake. Once I was outside,

I looked back and this building had already collapsed. Chaozhe is just one of many towns affected by the quake. But here, the loss of so many young lives has been particularly devastating. That report from the BBC's Burmese Service. The UN's head of humanitarian affairs, Tom Fletcher, has demanded answers and justice following the killing by Israeli forces of 15 Palestinian medics and rescue workers in southern Gaza. The bodies which were discovered on Sunday were found buried in shallow graves next to their vehicles which Mr Fletcher said were all marked. Here's our Middle East regional editor Mike Thompson. The Palestinian Red Crescent says that just over a week ago an ambulance was sent to pick up casualties from an Israeli airstrike in Raffa City. A support ambulance, dispatched to help, was shot at, killing two paramedics inside.

A convoy of vehicles, including more ambulances, were then sent to the scene. They too came under fire. The Red Crescent says eight of its members were killed along with six civil defense workers and at least one United Nations employee. The UN has described the incident as a flagrant and severe disregard of international law. Mike Thompson, the US State Department has said it expects all parties on the ground in Gaza to comply with international humanitarian law, but declined to confirm whether it was carrying out its own assessment into the deaths.

Here's our State Department correspondent, Tom Bateman. Asked about the killing by the Israeli military of the paramedics, civil defence staff and a UN worker, State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said that every single thing that happens in Gaza is happening because of Hamas. She said the US expects all parties on the ground to comply with international humanitarian law, but declined to say whether the State Department was carrying out any assessment of its own when asked about the attack given the US is Israel's biggest arms supplier. The UN's humanitarian agency has said five ambulances, a fire truck and a UN vehicle were struck one by one on the 23rd of March and that 15 bodies, including

paramedics still in their uniforms, had been gathered and buried in a mass grave. The Israeli military said its troops fired on vehicles advancing suspiciously without headlights or emergency signals and said a Hamas operative and other militants were among those killed but did not offer any comment on the accounts of bodies being gathered up and buried in the sand. International humanitarian law prohibits the targeting of civilians and calls for specific protections of medical personnel. The US is also bound by its own laws prohibiting its weapons being used by foreign militaries in breach of humanitarian law.

Tom Bateman, the French far-right leader, Marine Le Pen, has condemned as a political decision her conviction for embezzlement. A five-year ban on her running for public office means she won't be allowed to take part in the presidential election in two years' time. She said, I'm not going to let myself be eliminated like this. I'm going to pursue whatever legal avenues I can. Ms Le Pen says she's innocent and backed by millions of people in France and will appeal. She's been sentenced to four years in prison, half of it suspended, for diverting European parliamentary allowances for her own party's use. The BBC's Europe editor Katja Adler reports now on the day's events from the French capital

Paris. There was pretty much a sharp intake of breath across the country when the Le Pen verdict became known. The judge really dragged out the drama and TVs were on in bars and cafes. People were listening on the metro and in their offices. She is a huge political figure here in France, the face of the nationalist right. And even though, as you say, she has come out fighting, defiant, she's going to appeal the verdict, she says. Deep down, she

knows. This could spell the end of her political career and the ends to her long cherished hope of becoming France's next president. Silent fury oozing out of her, Marine Le Pen marched out of the Paris courthouse today, even before the final verdict. Why? It was perfectly clear, she said on French TV tonight, the judge was out to bar her from running for president.

MONDAY 31st OF MARCH IS A DARK DAY FOR OUR DEMOCRACY AND OUR COUNTRY. MILLIONS OF FRENCH VOTERS ARE BEING DEPRIVED OF THEIR FAVOURITE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE. IF THAT ISN'T A POLITICAL DECISION, I DON'T KNOW WHAT IS. Today's sentencing sent shockwaves around France, even amongst those who aren't natural allies of Le Pen. The BBC visited Moinsac in the rural southwest. I think this whole thing is political, to stop Le Pen becoming France's next president. She was in poor position. I don't share her values at all, but I believe everyone has the right to run as a political candidate.

The legal case dates back to Le Pen's years as a member of the European Parliament, ending in 2016. Today, along with more than 20 others in her Rassemblement National Parti, she was convicted of creating fake jobs and contracts to divert EU cash, well over three million pounds worth, for her party's operations in France. The judge banned her from standing for political office for five years and sentenced her to jail. Today's ruling has set off a political earthquake in France.

