Global News Podcast: Trump pleads not guilty to 2020 election charges

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This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service.

I'm Valerie Sanderson and in the early hours of Friday the 4th of August these are our main

stories. Donald Trump has pleaded not guilty to four charges at a court in Washington,

including conspiring to overturn the result of the 2020 US presidential election.

Satellite data from Brazil shows deforestation in the Amazon has dropped dramatically.

A man has stabbed more than a dozen people in South Korea.

Also in this podcast, we've took this bacteria which we had isolated and we infected these

mosquitoes with the malaria parasite and we found that it was the one responsible for

reducing infection in these mosquitoes. Scientists have found a natural strain of bacteria which

they say could help stop the transmission of malaria from mosquitoes to humans.

The former US president Donald Trump has pleaded not guilty to criminal charges that he conspired

to overturn the results of the 2020 election and defraud the American people. He entered

his plea in the same Washington courthouse where hundreds of his supporters were convicted

for their roles in the attack on the US Capitol in January 2021. Mr Trump, the frontrunner for

the Republican presidential nomination next year, said it was a very sad day for America.

Reporting from Washington is our correspondent, Shondili.

Donald Trump arrived at court with a secret service motorcade after flying in

from his Bedminster golf resort in New Jersey. Dressed in a dark suit, blue shirt and trademark

red tie, he entered the courtroom accompanied by his lawyers without speaking to reporters.

He listened intently as the prosecution read out the charges. Mr Trump was asked to enter a plea.

Denying all charges, he said slowly and deliberately, not guilty. Prosecutors did

not oppose bail, which the judge granted, but she told him not to talk about the facts of the case.

Failure to comply with this condition, she said, could result in an arrest warrant being

issued, contempt of court charges and potential custody. Mr Trump was driven straight from the

court to the nearby Reagan Airport, where he spoke to reporters. This is a persecution

of a political opponent. This was never supposed to happen in America. This is the persecution

of the person that's leading by very, very substantial numbers in the Republican primary

and leading Biden by a lot. So if you can't beat him, you persecute him or you prosecute him.

We can't let this happen in America. Donald Trump's next court date is the 28th of August.

The former president has been told he doesn't have to attend.

Sean Dilly in Washington. Michael Gerhardt is a constitutional lawyer and distinguished

professor of jurisprudence at the University of North Carolina, who testified at Donald Trump's

impeachment proceedings and also at the process involving Bill Clinton. Rebekah Kesby asked him

if this latest case is more important than any of the other cases that Mr Trump has faced so far.

I think they're all important or another way to think of it is they're each becoming increasingly

important. John Adams once talked about how this is a country of government. We have a government

of laws, not men. And that's what's being tested because the law should apply to everyone equally.

And Trump seems to, based on the evidence that has been amassed, to engage in a series of acts

that were designed to impede the peaceful transfer of power in the United States.

That's been a bedrock principle here in the United States that the loser sort of kind of acknowledges

that and then goes away. Doesn't try to create any kind of violence or rebellion or any kind of

havoc in the aftermath of the election. Mr Trump obviously did just the opposite.

Can you tell us anything else about how this trial may be conducted? Is it going to be televised?

Will there be a jury? If it's a grand jury, what does that mean?

It will not be a grand jury. So the grand jury's function in our legal system

is to charge somebody with a crime that's already been done. So now the ball sort of goes into the

court of the federal district judge is going to oversee Trump's trial. And then all those questions

are really left for her to answer. Will she allow television into the courtroom? When, if at all,

would she do that? She will oversee the selection of a jury, which is supposed to include people that

don't already have prejudices about this matter. She's going to be a tough judge. That's her reputation.

And I mean that in the best sense. She doesn't take any nonsense. She's been tough on people that

have come before her in the past who participated in the riots at the Capitol. She's handed out

tough sentences. But she also came to her judgeship from having been a public defender.

And that means she's very aware of and sensitive to the rights of criminal defendants. And she'll

be even handed. But in Mr. Trump's case, that might not be welcome. He wants somebody who's

already sort of biased in his favor. He doesn't have that here. Interesting. Michael, just a quick

word on what we know of the other co-conspirators. What can you tell us about that? Well, these are

all people who really worked for Mr. Trump in the administration. So they're fellow Democrats.

They're people he appointed to positions of power. So this is not a conspiracy, so to speak, of

Democrats that are kind of going after Mr. Trump. Instead, it's his fellow Republicans are the ones

that helped him attempt to undermine the election. And also people that had high ranking positions.

The acting attorney general of the United States is among them. It's a very serious problem

that these six co-conspirators were all people that wielded enormous power,

but they did his bidding in trying to impede the peaceful transfer of power.

