Afleveringen
-
Send us a text
This month the United Nations (UN) will host the ‘Summit of the Future’ in New York. What's the point of this high-level event? Inside Geneva investigates.
“The UN is not an entity that does anything. I mean, we can all blame it, but what is the UN? It’s just the sum of its parts: the governments,” says Christiane Oelrich, journalist for the DPA German Press Agency.Is the UN’s 1945 structure even fit for purpose?
“Historically the UN for many people is still associated with the West. And the question of including the global south still haunts the UN,” continues analyst Daniel Warner.
Does the UN have an answer to today’s brutal, intractable conflicts?
“Since World War Two there have been plenty of conflicts, but what we have seen in the last three or four or five years is the use of aggression and violence as an instrument of foreign policy. Yes, that’s right,” says Nick Cumming-Bruce, contributor for the New York Times.
Can more peaceful nations rescue the UN’s purpose?
“The fact that some countries follow the path of aggression doesn't mean that all the rest of the world has to talk about failure now,” adds Oelrich.
And is the summit a gamble for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres?
“We should tip a hat to Antonio Guterres for even trying to do this given all of the stuff that's going on,” says Imogen Foulkes, Inside Geneva presenter.
Join us on Inside Geneva to find out more about what we can expect from this summit.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) Public Forum is underway in Geneva and its key theme is ‘re-globalisation’. Are we nervous of that word? Inside Geneva sat down with WTO officials to find out what it means.
“Trade has been a very powerful force for reducing between-country inequality. Since 1995, for example, since the foundation of the WTO, extreme poverty in the world has been reduced from 40% to 10%, because of growth in many countries that was also export-led,” says Ralph Ossa, WTO chief economist.
Many ordinary people think global trade makes them poorer. How can it benefit them?
“At the WTO, our members have gotten together and many of them have formed a working group on trade and gender to especially put the lens of women to trade policy and to see what more can be done so that they can take advantage of opportunities,” says Johanna Hill, WTO Deputy Director.
The WTO doesn’t tell countries how to run their industries, but it does hope they can learn from one another.
“Perhaps one member might say, ‘Well, you know, supporting women in my country has really been a tremendous success. Because now we see higher growth rates, lower poverty rates and so on. Why don't you give it a try yourself?’” says Ossa.
Can global trade help us face global challenges?
“Nobody questions the importance of regulating to protect the environment or to protect health - everybody agrees on that. It’s the how that might be the question,” says Hill.
Join host Imogen Foulkes for a trade special on Inside Geneva.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
-
Send us a text
Conflict-related sexual violence has existed for as long as war itself – forever.
“It is a weapon of war. I would say it’s a weapon of mass destruction. It is really maximising harm,” says Esther Dingemans, Executive Director of the Global Survivors Fund.
In Inside Geneva’s final summer profile, we talk to a woman working to support survivors of sexual violence…from Sudan, to Ukraine, to Syria, or Chad.
“Young girls have been raped in front of their parents. Fathers are bound to chairs and forced to watch that. Or that an older – a woman in her 80s is raped in front of her son-in-law,” says Dingemans.
The 1949 Geneva Convention prohibits wartime rape and enforced prostitution. But even today there are few prosecutions. And what about the survivors?
“Survivors doubt themselves. Most victims of sexual violence will always question themselves. ‘Am I to blame?’” explains Dingemans.
The Global Survivors Fund works for reparation – not just money, but health care, counselling, and above all, recognition of the harm done.
“What is really important, particularly for survivors of sexual violence - which is often surrounded by so much shame and stigma - is that they are acknowledged, that harm has been done to them, and that it was not their fault,” concludes Dingemans.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
It’s three years since the Taliban took back control in Afghanistan. Inside Geneva talks to an Afghan human rights defender.
“I was scared and I could see it coming. Yes, I mean, I think for the women of Afghanistan, we knew that the Taliban taking over would mean a dark future for women,” says Fereshta Abbasi from Human Rights Watch.
In three years, women’s rights have been steadily, and brutally, repressed.
“No matter what we have done in the past three years, we haven’t been able to reverse a single decree of the Taliban that is restricting women’s rights,” continues Abbasi.
