Trump begins unprecedented second state visit to Britain

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

I'm Janet Jalil and at at 5 hours GMT on Wednesday the 17th of September, these are our main stories.

Donald Trump arrives in the UK for an unprecedented second state visit to Britain.

The man accused of murdering US right-wing activist Charlie Kirk appears in court.

The Taliban clamped down on the internet in Afghanistan, one of the last means of contact with the outside world for women and girls forced to stay at home.

Also in this podcast, could AI reshape the Japanese music industry?

In an honour accorded to no US president before him, Donald Trump, accompanied by his wife Melania, has arrived in Britain for a second state visit.

Today will be a day of royal ceremony and lavish spectacle at Windsor Castle, the venue being chosen because Buckingham Palace is currently being refurbished.

There'll be a carriage procession, a military parade and flypast, and a state dinner hosted by King Charles and Queen Camilla.

Then after the pomp and pageantry it will be down to business on Thursday when Mr.

Trump will hold trade talks with the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Our North America editor Sarah Smith watched as Air Force One touched down.

The Eagle has landed on British soil.

It was a blustery welcome for America's first couple who are bringing billions of pounds worth of commercial high-tech investment.

In almost 1,000 years, Windsor Castle has borne witness to countless historic events.

The next will be the unprecedented second state visit of Donald Trump.

For him and the First Lady, this visit is about reveling in the grandeur of a royal visit rather than the nitty-gritty of trade deals or transatlantic diplomacy.

My relationship is very good with the UK and Charles, as you know, who's now king, is my friend.

And it's the first time this has ever happened where somebody was honoured twice, so it's a great honor.

And this one's at Windsor.

They've never used Windsor Castle for this before.

They use Buckingham Palace.

And I don't want to say one's better than the other, but they say Windsor Castle is the ultimate, right?

Anti-Trump protesters will be kept well out of the President's sight.

It is my pleasure to bring from His Majesty the King

a letter.

He sends his best wishes and his...

On Kier Starmer's first White House visit, he quickly played his Royal Trump card.

So, can I present a letter from the king?

Thank you very much.

Am I supposed to read it right now?

Yeah, please do.

This is what no other nation can offer.

An invite President Trump will never refuse.

They make a rather odd couple with very different politics and personalities, but they appear to genuinely like each other.

We all know the great Prime Minister of the UK, and we just signed a document.

This is swa-sorry about that.

Even if it doesn't always look like a relationship of equals.

They will be finessing the very trade deal they had in their hands in Canada in June.

The full royal pageantry that's being prepared may be the highlight for President Trump.

Alongside the majestic display, there's also business to be done.

Several high-tech investment deals are due to be announced, particularly around artificial intelligence, bringing many billions of pounds of investment into the UK.

I think that it's amazing that, despite the politics, we have something that can bring the countries together

sort of above the politics.

And I think this state visit is amazing to kind of keep that special relationship.

I mean, this is one of the longest-lasting relationships in history.

Yeah.

And it's great.

The biggest protective security operation since the coronation is now in place for President Trump's visit, with police and boat teams on the Thames as well as drone and snipers all in place.

The recent murder of US right-wing activist Charlie Kirk and the attempted assassination of Mr.

Trump last year mean security is tighter than ever.

Sarah Smith.

Well, as we've heard, the British Prime Minister Keir Stahmer has put a lot of effort into ensuring the visit goes smoothly.

He's currently under a lot of pressure at home over the economy, migration, and scandals that have forced the resignations of several senior figures, including the British ambassador to the US, Peter Mandelson, over his links to the late paedophile, Jeffrey Epstein.

So, what could go wrong?

James Landell is our diplomatic correspondent.

There's a lot that the British want to get out of this.

They want to get business deals, investment, new tech partnerships.

So, that's what they're focused on.

But there are differences over the Middle East.

Next week, the UK government's likely to recognise formally Palestinian statehood.

The Americans are furious about this.

They think it's rewarding Hamas.

So, that's a point of difference.

Whether it comes up, I think, remains, you know, a moot.

I think a lot of that will depend on what questions journalists ask at the press conference.

The Americans at the moment don't want to pick a fight over this.

They want this trip to work.

They want this to be all about nice pictures of the president being honoured by the British royal family.

Donald Trump is not hugely popular here in the UK.

Polls suggest that only about 16% of people think that he's a likable character.

And so it's inevitable there are going to be protests.