The constitutional lawyer, Michael Gerhardt. When President Lila de Silva returned to power in

Brazil in January, he promised to reverse the damage done to the rainforest by his predecessor,

Jair Bolsonaro. Official figures from Brazil's Space Research Agency seem to show he's on the

right track, as I heard from our correspondent in Brazil, Katie Watson. Impe, which is the

Brazilian Space Research Agency, they monitor the Amazon through satellites. And they said that

in the month of July, 500 square kilometers of rainforest was cleared. And that's a 66%

drop from the same period a year ago. And even if you look at the first seven months of this year,

compared to the seven months of last year, deforestation has fallen 42.5%. So these are

massive, massive drops in the first half of 2023, since Lila de Silva came back

to be Brazil's president. And how has he done it? If you look at the surveillance, that's gone up.

So during Jair Bolsonaro's time in power, he cut resources, which meant there weren't as many people

on the ground in terms of finding people who did things that they shouldn't be doing in the Amazon,

like deforestation, or planting things they shouldn't, or putting cattle on land that they

shouldn't be doing that. He's increased that surveillance. In fact, the amount of fines rose

150%, practically about $400 million worth of fines were collected in the first half of 2023.

So he's really just up to the surveillance, up to the policing, if you like, of the Amazon in Brazil.

And you've just interviewed him, haven't you, President Lula? What did he tell you?

These figures come in the context of a summit that's being hosted in Belém, which is in the Amazon.

That's where Brazil's going to host the COP climate summit in two years' time. He's bringing

eight countries that share the Amazon rainforest together in the city to discuss how to preserve

the rainforest. He seemed hopeful that the region can play a big part in trying to solve climate issues.

This meeting is the first great opportunity for people to show the world what we want to do.

If we have the political will and common sense, we will do it. Brazil will fulfill what was promised.

We will reach zero deforestation in the Amazon in 2030.

And Katie, is there any active opposition to this? I mean, will he be able to achieve his

goal of stopping deforestation altogether by the end of the decade?

Well, this is Brazil. And in politics, there's certainly an awful lot of people who don't like

Lula. Clearly, people who had been allowed to, there were fewer regulations in the last four years

and were allowed to do more than they are now, might not be so happy about it. Whether or not he

is able to achieve his goal of stopping deforestation, I think it'll be incredibly difficult to get it

down to zero. But he's certainly committed with other countries to try and bring that number down.

When I spoke to him, he said that people need to look at this region and stop just talking and

actually doing. So the commitment's there, whether or not it's overambitious. I think

everybody's going to be watching that. Katie Watson in Brazil. France has condemned the suspension

of the state-run radio and television broadcasters in Niger following last week's coup,

describing the move as authoritarian repression. Niger has been an important ally for France,

which, like America, has a military presence there to fight jihadists in the region.

But relations have soured since the coup nine days ago, when hundreds of French nationals were

evacuated from the country after protesters attacked the French embassy. On Thursday, protests were

held in Niger's capital, Niame, in support of the military coup. Our Africa correspondent,

Catherine Biarahanga, has compiled this report. Long live the Nigerian army, a nation for the

patriots, crowds chanted in Niger's capital, thousands gathered in front of parliament

to show support for the country's new military leaders who are facing a chorus of international

calls to step down. It's also Independence Day in Niger, and the rallies focused on hostility to

France, the country's former colonial power, which still has troops in the country. Some Nigerians,

like this protester, are also angry with the West African regional grouping known as ECOWAS,

which has condemned the coup. We're going to demonstrate to all the ECOWAS countries

and all those who are taking unpopular and inhumane measures against Niger,

which is in the process of freeing itself from the yoke of colonisation.

Some in the crowd waved Russian flags, like neighboring Burkina Faso and Mali, which have

also experienced recent coups. Some believe, drawing closer to Moscow, offers better economic

and security prospects. But there is also a sizable part of Niger's population that wants

a return to civilian rule, and who have carried out their own protests in the past few days.

Regional efforts at mediation have so far failed to convince the soldiers of Niger

to go back to their barracks. Catherine Bjarahanga

At least 12 people have been injured in South Korea after a man drove a car into pedestrians

and then attacked many of them with a knife. The incident happened south of the capital's soul.