“In 2024, Afghanistan remains the only country in the world where women do not have access to education beyond the sixth grade. Women do not have the right to most employment. Women do not have the right to freedom of movement. Women do not have the right to protest and assemble. So, I think we need to speak about it,” says Abbasi.
What can we do to support Afghan women?
“I think it’s very important to stand with them, to listen to them, and to amplify their voices. It’s very difficult to think of a better Afghanistan, a brighter future for women under Taliban rule. And I don’t want to think about that. I want to believe and hold my strength together, that this madness cannot last.”
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
Join us for a special extra edition of Inside Geneva to mark World Humanitarian Day, with testimonies from aid workers who have given their all – and who have often lost a great deal.
“So I had taken him to the airport together with our child, and, yes, it took me in fact many years to be able to use the same elevator in the airport where I last kissed him,” says Laura Dolci.
Dolci’s young husband Jean-Selim was killed, just weeks after the birth of their son, in the bombing of the UN’s headquarters in Baghdad in 2003.
Twenty years on, WHO cameraman Chris Black was sent to Gaza, to support, and document, medical care there.
“Something I really will never forget is a woman, with a young child, saying to me: ‘Are we safe here?’ And I wanted to say: ‘Yes, you're in the grounds of a hospital, under international humanitarian law this is a protected space, you should be safe here.’ But I couldn't say to her: ‘You're safe here,’” says Black.
More than 200 aid workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023.
“People have told me oh you must be very brave for going to Gaza. And I don't think so. I think what's brave is the people who have been doing this work since early October and who go back every day to do it again and again and again,” continues Black.
“The aid worker, the humanitarian worker, the peacekeeper; ultimately it's a human being that decides to put its own being to the service of humanity,” says Dolci.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva for an inspiring listen.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
In the fourth episode of our summer profile series on Inside Geneva, we talk to a Geneva career woman and a Geneva asylum-seeker about a project to unite communities through sport. Surely the world’s humanitarian capital is good at welcoming refugees and immigrants?
“We have all these international organisations working on various global challenges. But when you talk to people from Geneva, they don’t really know what’s happening in this bubble,” says Lena Menge, from the Geneva Graduate Institute and co-founder of Flag 21.
For asylum-seekers, arriving in a new country, even a safe one, can be hard.
“I was very lonely. It wasn’t easy. You feel lost and don’t really know what’s happening or where you are. It takes time to realise where you are and what you are supposed to do,” says Mahdie Alinejad, an asylum-seeker from Iran and a coach with Flag 21.
Flag 21 is a project that brings locals and asylum-seekers together – to run, swim, do yoga, and much more.
“Sport was actually a meaningful tool to include people in need, people that needed a community around them as well,” continues Menge.
The project benefits everyone.
“It’s not easy to have this confidence and grow in society as an immigrant. So this is a very good thing that they’re doing, giving opportunities to people who really need it, to find themselves, their space, their place and their confidence,” says Alinejad.
“They have such resilience and so much strength to share that you come away thinking ‘my God, my little problems are really nothing’,” concludes Menge.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full interview.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
On Inside Geneva, we bring you part three of our summer profile series. This week we talk to a doctor looking for treatments for some of the world’s most neglected diseases.
“Neglect means that there are diseases that affect an important proportion of humanity but for which no new drugs have been developed because there is no money in it. Because they affect very poor populations in remote rural areas,” explains Olaf Valverde, clinical project leader at Drugs for Neglected Diseases (DNDi).Valverde is the clinical lead on a project looking for treatments for sleeping sickness.
“It’s a disease caused by a small parasite that almost always kills if untreated. During the first half of the 20th century there were huge epidemics. It not only destroyed communities but also caused the desertification of entire regions of Africa,” he adds.
Cases of sleeping sickness with no effective treatment had been rising again until DNDi began combing medical trials – some abandoned by big drug companies as not profitable – for other options. They found one promising lead and began testing in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
“The motivation, concentration and interest shown by our doctors in the DRC who were developing the clinical trial, were totally amazing. For them it was an opportunity to serve their people. And that was absolutely beautiful,” says Valverde.
The drug worked and sleeping sickness is on the way to being eradicated.
“I think this is what I always wanted to do; to do something that could be helpful to others. And this is what satisfies me. Just seeing that people have opportunities.”