And earlier this evening, campaigners projected an image on the side of Windsor Castle here showing Donald Trump and the convicted paedophile Geoffrey Epstein.

And that's just one of the potential tensions that could overshadow this visit.

This was brought to the fore by the sacking of Lord Mandelson as Britain's ambassador in Washington for his connections and friendship with Geoffrey Epstein.

Just one of the difficult issues that I think that both the Americans and the British will try to navigate during a visit that both sides hope will go off without a hitch.

James Landell in Windsor.

There's been international condemnation of Israel after it announced on Tuesday that it had started its long-awaited major ground assault on Gaza City, which Benjamin Netanyahu calls Hamas's last major stronghold.

The British Foreign Secretary, Yvette Cooper, called the offensive utterly reckless and appalling.

The UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the war in Gaza morally, politically, and legally intolerable.

He was speaking after a UN Commission of Inquiry found that Israel has committed genocide.

Aid organizations have called again for urgent intervention in Gaza.

Thousands of people are attempting to flee Gaza City on foot, on donkey carts, and in vehicles overloaded with belongings.

Among them, Abir Ziyad Barakat, an English lecturer, or at least she used to be when the education system functioned.

She's in the southern Ramall neighborhood in Gaza City.

Bombardment doesn't stop.

It's constant day and night.

Whenever there is any kind of bombardment, whether in the eastern side, western side, northern side of Gaza, we hear all of it because this neighborhood is considered as the heart of Gaza.

And when the Israeli military says we want to invade the heart of Gaza, they mean this place.

So believe me when I tell you that wherever you are inside this place, it feels like every bombardment is just in the next block.

I know that you're you're in one of the southern neighborhoods of Gaza City and the Israeli army is sort of working its way down from the north.

But are you seeing

people

from the northern parts of Gaza City?

Are they moving through your neighborhood, perhaps en route to the south?

Well, we see all kinds of people moving from all kinds of neighborhoods because this is, as I told you, it's somehow like the center.

So whenever people are passing from the other areas, we see them in their vans or trucks carrying their clothes, carrying whatever they can carry from their homes.

And

it's a little bit, you know, disturbing to see all of these people running away for their lives.

And Abir, I can hear the sound of children in the background.

Can I ask you about you?

I mean, do you,

what are your family circumstances at the moment?

Well, my children aren't small anymore.

They are adults and teenagers, so thank God I would have to suffer with them because that would be another area of suffering.

But the children you are hearing are from the neighborhood because it's very crowded with people that are even staying in the street, whether building mix sense or whether staying with other relatives.

For example, in one apartment, 50 people staying.

So that's why you can hear this kind of noise around me.

And Abir, have you decided what you are going to do if Israeli troops approach closer?

Well,

our strategy would be the same as it was before all of this.

Whenever there is a ground invasion around us, we would move to another area.

So we used to move to the eastern area if the ground invasion is on the western areas and vice versa.

Right now, the only direction we have to move is south.

And this is something that we don't want it to happen because the situation in the south is very miserable already for the people.

who went there.

People cannot find proper drinking water, proper living conditions.

They are staying in tents.

They can't have access to food, hospitals, medicine, any kind of, you know, the necessities that any normal human being would need.

So we hope that we won't have to go through this journey because we are staying here in apartments already.

So, why should we leave our apartments and move to stay in a tent?

We haven't done anything wrong.

We don't deserve this to happen to us.

And whenever the Israelis say in the media that we are destroying the buildings of Hamas, these buildings that they are destroying, they are not used by Hamas, they are used by the people of Gaza.

And they are taking Hamas as a way to wipe out the whole of Gaza.

And this is what is happening on the ground.

They have wiped out all of Jebalia, Betlaya, Bethanoon, Rafah, part of Sofhanounis and they are doing the same thing to the remaining neighborhoods of Gaza.

So whatever is left, all of them are completely wiped out and they are actually doing what President Trump have said that Gaza is a demolishing site.

Abir Zial Barakat, an English lecturer in Gaza, speaking to Tim Franks.

In the U.S., the man accused of shooting dead, the right-wing activist, Charlie Kirk, has appeared in court for the first time.

Tyler Robinson seemed to listen attentively but showed no emotion as the judge read out the seven charges against him, including aggravated murder, obstruction of justice and witness tampering.

The 22-year-old was also informed that prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

Our correspondent Neda Torfik told us more from outside the court in Utah.