Jean McKenzie has more details. The suspect, dressed all in black, drove his car onto the

pavement during the evening rush hour, ramming into four people. He then got out, brandishing a

knife, and walked into a busy shopping centre, where he stabbed at least nine others. All of

the injured have been taken to hospital. Some are said to be seriously hurt. At the scene,

police have arrested a man in his 20s. South Korea's National Police Commissioner

has described this as an indiscriminate attack. It follows another random stabbing in soul

a fortnight ago, in which one person was killed. Jean McKenzie

Now to a possible breakthrough in preventing the transmission of malaria from mosquitoes

to humans. Scientists at a GlaxoSmithKline research facility in Spain have discovered

a naturally occurring strain of bacteria, which, over time, inhibits the development of

malaria parasites in a mosquito's gut. More research is taking place following the discovery,

but it's being seen as a potentially significant tool that could be used to combat the spread of

the disease, which, in 2021, accounted for the deaths of more than 600,000 people around the

world. Gillian Warwickers wrote to the author of the research from GlaxoSmithKline,

Janeth Rodriguez. We froze down those tissue samples in our freezers and took this bacteria

which we had isolated. We put it into a new colony which was established in our insectry

and we infected these mosquitoes with the malaria parasite and, yes, we found that it was the one

responsible for reducing infection in these mosquitoes. So this is effectively a natural

bacteria which you've now discovered inhibits the development of the malaria parasites in a

mosquito's gut. Exactly. That's what you've now found. Yes. And how significant is that potentially?

Oh, potentially. It is tremendously significant because all of the currently used vector control

tools, or those which are in development, these target the mosquito itself. So they kill the

mosquito vector and because of that, there is a high chances for development of resistance and

resistance to insecticides is now one of the major challenges for mosquito vector control. So

that's the reason why this kind of intervention has an added advantage. And also, it would mean

that those particular mosquitoes would no longer threaten humans with malaria. Exactly. What's then

the potential application of this on the kind of scale that would make a difference around the world?

So, looking into the future, I mean, we would like to see this used, of course,

deployed as a tool or deployed as the tool for the prevention of malaria. But what we see from

this study, what we concluded from this study is that we not only have the TC1 bacteria which could

be used as an active ingredient to be incorporated into potential vector control tools, we have three

different active potential active ingredients which have arisen from this TC1 based intervention.

Right. So in those circumstances, the mosquitoes would absorb that bacteria based intervention.

Exactly. And that would have the effect of nullifying the mosquito's gut and being able to

pass on malaria. There was a particular figure added to this that this strain can reduce a

mosquito's parasite load by up to 73%. Is that right? Yes. And in terms of that wider application,

what happens now in terms of trying to make this make the difference everybody wants it to make

for those who might be at risk of malaria? So the advantage we have is that one, it is a non-genetically

engineered microorganism. It is naturally present in the environment. So based on these

preliminary experiments, we are doing additional rounds of experiments to ensure that we do have

good efficacy, good uptake of this bacteria in the mosquito gut, and also to ensure safety

within the environs of that mosquito sphere. What's the timescale for all this in terms of when it

becomes a practical application? It's too early to say because these are just the preliminary

studies. So it would be too speculative to talk about timelines right now.

But put it into context for us, when we think of all the other developments there have been in

recent times, where does this one sit? I wish I could answer that because right now, what we have

is we don't have a final product format. But it's a good day. It is a good day. It's a very good day.

Janeth Rodriguez from GlaxoSmithKline.

Still to come, why fish skin is being used to treat wounds? With fish, there is no

virus that can be transferred from a fish to a man. There's no mad cod disease,

and that's what does the good in the healing.

Hi, I'm Hannah. I am the host of a new daily podcast, What in the World from the BBC World

Service, where we try to help you make sense of the world around you, explaining the big events

and some of the smaller events, so that you might feel a little bit better when you pick up your phone

and scroll through your news feed. Just search for What in the World Wherever

You Get Your BBC Podcasts and hit subscribe. Welcome back to the Global News Podcast.

A senior Ukrainian military figure says it was one of their teams which struck the Kerch

Bridge, linking Russia with Crimea last month. The attack temporarily stopped traffic on a

strategically important route. Russia blamed marine-based drones. Here's Pomos.

There was a time when Ukraine didn't comment on operations behind enemy lines,

but the authorities in Kiev have recently become more candid and have now claimed responsibility

for blowing up part of the Kerch Bridge last month. By linking Russia with occupied Crimea,

the bridge has come to symbolise Russia's territorial conquests. But the Secretary of

Ukraine's National Defence and Security Council mocked the idea that the bridge was heavily

protected. Alexei Danilov said many Russian facilities were labelled untouchable, but

that Ukraine was putting that claim where it belonged. Pomos. Well, conflicts like the one

in Ukraine have been taking place throughout history. Ways to treat those wounded in war

are constantly being developed via new medical techniques. But sometimes the most simple ideas

have extraordinary outcomes. A British surgeon Stephen Jeffrey, a professor specialising in

the study of wounds, has worked in several war zones. He told Martha Carney that specially

treated fish skin proves invaluable when treating soldiers injured on the modern battlefield.