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full interview.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
Here’s episode two of our summer profiles series on the Inside Geneva podcast. We talk to the head of one of the world’s leading humanitarian agencies. We start with his first assignment in Darfur, in western Sudan.
“As I was one day building the shelter I realised for the first time in many years I hadn't thought of what’s next? I wasn’t thinking everyday where do I go from here, what do I do, what’s my plan? I’d just been so absorbed in the work,” Chris Lockyear, Secretary General of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) told host Imogen Foulkes.
We also discuss the current crisis in Gaza, where, amid terrible destruction, MSF is providing medical care.
"What are we [on] now 37,000 people killed? It’s astonishing. Neighbourhood after neighbourhood after neighbourhood which has been completely flattened,” continues Lockyear.
In Gaza, MSF staff have met children as young as five, who said they wished to die.
“They've been going through this for months and months and months, and the brutality of what is happening, what they’re living through, yes, people are saying that they would rather end it than continue. And that can't be a surprise to us.”
MSF has been outspoken when it believes international law has been violated:
“What does it mean elsewhere? How could this be translated into other countries? Into Sudan, into the future if we can operate as a world with such impunity? Where does that leave us?” says Lockyear.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on our Inside Geneva podcast to listen to the full interview.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
On Inside Geneva, we’re bringing you a series of summer profiles, from doctors in war zones to researchers into the diseases that affect the world’s poorest.
Today, we talk to international human rights lawyer Antonia Mulvey, who devotes herself to defending women.
“With many of those that we work with, who have been subjected to sexual violence, part of it is listening to them, hearing them, acknowledging what has happened,” Mulvey says.
From Somalia, to Sudan, or Lebanon, Mulvey and her colleagues offer support and advice, but the women affected are always in control.
“Some have the courage and bravery to step forward, and we represent them in legal cases. But they have to lead the way,” she adds.
Mulvey also hopes to inspire other women.
“Let’s step up, let’s work with women, let’s work with women’s groups, to take more cases, to keep challenging it, to keep pushing that door open,” Mulvey concludes.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
Geneva is the home of international law, the rules that are supposed to stop the worst violations in war. But does anyone respect it anymore?
Please watch the video version of this episode on YouTube.Andrew Clapham, Professor of International Law at the Geneva Graduate Institute, says: “It’s quite blatant that when we like what the International Criminal Court is doing we will support it, but as soon as it steps out of line we will call it a ridiculous institution. So, it is a bit of a crossroads for international law.”
The Geneva Conventions are 75 years old – are young people even aware of them?
“We have the law, and at least my generation or younger generations tolerate much less those types of violations, and we are reporting more,” says Cristina Figueira Shah, international law student and co-President of the Human Rights, Conflict and Peace Initiative.
Are there any rules of war that work?
Laurent Gisel, Head of the Arms and Conduct of Hostilities Unit at the Legal Division of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), explains that “far fewer people know about the prohibition of blinding laser weapons than the mine ban treaty. Why? Because it has been prohibited before they were developed. And it was prohibited 50 years ago.”
Does indicting a political leader achieve more than headlines?
“Naming somebody as a potential war criminal has a huge effect because if the leader is named as a war criminal, like President Putin or Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that means that assisting them to do what they are doing means that you are aiding and assisting, potentially, in a war crime,” says Clapham.
How can we encourage more respect?
“I think we should go back and understand all the reasons why we got to this point in the first place. How we wrote all the international treaties and understand from that what our generation can do to improve it,” says Shah.
“Violation of international humanitarian law creates even more hatred. And if you want to live in peace afterwards, it helps to respect international humanitarian law during the conflict,” says Gisel.
Join Imogen Foulkes for an Inside Geneva special from Geneva’s Graduate Institute where experts and audience ask: “Is international law dead”?
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
In this week’s episode of our Inside Geneva podcast, we revisit our coverage of laws that changed the world.
Save the Date for a live recordingWe’d like to invite you to a live recording session of our Inside Geneva podcast about the role of the Geneva Conventions and international law. Mark your calendars - June 5, 2024, from 12:30am to 13:30pm - at the Geneva Graduate Institute. Registration is required to secure your spot here. If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected].