On the one hand, you have the hard right, the far right, who say this was an attempt to steal the presidency from them, their chance to reform France and make it great again. But there are wider implications, those who suggest the court was biased, that it took a criminal case against Marine Le Pen for political ends to stop her and her nationalist agenda. A stony-faced Marine Le Pen headed to her party's headquarters

outside Paris. She's launching a legal appeal. They're launching an online petition to support her. If she fails, the man waiting in the wings, Le Pen's political proteé, Jordan Bardella. 29 years old, wildly popular in the polls, but considered by many as too inexperienced for a bruising French presidential race. France was already deeply divided before today's Le Pen ruling. The schisms now run even deeper between those who believe justice has been done and others

convinced French judges the French establishment is out to prevent the will of the people. Katja Adler in Paris. Criticism of the judge's ruling is not only coming from the far right. Aides to France's Prime Minister, François Bayrou, reportedly say he's troubled by its wording. There's also been international criticism. The US administration says it is particularly concerning. Hungary's Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, posted on X, Je suis marine. The BBC has seen a leaked draft of the last American proposals for a deal with Ukraine over access to its mineral deposits, which would hand significant control to the United States.

Donald Trump has warned that President Zelensky will face big problems if he tries to withdraw from the agreement, which remains unsigned. From Kyiv, here's our Ukraine correspondent, James Waterhouse. It was President Zelensky who first pitched trading Ukraine's natural resources for American security guarantees. But Donald Trump has so far resisted, insisting the mere presence of US companies would put Russia off from breaking a future ceasefire.

Nevertheless, Kyiv was willing to sign an agreement, until now it seems. Volodymyr Zelensky claims America's latest draft proposal includes demands that have either been undiscussed or previously rejected. In a leaked copy seen by the BBC, it seems the White House has toughened its stance further, with demands that Kiev would have to open its government books for inspection and that the US would get first refusal on all future investments. That would be in breach of the European Union's strict competition laws and with Kiev still

ruling out any compromises on its potential path to EU membership, this rare earths agreement looks likely to remain unsigned. James Waterhouse in Ukraine. Law enforcement authorities on both sides of the Atlantic have given new insights into the activities of an Irish crime gang that's risen from being a bunch of small-time dealers in Dublin to becoming one of the biggest such organized crime groups in the world. The Kinneran cartel's leaders are the subject of a five million dollar bounty in the US. As our Ireland correspondent Chris Page

now reports, the story of the Irish crime gang has been reported in television documentaries. The Kennehan Transnational Criminal Organization, also known as the KTCO, has been accused of a wide range of heinous crimes all around the world, including murder, trafficking and firearms in our cottages. You're in the League of Pablo Escobar, Chapo Guzman. They've come a long way. The United States will bring their leaders to justice no matter where they are. The Kinnahann Cartel began as a small-time street drug dealing operation in Dublin in the 1980s. It's now one of the most feared criminal organisations in the world.

The BBC documentary series, Kinnahann, the true story of Ireland's mafia, shows the extent of its multi-billion dollar activities, including in the United Kingdom. I'm Ty Surgeon, I'm the regional head of investigations for the National Crime Agency. For approximately the last 20 years the Kinnerhyn crime group has been on the radar of the National Crime Agency. They're drug smugglers, they trade in firearms, and there's no doubt in my mind that they supply many other crime groups across the UK. The programmes feature exclusive accounts of police operations to try to dismantle the cartel's structure.

One investigation led to the arrest and conviction of Thomas Kavanagh in the Midlands of England. He's described by one officer as being, in effect, the European chief executive of the Kinnahamn drug trafficking network. The most senior members of the organisation live in Dubai. A lawyer for the Kinnahans said rumours and theories about them haven't been tested in court and that a massive investigation by five countries ended with a dismissal of the main charges. The cartel came to international attention when a feud began with another

criminal organisation, the Hutch Gang, in Dublin in 2016. The murderous dispute started when an associate of the Kinnerhans was shot dead at a boxing weigh-in in the Irish capital. It descended into months of lethal violence. The Hutch Kinnerhans feud has claimed 18 lives. The Kinnerhans were responsible for 16 of them. It was around this time that the authorities in the US started to take a bigger interest in the Kinahans. The series has a new insight from Gregory Gajanis, who was the associate director of the Department of the Treasury.

There was a capacity to use the US.S. financial system because they were engaging in so many crimes we needed to protect the U.S. financial system. This was a criminal organization that was in its ascendancy and it was violent. It had global reach. It was affecting our European allies and it was vulnerable to sanctions because they were looking to enter legitimate markets as sports and things of this sort. And we saw this as an ideal opportunity to target them early in their ascendancy. Three years ago, the Department took the rare step of offering a reward of $5 million for information about the cartel's alleged leaders, Christie Kinahan and his sons Daniel and Christie Jr. million dollars for information about the cartel's alleged leaders, Christie Kinahan and his sons Daniel and Christie Jr. One of the reasons why Washington had