It facilitates and promotes and speeds up wound healing. And when you're in a mass casualty

situation where you have more casualties than you can operate on, one of the things I bring

with me is this fish skin because it will, by speeding up the process of wound healing,

it will allow more patients to be treated. And just so people can know what it looks like,

it's a rather kind of papery thin white piece of almost looks like parchment. But I can see

the sort of traces of what will look like scales or, you know, where scales have been on it. And

how exactly does it work? Well, this is freeze dried. So you when you when you wet it, it sort of

rehydrates and then it becomes more pliable. And when you normally take an animal product and you

want to use it on a human, you have to process it very thoroughly to get rid of any risk of viral

transmission, you know, is it going to contain hepatitis, HIV, mad cow disease, anything like

this. And doing that, you get rid of a lot of the structure and a lot of the goodness of the

chemicals that promote healing. And it turns out that with fish, there is no virus that can be

transferred from a fish to a man. There's no mad cod disease. So the processing is a lot more

gentle. It retains a lot more of that good structure, for example, the Amiga 3 fatty acids.

And that's what does the good in the healing. Is this part of a trend in a way that we're going

back to what might seem to be more traditional old fashioned remedies? Well, certainly, we are

rediscovering that what our ancestors used not all the words mumbo jumbo, some of it actually

works. The other good thing about the fish skin is it's a it's a form of recycling because

this is skin that's come from the food industry. You know, we eat the cod and previously they

would throw away the skin. But now that can be processed and turned into a very useful product

for wound healing. The British surgeon, Stephen Jeffrey. Now to Romania, where the government

has been implementing policies to try to persuade its diaspora to move back home. Almost 20% of

the population live elsewhere. And that causes issues, particularly in the health and construction

sectors in the country. Tessa Dunlop has been meeting those who've decided to return home to Romania.

That is actually a plastic hammer banging soft Italian leather in a Transylvanian workshop.

Why are you making that? It is cut with suspenders. We're basically hammering the the seams to make

them nice and flat so we can make the final stitch. I'm in Cluj-Napoca, a city in the west of Romania

and one of its richest with fashion designer Alina Marar. She returned here in 2019, having spent

five years in London. I asked her why she'd originally left her homeland. Now it's a bit

better. But back then, 10 years ago, I had blue hair, like everyone was making fun and

pointing fingers at me. You know, self-expression wasn't big. What brings you back? What pulls you

back to Romania? On Facebook and some members of my family told me that there are these funding

that's been offered to people that have been living outside of Romania for at least one year.

It's funding for startups, for people that have an idea about something they want to do. It doesn't

have to be, I didn't even have to have a company. I just needed to have an idea and a business plan

put together with something that I wanted to do. With the help of EU funds, in 2014, the government

introduced diaspora grants. Alina got 33,000 euros. That's roughly 37,000 US dollars. And it's not the

only policy being used to tempt the diaspora home. The mayor of Cluj-Napoca, Emil Boc, was

Prime Minister of Romania just after the country joined the European Union in 2007. Hundreds of

thousands of people were leaving every year. Unfortunately, the interest of Romania in the

European Union was followed by the economic crisis. So it was accelerating the migration process.

We weren't in the situation not to have money to pay pension and salaries.

And what impact did that have here on the ground in Romania?

We had to cancel projects because there are no people in construction. We have money,

no people to work and to finalise a bridge or a street or something like that.

We had to close sometimes hospitals. We had, in the worst-case scenario,

possible, a combination of losing people and economic crises.

The scale of the exodus was terrifying. But these days, Romania is a changed place. Aided by an EU

boost of 30 billion euros, it's projected to be the third fastest growing economy in the European

Union this year. Of all the policies the Romanian governments introduced to get the diaspora back,

their most successful has been in the health sector. In 2018, the increased salaries by

around 70% overnight. And by 2021, the number of doctors applying to work abroad had almost halved.

Ioana Biris is a fetal cardiologist and spent almost a decade working for Britain's National

Health Service. She's just moved home to Timisoara, which is this year's European Capital of

Culture. We have decided to come back right in time in Timisoara because there are a lot of

festivals happening in Timisoara, which I don't recall this happening 10-15 years ago.

And I think you feel much more up to date with what's happening in the world.

For some, though, the policies aren't cutting through. And life on a lower salary often seems

better in Western Europe. The governments introduced tax breaks for the construction

industry, but builder John is still struggling to find the staff.