From the Convention against Landmines:
"The very day that I entered the hospital for war victims, I realised that all these patients were without one or two legs," said Dr Alberto Cairo from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
"Every day, just about, somebody was injured by a landmine, and they were rushed off to Khao-I-Dang hospital to have their legs amputated," said nurse Denise Coghlan, in Cambodia.
The convention was adopted in 1997.
Steve Goose, from Human Rights Watch, says: "This has been an extremely successful treaty, because it has saved so many lives, and so many limbs, and so many livelihoods."
But landmines still cause huge harm.
"Every morning when I get up in the morning I put on my artificial leg. That’s something that I will do every day for the rest of my life," said Stuart Hughes, a landmine survivor.
We have a convention against genocide, but is it enough?
Ken Roth, human rights expert, says: "People feel like, if you don’t call it genocide, then it’s not serious. And that’s a mistake."
"We have a genocide convention, and we don’t have a crimes against humanity convention, at least not yet," said Paola Gaeta, professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute.
And the Convention against Enforced Disappearances – a protection for families as well as the disappeared.
Cordula Droege, from the ICRC, says: "Victims of enforced disappearances are not only those who are disappeared but also those who suffer directly from it, such as the relatives."
"He was taken by armed men, and taken to a car, a red car without a plate number, and he disappeared," said Aileen Bacalso.
Olivier de Frouville, UN expert on enforced disappearances, adds: "That’s why we describe also for the relatives, who are victims of enforced disappearances, we describe it as torture, because this is real torture."
Inside Geneva hears from the people who campaigned to make our world safer, and asks, are we honouring their laws and their sacrifices?
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
Four years ago, our lives were upended by the Covid-19 pandemic. Countries locked down, millions became ill, millions died. And when the vaccine finally arrived, it was not fairly distributed. Rich countries bought too many, poor countries waited, with nothing.
“What we saw during the Covid-19 pandemic was collapse. Basically, a complete failure of international cooperation,” says Suerie Moon of Geneva Graduate Institute’s Global Health Centre.
Surely we can do better? Countries are gathering in Geneva to try to hammer out a pandemic treaty. Do they have the vision? And the courage?
“There’s been so much lip service paid to equity, but when it actually comes to nailing down what that means, and how to avoid a repeat, it seems like governments are struggling,” says Kerry Cullinan, deputy editor of Health Policy Watch.
What about the vaccine manufacturers? Are they ready to share?
Thomas Cueni former head of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers told us in 2023: “I’ve always been of the view that no treaty is better than a bad treaty. Have a good treaty, I think it would be great.”
David Reddy, the new director-general of IFPMA, adds that they “remain committed to providing the expertise and know-how of our companies to global efforts to prepare for and respond to future pandemics.”Are we going to be better equipped for the next pandemic?
“I think it would be an insult to the seven million people plus who died during the pandemic for there not to be a historic agreement,” says Cullinan.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on our Inside Geneva podcast to learn more about this treaty.
This text was updated on May 16, 2024, to mention that Thomas Cueni is now the former head of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers. The interview mentioned in the podcast was recorded in 2023.Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
In the wars in Ukraine and in the Middle East, new, autonomous weapons are being used. Our Inside Geneva podcast asks whether we’re losing the race to control them – and the artificial intelligence systems that run them.
“Autonomous weapons systems raise significant moral, ethical, and legal problems challenging human control over the use of force and handing over life-and-death decision-making to machines,” says Sai Bourothu, specialist in automated decision research with the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots.
How can we be sure an autonomous weapon will do what we humans originally intended? Who’s in control?
Jean-Marc Rickli from the Geneva Centre for Security Policy adds: “AI and machine learning basically lead to a situation where the machine is able to learn. And so now, if you talk to specialists, to scientists, they will tell you that it's a black box, we don't understand, it's very difficult to backtrack.”
Our listeners asked if an autonomous weapon could show empathy? Could it differentiate between a fighter and a child? Last year, an experiment asked patients to rate chatbot doctors versus human doctors.
“Medical chatbots ranked much better in the quality. But they also asked them to rank empathy. And on the empathy dimension they also ranked better. If that is the case, then you opened up a Pandora’s box that will be completely transformative for disinformation,” explains Rickli.
Are we going to lose our humanity because we think machines are not only more reliable, but also kinder?