Tyler Robinson appeared virtually from jail for his first court appearance, wearing a vest that's meant to protect from self-harm.

He spoke briefly, just stating his name and otherwise wore a blank expression.

As the judge informed him that he would be held without bail, that he would be appointed a court attorney, and that he was granting the prosecution's request for a protective order barring Robinson from directly or indirectly contacting Erica Kirk, Charlie Kirk's wife.

Now, earlier, the Utah County attorney, Jeff Gray, said that he would be seeking the death penalty.

I do not take this decision lightly, and it is a decision I have made independently, based solely on the available evidence and circumstances and nature of the crime.

Because we are seeking the death penalty, the defendant will continue to be held without bail in the Utah County jail.

He said that Robinson had not been cooperating with authorities, but that his parents and his roommate had, detailing new evidence that we are just now hearing about.

For example, the suspect's mother explained to officials that Robinson had become more left-leaning in his politics in the last year or so, expressing pro-gay and trans rights as he began dating his transgender roommate.

And authorities also releasing some of the messages between that roommate and the 22-year-old suspect after the shooting.

in which he seems to admit to killing Charlie Kirk, saying Kirk was somebody who spread hate and discussing how he was going to try to retrieve his rifle and efforts to get the roommate to delete their conversations.

Now, all of this adds to what prosecutors feel is a weight of evidence against Tyler Robinson, including DNA evidence.

Nedatorfik.

For Afghan girls and women subject to increasingly draconian Taliban restrictions that stop them from going to school or work, the internet has been a haven, allowing them to attend online classes or connect in other ways with the outside world.

It's now emerged, however, that the leader of the Taliban has ordered fibre-optic internet to be disconnected in three provinces to prevent what he says are vices.

Mobile internet still appears to be working, but is not always available.

Ambrasa Netirajan has more details.

Afghan Taliban officials said internet via cable had been banned in Balkh, Helmand, and Kandahar provinces to prevent abuses, and an alternative route would be created.

But they did not explain what they meant by preventing abuses.

It is understood that the de facto Afghan rulers were exploring whether a filter could be used on cable internet to prevent what they view as negative content.

However, mobile internet is still available in these provinces, but it is slow and expensive.

Reports said activities in banks, public institutions, institutions, and some government departments in the three provinces had been disrupted.

Business leaders have expressed concern that if the internet ban continued, their businesses would be seriously hit.

The confirmation of the cable internet shutdown came after complaints from consumers that their services had either disrupted or stopped working completely for the past two weeks.

The scariest part was when when the ICE agents with guns suddenly burst into the office and told us to come out.

I fell sick.

One by one, we were cuffed at the wrists, then chained at the waist, and shackled at the ankles.

A South Korean worker detained in last week's major immigration raid in the U.S.

speaks out about his experience.

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Colombia has halted arms purchases from the U.S., its biggest military partner, after the Trump administration said the South American country was no longer an ally in the battle against drug trafficking.

Mr.

Trump denounced Colombia's left-wing president, Gustavo Petro, for failing to stop a surge in cocaine production in recent years, but stopped short of cutting off the flow of US aid to Colombia.

I got more from Luis Vajardo of BBC Monitoring.

President Petro is reacting to the U.S.

decision to formally decertify the Colombian anti-drug effort.

According to U.S.

law, the White House every year has to evaluate if certain countries, including Colombia, are fulfilling their duties in anti-drugs activities.

And the Trump administration reached the conclusion that Colombia was not.

They initially declined to impose economic sanctions on Colombia according to US law.

This could have led to a restriction to a cut in USAID to Colombia.

The US government said it was not doing so because of national security concerns.

President Petro, who is the first leftist president of Colombia, since he has been in office for the last three years, he has had a rocky relation with the U.S.

government and particularly in recent months with President Trump.

So he has objected very strongly to this decertification.

He says that it is disrespectful.

And he says that Colombia should not allow itself to be influenced by this process, which he considers unilateral.

So as a result, he's saying that Colombia, according to him, would not buy any more weapons from the United States.

And is Mr.

Trump right to blame his Colombian counterpart for the surge in cocaine production?

Because there has been a surge under President Petro, hasn't there?

Yes, there has been a very substantial increase in cocaine and coca leaf production during the Petro administration.

The Petro government says that a lot of it has to do with increasing demand for drugs in other parts of the world.