He's saying, as an example, I had the construction site and I had no people, absolutely no people to

work with. I pay my workers a thousand years a month. That's the same amount of money that the

worker in Italy would earn, but they still don't want to come back.

That report by Tessa Dunlop. Here in Britain, five people have been arrested after they

climbed onto the roof of the British Prime Minister's home in Northern England

to protest against his fossil fuel policies. The demonstrators from the climate group Greenpeace

draped black fabric over the house. The activists also laid out a banner on the front lawn reading

Rishi Sunak, oil profits or our future. This week, he'd approved hundreds of new oil and gas

exploration licenses in the North Sea, angering environmentalists. From North Yorkshire,

Piona Trock reports. On a quiet lane in North Yorkshire, police cars still surround the Prime

Minister's family home. Inside the grounds in front of a union flag, you can see ladders propped up

next to a CCTV camera. The investigation into how this happened is well underway.

Protesters wearing harnesses and hard hats climbed onto the roof. Footage released by

the campaign group Greenpeace appear to show them walking onto the property unchallenged.

The Conservative MP, Greg Clarke, said the breach of security was a real concern.

The home of the Prime Minister should be secure. I think everyone would accept this. We

who know the risks and the dangers. I'm not saying that these protesters

had in mind violent intent, but that doesn't matter. Another senior Tory backbencher,

Alicia Kearns, said politicians' family homes should not be under assault. The former Deputy

Chief Constable of North Yorkshire Police, Peter Walker, says the situation could have been much

worse. There is an opportunity here for somebody who wants to attack the Prime Minister to place

an improvised explosive device at the premises, and I really hope they're going to be checked

after all this is over. It seems to me that the wrought to have been a police presence at the

home, the fact that it has been left unattended is astonishing. Three men and two women remain

in custody as detectives continue to investigate why the Prime Minister's home was not safe and

secure. Fiona Trott in Northern England. The American pop style Lizzo has denied allegations

that she sexually harassed and fat-shamed three of her former dancers. They've filed a lawsuit

against the singer who called the accusations unbelievable. Our entertainment correspondent,

Colin Patterson reports.

Lizzo has won Grammys and many devoted fans who love her messages of inclusivity and body

positivity. 36 hours after being faced with the lawsuit containing allegations of body

shaming, sexual harassment and having created a hostile work environment, Lizzo responded

with a lengthy statement on social media. She described the allegations as false,

unbelievable and too outrageous to not be addressed, saying that it had never been her

intention to make anyone feel uncomfortable and that she would never criticise or fire an employee

because of their weight. The three dancers who were bringing the case against Lizzo gave me the

reaction to Lizzo's statement. Crystal Williams and Ariana Davis were both sacked by the singer.

Noel Rodriguez resigned in protest. Speaking from their lawyer's office in Los Angeles,

Ariana Davis responded to Lizzo's comment that she was not the villain she'd been made out to be.

She's less of a villain and more of an anti-hero to me and what that means to me is that a villain

is someone with no redeemable qualities. They are bad and evil and terrible, but an anti-hero is

someone who does bad things but has redeemable qualities. Do I think Lizzo can take this and

change and be who she says she is? Yes, absolutely. I want her to be who she said she was when I first

met her. Crystal Williams said it had never been their intention for the three to go public.

This was worst case scenario. It was a last resort. There were several attempts made to try to

handle this privately. I multiple times asked to speak with her. The BBC has asked Lizzo for

an interview but there has been no response. Colin Patterson and finally the composer Carl Davis

who wrote the music for more than a hundred films in television series has died at the age of 86.

He was born in New York but had lived in the UK since the early 1960s. A versatile and prolific

musician he composed scores in a wide range of styles for films including The French of Tenants

Woman and television series such as Pride and Prejudice. Sophie Van Bruggen looks back at his life.

Carl Davis' music for the BBC's Pride and Prejudice. Like so many of his works it was

tuneful and just right for the purpose. He arrived in Britain in 1961. From then on themes

and incidental music poured from his pen for everything from the world at war to Ben Hur

to Torval and Dean's Far and Ice. From the 1970s he became the world's foremost composer of music

for silent films. He wrote and adapted a mammoth five hours of music for a restored version of

Abel Gasse's 1927 masterpiece Napoleon.

Ah, Sophie Van Bruggen there on the life of the composer Carl Davis

who's died at the age of 86.

And that's it from us for now but there'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later.

If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it send us an email.

The address is GlobalPodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on Twitter at Global NewsPod.

This edition was mixed by Daniel Ehrlich. The producer was Liam McCheffrey. The editor as ever

is Karen Martin. I'm Valerie Sanderson. Until next time, goodbye.

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.