“I think it's going to be an incredibly immense task to code something such as empathy. I think almost as close to the question of whether machines can love,” says Bourothu.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on the Inside Geneva podcast to learn more about this topic.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
The world is marking 30 years since the Rwandan genocide. Inside Geneva talks to those who witnessed it.
“We came to one village where there were a few survivors and a man came to me with a list and said ‘look, the names have been crossed out one by one, entire families, they were killing everybody from those families,’” says Christopher Stokes, from Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders).
Charles Petrie, former United Nations (UN) humanitarian coordinator, recalls: “She thought there was a good chance that the Interahamwe [militia] would find the kids, the children, and she said, ‘pray that they don’t hack them to death, pray that they shoot them’”.
Why was it not prevented?
“The paralysis of the UN system, the paralysis of all the major players to respond to what was pretty clearly a massive genocidal operation,” says Gareth Evans, former Australian foreign minister.
Senior diplomats worked to make the UN stronger in the face of atrocities.
“Instead of talking about the right to intervene, we talked about the responsibility to protect. There are some kinds of behaviour which are just inconceivably beyond the pale, whatever country we live in, and just do demand this response,” says Evans.
Has “responsibility to protect”, or R2P, worked?
“I don’t think there’s been significant progress. I would say actually that we went from perhaps a hope, an illusion that something would be done to actually not expecting anything at all now,” says Stokes.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on the Inside Geneva podcast.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
In Inside Geneva this week we get an eyewitness account of a mission to supply Gaza’s hospitals.
Chris Black, World Health Organisation: ‘People have told me oh you must be very brave for going to Gaza. I don’t think so, I think what’s brave is the people who have been doing this work since early October, and who go back every day, to do it again and again and again.’
Aid agencies say nowhere is safe in Gaza
Chris Black, World Health Organisation: ‘A woman with her young child saying to me, are we safe here? And I wanted to say to her ‘You’re in the grounds a hospital, this is a protected space, you should be safe here’. But I couldn’t say to her ‘you’re safe here.’’
And we hear from human rights defenders who have come to Geneva, hoping for support.
Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, human rights defender, Belarus: ‘I really believe that the democratic, powerful world will its teeth and will show to dictators that they will not prevail. We are not asking you to fight instead of us, we are asking you to help us fight the dictators.’
Are democracies letting human rights defenders in autocratic states down?
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production Assistant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin ZhangGet in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
In 2024, four billion of us can vote in elections. Can democracy survive artificial intelligence (AI)? Can the UN, or national governments, ensure the votes are fair?
“Propaganda has always been there since the Romans. Manipulation has always been there, or plain lies by not very ethical politicians have always been there. The problem now is that with the power of these technologies, the capacity for harm can be massive,” says Gabriela Ramos, Assistant Director-General for Social & Human Sciences & AI Ethics at UNESCO.
Analyst Daniel Warner continues: “I’m worried about who’s going to win. But I’m also worried about whether my vote will count, and I’m worried about all kinds of disinformation that we see out there now. More than I’ve ever seen before.”
Are deep fakes the biggest dangers? Or just not knowing what to believe?
“I think the problem is not going to be the content created, the problem is going to be the liar’s dividend. The thing that everything can be denied, and that anything can be questioned, and that people will not trust anything,” said Alberto Fernandez Gibaja, Head of Digitalisation and Democracy at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA).
Laws to regulate AI are lagging behind the technology. So how can voters protect themselves?
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assistant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin ZhangGet in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
The UN’s refugee agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, is the focus of major scrutiny after Israel claimed some UNRWA staff were involved in the October 7th attacks, and thousands more were members of Hamas, or supportive of it. Now one of two UN investigations has concluded that UNRWA does need to improve its measures to uphold the humanitarian principles of impartiality and neutrality, but that Israel has offered no supporting evidence for its claims that many UNRWA staff support Hamas. Many people around the world hadn’t really heard of UNRWA before this scandal - so what is it exactly, why was it founded, and does it really need to continue? Imogen Foulkes takes a deep dive, talking to UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini, Israeli diplomat Nina Ben-Ami, Jan Egeland of the Norwegian Refugee Council, and Louis Charbonneau of Human Rights Watch.
