US Senate vote could end government shutdown

Speaker 1 This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

Speaker 2 Stream acclaimed new originals like Code of Silence.

Speaker 3 You read lips, right?

Speaker 2 And Linley, based on the best-selling mystery series.

Speaker 1 See I Lindley.

Speaker 2 Take it from here. And don't miss the new season of Karen Pirry coming this October.

Speaker 3 You don't look like police.

Speaker 5 I'll take that as a compliment.

Speaker 2 See it differently when you stream the best of British TV with Brick Box. Watch with a free trial today.

Speaker 6 Tires matter. They're the only part of your vehicle that touches the road and they're responsible for so much.
Acceleration, braking, steering and handling.

Speaker 6 Tread confidently with new tires from Tire Rack. Whether you're looking for expert recommendations or know exactly what you want, Tire Rack makes it easy.

Speaker 6 You'll get fast, free shipping, free road hazard protection, and convenient installation options. Try mobile installation.
They'll bring your new tires to your home or office and install them on site.

Speaker 6 Tire Rack has the best selection of tires from world-class brands, and they don't just sell tires, they test them on the road and on their test track.

Speaker 6 Learn how the tires you want tackle evasive maneuvers, drive and stop in the rain, or just handle your everyday commute.

Speaker 6 Go to tirerack.com to see their tire test results, tire ratings, and consumer reviews. And be sure to check out all the current special offers.
That's tirerack.com. TireRack.com.

Speaker 6 The way tire buying should be.

Speaker 7 following claims viewers were misled by the editing of a speech by the US President.

Speaker 7 Also in this podcast, activists in Afghanistan say the Taliban authorities have ordered women to wear burqas to be allowed into hospitals.

Speaker 8 When a woman go into hospital in different provinces of Afghanistan, they have to go with a male chaperone, otherwise they are not allowed.

Speaker 7 We start in Washington where US senators have passed a deal that paves the way for the end of the longest government shutdown in history.

Speaker 9 On this vote, the yays are 60 and the nays are 40. Three-fifths of the Senate duly chosen and sworn, having voted in the affirmative, the motion, upon reconsideration, is agreed to.

Speaker 7 The shutdown has brought pain to Americans. Low-income families have lost food stamps, and federal employees have been forced to work with no pay or be furloughed.

Speaker 7 The deadlock was broken when several Democrat senators voted with their Republican rivals. Anthony Zerker is our North America correspondent.

Speaker 9 The government shutdown isn't over, but it is heading towards a resolution.

Speaker 9 After 40 days, where both the Republicans and Democrats were at odds, as you mentioned, a group of Democrats in the U.S.

Speaker 9 Senate have now sided with Republicans to begin a series of procedural maneuvers to reopen the government.

Speaker 9 Once the Senate ultimately approves that, with this democratic help, then the measure has to go back to the U.S. House of Representatives where it also has to approve it.

Speaker 9 And then it goes to Donald Trump's desk for signatures. But the biggest obstacle, the obstacle that has led to this 40-day shutdown in the U.S.
Senate has apparently been resolved.

Speaker 7 Aaron Powell, Prince. And what will be the next steps in the process as well, Anthony?

Speaker 9 Well, what we're going to see once this government shutdown is ended is that all the government services will be reopened once it have been put on hold, such as

Speaker 9 furloughs of government government workers, government workers going without pay, air traffic controllers, for instance,

Speaker 9 have not been paid for 40 days, airport security officers as well. That had led over the past couple of days to cancellations and flight delays across the United States.

Speaker 9 Thousands of flights had been canceled just on Sunday alone. National parks and public museums will reopen.
Things essentially will start to return to normal.

Speaker 7 And what was key in unlocking this deadlock?

Speaker 9 Democrats actually had been insisting during this shutdown was that Republicans address health care

Speaker 9 subsidies to help pay for health insurance provided to low-income Americans. That actually wasn't addressed in this.

Speaker 9 The only thing that Republicans promised was that they would have a vote on extending those subsidies in the U.S. Senate.

Speaker 9 No guarantees that the House would take it up as well, which would be necessary to extend these subsidies.