He also says that his government, in fact, has reached record levels of cocaine confiscation, of cocaine seizures.

But his critics would also argue that during the Petro administration, cocaine production also increased a whole lot.

So the government forces are seizing a lot of cocaine, but it is also because a lot more cocaine is being exported.

And this all comes as the Trump administration says it's in a fight against narco-terrorists, which has included it killing people that it said were on drug boats coming from Venezuela.

That is indeed the case.

And it is also an issue that creates a great lot of controversy in Colombia, and particularly with the Petro administration, because Petro has been very unwilling to explicitly criticize and condemn the Venezuelan government, which is led by a fellow left-wing president by Nicolás Maduro.

And Petro has been extremely critical of U.S.

announcements about eventual military interventions in the area and military deployments.

Critics of Petro say that this has created more political problems for Colombia, that Petro getting into this political fight also with the Trump administration, he actually made it worse for Colombia regarding the decision to decertify Colombia.

Luis Vajardo, a South Korean man who was detained in the U.S.

last week in a major immigration raid, has told the BBC he's still traumatized by what happened to him.

He was one of more than 300 Koreans picked up by ICE agents when they raided a car battery factory in Georgia being built by by two South Korean companies.

The workers were kept in detention for a week before being allowed to return to Seoul on Friday.

This young engineer was in the US for a few weeks to train factory staff.

He asked us to conceal his identity as he's worried about reprisals from the US, so one of our producers has revoiced his words.

He started by telling our Seoul correspondent, Gene McKenzie, what happened when the immigration officials arrived at the factory.

When I looked outside, I saw agents running around with guns.

There were armored vehicles and even a helicopter above.

The scariest part was when the ICE agents with guns suddenly burst into the office and told us to come out.

I panicked and went completely blank.

I fell sick.

I thought I'd be released because I didn't have any visa issues.

I only realized I was getting arrested when they started putting handcuffs on me.

We've seen the videos of the workers in handcuffs and in chains.

Is this what they did to you?

Yes.

One by one, we were cuffed at the wrists, then chained at the waist, and shackled at the ankles.

Then we were put on a bus.

I couldn't understand why we were being treated this way.

How did they treat you when you got to the detention center?

They put us in a room with about 60 to 70 people and locked the door behind us.

I had a panic attack.

I just stood there, trembling.

What was it like sleeping there on your first night?

The room was very cold.

Someone asked the guards if they could turn down the AC, but they said they didn't have the authority.

We weren't even given blankets for two days.

I was wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt, so I put my arms inside my clothes and wrapped myself in a towel to try to stay warm.

But the worst part was the water.

It smelled like sewage.

We drank as little as as possible.

Did you have any idea how long you were going to be held there for?

No, I had no idea.

I thought I might be there for at least a month, maybe even a few.

Then after three or four days, some workers were able to meet a lawyer, and we learned we might be able to leave later that week.

Talking to you about this now, I sense that you still find this very difficult to talk about, that you're still in a lot of shock.

That's right.

When I first saw my family at the airport, I smiled and hugged them, but I couldn't feel anything.

It was like I was hollow inside.

It wasn't until my mom cooked me dinner that night that it really hit me and I cried for the first time.

And these days, when I'm outside, if I smell something similar to the prison, I start trembling and get short of breath.

So I don't stay out for long.

You were in the States on a visa waiver on an Esther,

which allows you to have business meetings.

But do you think in any way you overstepped the terms of your visa?

No, never.

I only attended meetings and gave training presentations.

That's all.

So I never thought I was doing anything illegal.

South Korean companies have said they're going to invest billions in the United States to build factories like the one that you were working on.

How do you feel towards the US now and whether it's a trusted partner for South Korea?

Honestly, my trust in the US has been deeply shaken.

The ICE agents who arrested us said they were just following orders.

That means the order came from higher up.

So, no, I don't think the US is trustworthy.

I'll probably have to go there again for work, but I'll definitely avoid Georgia if I can.

A South Korean worker detained by ICE.

Jaguar Land Rover has confirmed that its UK factories will remain closed for another week following a cyber attack.

The car maker, which usually manufactures 1,000 vehicles a day, has now lost more than two full weeks of global output.

Here's our business correspondent, Theo Leggett.

Jaguar Land Rover has been unable to build cars since the start of the month.

Its computer systems were shut down following the cyber attack, paralyzing many of its operations.