become so concerned was that investigators believed the Kinahans had developed links with the Middle Eastern Islamic militant group Hezbollah, which was raising finances through the international drugs trade. A retired drugs enforcement agency officer, Jack Kelly, explains. Customs and Border Protection, one of their top members who was a partner with me, was trying to get my attention on the Kinahans and explaining the importance of them. Specifically, Daniel Kinahan, a boss at the National Targeting Centre says, Jack, we don't have to specifically target this guy, Kinehan,

but you need to know that he's working directly for the, these guys we're going after in Hezbollah. As a result of law enforcement operations, particularly by the Irish police force Garda Siachona, more than 80 members of the Kinehan Cartel have been jailed. That report by our Ireland correspondent Chris Page. Still to come, the two NASA astronauts, Sunny Williams and Butch Wilmore, who were stuck in space for more than nine months, have spoken publicly for the first time

since returning to Earth nearly two weeks ago. This is Sunny. Well, I'm back. First and foremost, we were always coming back and I think people need to know that and we're back to actually share our story. Good Bad Billionaire is back. Yes, the podcast uncovering the lives and livelihoods of some of the world's richest people is back for a new season. I'm Simon Jack. And I'm Zing Zing.

Join us each week for a closer look at the lives of some of the world's billionaires. From Minecraft creator Marcus Person to basketball star LeBron James. Zing and I have more intriguing billionaires lined up for a new season. Good bad billionaire from the BBC World Service. Listen now wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Global stock markets tumbled on Monday and we haven't even got to the day of reckoning yet. That day is Wednesday when President Trump says he will announce a raft of new tariffs. He's calling it Liberation Day. Investors worry that plans to tax imports will hit the global economy. President

Trump says tariffs will protect American jobs. Our economics editor Faisal Islam has more. The smoke signals are that President Trump wants to go big, bigger than expected. Much now hinges on the reports from his trade advisors on the policies of every country in the world which arrive on his desk. Until the weekend it had been assumed that a select group of the biggest economies would face US tariffs based on the perceived unfairness of their trade policies. Now the talk in Washington is again of something much bigger, a flat tariff on all imports as high as 20%. His senior trade advisor Pete Navarro talked of raising $6 trillion of revenue

over a decade. For context, total goods imports in just one year are $3.3 trillion. These sums seem wildly optimistic because the tariffs will significantly divert trade and patterns of supply and demand, but they do indicate the historic scale of the plans. Such moves are designed to help restore manufacturing and related jobs, for example for cars, back to the US. But there will be wide-scale counter retaliatory tariffs that will cost US exports too. Separately, as is already evident in Canada and Europe, consumers may start to join in boycotts for some high-profile US products. What is clear however is that the US

administration wants to change the geography of the world economy. The world economy enters a critical 24 hours of profound uncertainty with other negotiators clear that the ultimate decisions here are really down to one man, President Trump himself. The BBC's economics editor Faisal Islam. In recent days Donald Trump has said he's not joking about wanting to serve a third term as US President. The US Constitution says that no person shall be elected more than twice, but some of his advisors have suggested there could be ways around that. Asked in an interview with NBC television about the possibility of seeking a third term

in the White House, Mr Trump said there are methods which you could do it. James Menendez spoke to Brian Calt, a professor of the law at Michigan State University in the United States. So what are those methods? The term limit provision you read says that you can't be elected more than twice, but there are other ways to get into the office through succession, the line of succession. In other words, what somebody else would take over and then and then pass the office to them. In other words, JD Vance could become elected president and then make way for Donald Trump. Is that it? Exactly.

I was reading about another amendment to the Constitution which suggests that anyone who's not eligible for a third term cannot become vice president. Is that right? Yes, the 12th Amendment says that no one who's not eligible to be president can be eligible to be vice president, but that just gets us back to the question of whether you can be president despite the two-term election limit. Right. Constitutional change, though, is the other way. What needs to happen? Well, that's much less likely because that requires two thirds majorities in the House of Representatives and the Senate and three fourths of the state legislatures. And there's just not that much support on bipartisan basis for this,

let alone maybe not even among the Republicans, but certainly not among the Democrats. So they just wouldn't have the votes for that. Right. So that's not going to happen. So I mean, so what do we make of the comments then? I mean, should we take them seriously? I think so. President Trump has shown a willingness in the past to interpret the Constitution in ways that empower him. Lots of

people do that, but he's been particularly aggressive. And these interpretations of the constitution that allow these loopholes are not as outlandish as some of the theories that he's advanced about other things. So I think it really is a serious issue that people should start thinking about. But presumably it would be tested in the Supreme Court. Well, that's part of the problem too. It's a little awkward to get this into court because by the time he would get on the ballots and that got litigated, it