Speaker 9 One of the things that you did see were some government services being funded through the end of the fiscal year, so through the end of September.

Speaker 9 That means that food support for low-income Americans would be provided and guaranteed for almost an entire year.

Speaker 9 That had been a source of pain for many Americans over the past few weeks as it looked like those funds ran out.

Speaker 9 The Republicans also agreed to return to work, people who had been threatened with layoffs in the federal government over the course of this shutdown.

Speaker 9 Now they're guaranteed that they will have their jobs back.

Speaker 7 Next to the crisis that's engulfing the BBC, two of its most senior leaders have resigned. In the week before last year's U.S.

Speaker 7 presidential election, the BBC broadcast a documentary which included excerpts from a speech made by Donald Trump in the run-up to the Capitol Hill riots in 2021.

Speaker 7 But there were complaints that it misled viewers by selectively editing Mr. Trump's comments.

Speaker 7 And after a leaked internal memo also criticised the documentary and other areas of BBC News coverage, the Director General Tim Davey and head of news Deborah Turness have resigned.

Speaker 7 It's the latest in a series of controversies and accusations of bias against the BBC. In a statement, Mr.
Davey acknowledged that mistakes had been made in what he described as feebril times. Ms.

Speaker 7 Turness also accepted criticism, but denied allegations of institutional bias within the BBC.

Speaker 7 President Trump welcomed their resignation and here in Britain Nigel Huddleston of the main opposition Conservative Party said it's a major wake-up call for the public broadcaster.

Speaker 10 It's really exposed some serious concerns

Speaker 10 about impartiality at the BBC.

Speaker 10 We need to make sure that the BBC does what we all want it to do and what it does best, which is be a global brand for the UK based on world-renowned, impartial, trusted news coverage and content.

Speaker 10 And I'm afraid that is not the case at the moment.

Speaker 7 So just how damaging is this for the corporation? It's a question I put to our correspondent, Rob Watson.

Speaker 11 The first thing to say, Ankara, is that it is a massive crisis for the BBC. There's just no two ways about that.
One of the worst crises it's faced in its hundred-year history. How has it come about?

Speaker 11 Well, I think in many ways, this was the final straw. There'd been a string of incidents over the last 12 months or so over various stories, various bits of coverage.

Speaker 11 But the final straw was essentially a memo that was leaked to a British newspaper, and that memo was written by someone who was an independent advisor to the BBC editorial, a guidelines and standards board.

Speaker 11 And this memo was immensely damaging because what it contained was largely based on internal BBC reports by a senior journalist into issues with our coverage, coverage not just of

Speaker 11 now the notorious Trump editing, but the US election, anti-Israel bias, particularly in the BBC Arabic service, but allegations of bias more generally against Israel.

Speaker 11 And then all sorts of sort of basic journalistic errors, whether it was covering race, gender, immigration, even some economic stories.

Speaker 11 And what the man who'd written the memo to the BBC board had said is that it's just astonishing, essentially, that you've failed to implement any measures to resolve these highlights.

Speaker 11 lighted issues and in many cases don't even consider them issues at all. And as I say, this had come on top of other issues.
And so, yeah, final straw really for Tim Davey and for Deborah Turnas.

Speaker 7 You mentioned quite a few examples there. And we've also already had reaction from President Trump.
He says the BBC has corrupt journalists. Criticism from other parts of the British press.

Speaker 7 And then that comment as well from Tim Davey, his outgoing comments, these february times, it sort of just highlights how much pressure there is on the BBC now going forward to get this right.

Speaker 11 Yes, but there's also been criticism of the BBC from its friends.

Speaker 11 And I think for those who wish the BBC well, part of the danger they see is that the BBC will try and say, well, look who's making these criticisms of us.

Speaker 11 It's right-wing newspapers, it's foreign politicians who don't like us very much.

Speaker 11 But I think the sort of true friends of the BBC would say that it doesn't matter who the criticism is coming from to some extent.

Speaker 11 You do have to address some of the very serious underlying issues that have been raised here.