The company has not revealed how much damage was caused, but a criminal investigation is ongoing.

The shutdown is thought to be costing JLR itself at least £50 million a week.

But the biggest impact is likely to be felt in its network of thousands of suppliers, many of which are small or medium-sized businesses that lack the financial muscle to survive for long without money coming in.

The trade union Unite has asked the government to set up a COVID-style furlough scheme, which would subsidise workers' wages and hopefully avoid significant layoffs.

Jason Richards is Unite's regional officer for the West Midlands.

Sources within the industry say they don't expect production at JLR to be back to normal for weeks or even months.

The company has dismissed such talk as speculation.

But analysts say without some kind of government support, bankruptcies within the sector are highly likely.

Dear Legit, prosecutors in Serbia have charged a former government minister and 12 other people over last November's disaster at Novi Sad railway station.

Sixteen people died when a concrete canopy collapsed at the recently renovated facility.

Since then, there have been nearly daily protests with the tragedy becoming a symbol of entrenched corruption for many Serbians.

Here's our Balkans correspondent, Guy Delorny.

Serbia's former construction minister, Goran Vesic, is the best known of the 13 people facing charges.

They're accused of allowing Novisad railway station to reopen without a permit.

There are also charges relating to failures of maintenance and design.

The station was part of the government's signature infrastructure project, the high-speed line from Belgrade to Budapest.

The disaster triggered an ongoing nationwide anti-corruption movement demanding full transparency and accountability.

There's been violence at recent protests, and participants are unlikely to be mollified by the prosecutions.

Guidalauni.

One of Japan's biggest girl groups, AKB 48, has released a song with a difference.

It was partly composed by using artificial intelligence.

We can't play it because of rights issues, but our correspondent, Mark Savage, says a lot of songwriters will be watching nervously to see if the AI song is a hit with the fans.

AKB 48 are a huge band, like you say, in Japan.

And they were put together 20 years ago by this Svengali figure, a sort of Simon Cowell of Japan called Yasushi Akimoto.

And he writes the majority of their songs.

He accepted a challenge for their 20th anniversary.

He would write a song, and an AI trained on his back catalogue would write a song.

Fans would be presented with both, not knowing which was which, and they would vote for the one that would become AKB 48's next single.

They had five days in this blind vote, and the AI version won by almost 4,000 votes.

Now, I suppose it's not necessarily embarrassing for the composer because it was all based on his own back catalogue anyway, wasn't it?

Yes, in fact, the AI that they use was trained not just on the music he'd written, but on his notes, on other writings.

You know, it really studied the ins and outs of his thought process, the way that he chose who would sing the lead vocal in each songs.

And that was all fed into the the computer.

And I have to say, there is a bit of a caveat here.

The song's lyrics were written by the AI.

It apparently assisted in part with the melody.

It chose who would be the lead singer from this group, which has 43 separate members.

But crucially, humans were involved in the arrangement and the recording, and obviously the vocals on the song.

So it's not 100% AI,

but still, I think Yasushi Akimoto was a little bit surprised when his human-created song lost.

Yeah, I have to say, if I was a composer of music or a songwriter, this would make my blood run quite cold.

I'd be pretty worried.

Yeah, I mean, I think

that caveat that I gave about the AI being...

part of the process, I think that's where a lot of musicians who want to embrace AI hope it will go.

I don't know if you remember, but you know, 40 years ago when drum machines were first introduced, there was a huge panic in the music industry.

Musicians unions got involved.

This is going to put musicians out of jobs.

Everything will become automated.

It's the end of the world.

That never happened.

In fact, what happened was drum machines allowed human drummers to do things they could never do before, to trigger sounds, to trigger loops, to do all sorts of crazy inventive things that changed the direction of music.

The optimists about artificial intelligence hope that it will be like that, that it'll be a tool that will unlock new potential in music.

On the other side, there are a lot of people who worry a great deal that songs that are generated by artificial intelligence will be boosted by streaming sites, that they will take away the money, the royalties that songwriters earn, and will essentially turn music into something that is a facsimile of itself rather than a creative process.

Mark Savage speaking to Nick Miles about the growing use of AI in music.

And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast later.

If you want to comment on this podcast, you can send us an email.

The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk.

This edition was mixed by Caroline Driscoll.

The producers were Anna Aslam and Arian Kochi.

The editor is Karen Martin.

I'm Janat Jalil.

Until next time, goodbye.