would be late in the day, there would be people saying just let the voters decide, and there's also some constitutional awkwardness about the Supreme Court deciding these things instead of Congress. Congress has a role here too. So that muddies the waters as well and gives him even more of an opening. Rupert Spira Brian Coulth, a professor of law at Michigan State University. Television drama is often a reflection of growing and worrying social issues. Take Netflix's new drama Adolescencecence which has tapped into

concerns about online misogyny. It has broken records to become its most watched limited series in its first few weeks with more than 90 million views worldwide. I'm gonna start off with asking you. Do you know a girl called Katie Leonard? Yeah? Describe each other as friends then. Is she dead then? Why would you ask her? Well the story looks at the aftermath of the murder of a teenage girl by one of the boys at her school in Northern England.

It's had a particular impact in the UK and now the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has endorsed it being made freely available in schools across Britain as an educational resource. Mr Starmer met the programme's creators on Monday at his official residence, 10 Downing Street in London. It seems the whole nation is talking about adolescence, not just this nation either. And that is undoubtedly because it grips you from the first of the one short take and it holds you there.

And I have to be honest, as a dad, I have not found it easy viewing. We've been watching it with our children and it's been really hard to watch. It is relatively rare to see senior politicians reacting to a television drama like this. I asked our political correspondent Rob Watson why has this had such an impact? It's fantastically well written, filmed and acted. It's incredibly compellingly produced. I watched it, I binge watched it like lots of other people just in one weekend, and I think because it touches on something that's just of concern to all of us, whether you're a parent or not, and that is this broad

general issue that goes way beyond Britain, which is the influence of social media. What are our children doing with their smartphones, either up in their bedrooms or at school, and how does this affect the rest of us? I think that's why it's so gripping because you can't get away from it. It's this huge societal issue. It really is compelling. I watched it in one sitting pretty much with my adolescent son. I mean the UK's online safety Act comes into effect what later this year making what tech companies legally responsible for keeping children and others safe online but how hard is this problem reflected in that drama possible to manage or even to quantify? Well if you take quantifying

first Nick I mean it's massive I'll just quote three surveys quickly there was one in the US that suggested something like half of American school kids have experienced cyberbullying absolutely stunning One in the UK that showed that 70% of boys aged 11 to 14 have been exposed to online material promoting misogyny and some UN research across 44 countries suggesting one in six school kids have experienced cyberbullying. So it's massive. Why is it so difficult to deal with? Well, you know, the program makers in this case have said, you know, it's not just enough for schools and parents, government should be getting involved, but the government in turn, in the form of

Sakir Starmer said, yeah, absolutely, the government should look at this, but it's a broader societal question. And then you have the social media companies themselves who say, you know, our bottom line is always freedom of speech and self-regulation. So everybody can see there's some kind of a problem, but everyone's struggling to find what the solution is. Rob Watson. Sonny Williams and Burch Wilmore, the NASA astronauts who left Earth on an eight-day mission last June and who ended up having to spend nine unplanned months on the International Space Station, gave their first news conference on Monday after splashing back down off the coast of Florida almost two weeks ago. Sunny was asked what her message was for all those people who were waiting so eagerly for her return.

Oh, well, I'm back. First and foremost, we were always coming back and I think people need to know that and we're back to actually share our story because it's slightly unique and there's some lessons learned to it and part of that is just resilience and being able to take a turn that was unexpected and make the best of it. She was also asked how she felt about the huge amount of attention she and Butch had received. I mean we were just part of the team doing the job, filling in wherever we could and then knowing that we'll be coming home eventually on a rotational flight. So pretty honoured and humbled by the fact of when we came home like wow there's a lot of people who are interested, very thankful, very amazed that we could hopefully be one positive element to bring people together. And Butch, who was sitting alongside her, was asked who he blamed for the failure of

the original return mission. Responsibility with Boeing, yes. Responsibility with NASA, yes. All the way up and down the chain. We all are responsible. We all own this. You cannot do this business without trust. So we're not going to look back and say this happened or that happened and that person or that issue or that entity is to blame. We're going to look forward and say,

what are we going to use our lessons learned from this whole process and make sure that we are successful in the future. The NASA astronaut Butch Wilmore. And that is all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later on. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast.bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag globalnewspod.

This edition was mixed by Caroline Driscoll. The producer was Leah McShepard. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Nick Miles. And until next time, goodbye. Hizbollah, the powerful Lebanese militia group, has been battered by its war with Israel. Now even some supporters are questioning its purpose. So is this a turning point? Join me, Hugo Bashega, as I travel to the heartland of the movement to find out.

Listen now by searching for the documentary wherever you get your BBC podcasts.