Inside Geneva looks at what’s at stake.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin ZhangGet in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
The war in Ukraine is two years old. Inside Geneva discusses the latest military developments in Ukraine, the chances of peace and where the war will go from here.
“Isn’t there a limit when there are so many civilian deaths so you as a state have a responsibility to stop?” asks journalist Gunilla van Hall.
How will this war end? Ukraine, with the West’s support, is fighting a regime that poisons, imprisons, and kills its political opponents.
Inside Geneva host Imogen Foulkes says: “Putin's dream of getting the whole country, if that's what he wanted, doesn't seem that achievable, and yet Ukraine getting its entire country back doesn't seem achievable either.”
What chance is there of a peace agreement? Does the United Nations have any role to play?
“With this particular cast of characters, it's not going to happen. With Putin on the one side and [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky and his entourage. They’re committed to victory whatever that is,” says Jussi Hanhimäki, professor of international history at the Geneva Graduate Institute.
Is the West’s support for Ukraine waning? What could that mean for international stability?
“Russia is basically independent as far as acting in this war, whereas Ukraine is dependent. And I think of the question of Western fatigue and the radar now is on the Middle East,” concludes analyst Daniel Warner.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on the Inside Geneva podcast for the answers.
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
It’s one year since devastating earthquakes hit Turkey and Syria. Inside Geneva talks to search and rescue teams who were there:
Filip Kirazov, from Search and Rescue Assistance in Disasters (SARAID) says: “Every member of SARAID is a volunteer. So no one gets paid for any of the work we do. Our sole aim is to minimize human suffering, due to the impact of natural or manmade disasters.”
And to local business leaders who had tried to prepare for such a disaster.
“We were expecting a big earthquake in Istanbul, and we were calculating the number of people that were going to lose their lives, and the number of economic losses. The role of businesses there was to be prepared before, and help the economic recovery afterwards,” says Erhan Arslan, Turkonfed (Turkisn Enterprise and Business Confederation).
Can humanitarian organisations and business work together to respond? The United Nations (UN) have an initiative that tries to do just that.
Florian Rhiza Nery, Connecting Business Initiative says: “We often times see the challenges that come from the differences, between the business community, the private sector, and humanitarian organisations, not just the UN.”
Can it work? Humanitarians and entrepreneurs don’t always think the same way…
“When I hear about private public partnerships, I always say about in terms of the private ‘what’s in it for them?’ And the question of a private company being totally neutral or altruistic, I still have my doubts,” concludes Daniel Warner, political analyst.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva
Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang -
Send us a text
The International Court of Justice (the United Nations’ top court) is considering charges of genocide against Israel. The case was brought by South Africa.
Adila Hassim, the lawyer for South Africa, says: “Palestinians are subjected to relentless bombing. They are killed in their homes, in places where they seek shelter, in hospitals, in schools, in mosques, in churches and as they try to find food and water for their families."
Israel is defending itself with vigour.
“What Israel seeks by operating in Gaza is not to destroy people but to protect people, its people. In these circumstances there can hardly be a charge more false and more malevolent than the accusation against Israel of genocide,” says Tal Becker, a lawyer for Israel.
Inside Geneva asks if this is really a case for the UN’s top court.
Margaret Satterthwaite, UN special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers: “This is a case about asserting humanity, and in fact asserting law over war. The purpose of the UN is to prevent disputes from turning into armed conflict. […] And the ICJ is there to help resolve disputes and to prevent war.”
Can that really work? Or will this high-profile case simply distract from other human rights violations?
“People feel like if you don't call it genocide then it's not serious and that's a mistake. Crimes against humanity are incredibly severe,” says Ken Roth of the Harvard Carr Centre for Human Rights Policy.
The ICJ’s final verdict will take years. There is no right of appeal, and member states are obliged to comply. But the ICJ has no power to enforce.
“There's not a UN police force running around making sure that states comply with their international law obligations,” concludes Satterthwaite.
Join host Imogen Foulkes on our Inside Geneva podcast to learn more about the case.Get in touch!
Email us at [email protected] Twitter: @ImogenFoulkes and @swissinfo_enThank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter.
For more stories on the international Geneva please visit www.swissinfo.ch/
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang - Laat meer zien