Speaker 11 And very important to remember, Anchor, that critically, these damning reports about the BBC's coverage, I think particularly of its coverage of Israel and Gaza and Hamas, have not come from outside the BBC.

Speaker 11 They were from a senior BBC journalist responding to criticisms about several issues, including that one, but others too.

Speaker 7 How damaging is this to the trusted brand which the BBC prides itself on?

Speaker 11 Well, it's undoubtedly damaging, and that will be the BBC's first priority: to restore its reputation for not just impartiality and balance, but I think rather critically here, competence, right?

Speaker 11 Because a lot of this criticism is

Speaker 11 not so much about this idea that the BBC is biased, it's not properly impartial, but just that all sorts of mistakes have been made.

Speaker 11 So, that will be task number one for the BBC domestically here in the UK, but around the world.

Speaker 11 But the point is that they will be doing this against you know a background of tremendous political pressure principally here in the UK with politicians saying look the BBC needs to do better so I think all sorts of questions going to be raised about its funding and how it's regulated the one bit of good news for the BBC dare I say at anchor amidst all this is that while there's been some pretty ferocious criticism of the BBC from politicians here and around the world, politicians here, you know, whether they're left, right or centre, think that by and large, the BBC is a national and international asset and don't want to see it fail.

Speaker 7 Rob Watson. Activists in Afghanistan say the Taliban authorities have ordered women to wear burqas to be allowed into hospitals and government offices in the western city of Herat.

Speaker 7 The medical charity MSF says such restrictions often mean care is delayed or refused.

Speaker 7 Rebecca Kesby has been speaking to Zahra Joya, an Afghan journalist and women's rights activist now based in London. This is what she's been hearing from Herod.

Speaker 8 The Maority police of the Taliban, they are in front of the central hospital in Herod. So my colleagues, one of them, was there.

Speaker 8 And then we received a lot of videos showing that the Taliban Majority Police do not allow the women who don't have worker to enter the hospital. The Taliban Majority Police, they whipped them.

Speaker 12 They whipped them.

Speaker 8 Yes. Very brutal treatment that the Taliban are doing against those women that they need to have access to the medical services.

Speaker 12 And women of your age were spared this for many years after the American-led invasion.

Speaker 12 Of course, people will be familiar with seeing the pictures of the burqa being widely enforced across Afghanistan in the 1990s when the Taliban were first in power.

Speaker 12 Just on the issue of the access to medical help, though, this is an ongoing problem for women in Afghanistan, isn't it? Because women have been banned from working.

Speaker 12 They can't study as doctors or I believe nurses as well. What kind of healthcare problems are women in Afghanistan having at the moment?

Speaker 8 So there are lots of restrictions. First of all, when women go into hospital in different provinces of Afghanistan, they have to go with a male chaperone, otherwise they are not allowed.

Speaker 8 And the second thing now started from Herod, although it is happening in Kandahar and other programs of Afghanistan.

Speaker 8 But in Herod, this recently the women are resisting and they are trying to argue with the Taliban that this is not the right way.

Speaker 8 They can't wear burqa because this is not the way that they are covering themselves. And also, there is a gender segregation for the women.
Basically, all the staff in hospital should be women.

Speaker 8 Female doctors should visit women, and otherwise, it is not possible.

Speaker 12 So, traditionally, women would prefer to see a female doctor. I think that's the case in lots of countries.

Speaker 12 But if women aren't allowed to be doctors anymore, the women now have to go to a male doctor.

Speaker 8 Before, like in Kabul, I have seen many times that when there was some emergency, men doctors could visit women. So, it was not that much restriction.
But now, it's completely forbidden.

Speaker 8 Even if women are dying.

Speaker 12 So a woman can't be treated by a male doctor, but at the same time there are no female doctors. So women are just going without any sort of medical care.

Speaker 8 So this is the problem. The restriction is so deep.
The pressure that the Taliban are putting on the women is so deep.

Speaker 8 And it is something like we never seen like this in other Islamic countries, in other conservative society like this, that we are seeing in Afghanistan under the Taliban regime now.

Speaker 8 Today, the Doctors Without Borders issued a statement which says that after this restriction from the Taliban and Herod, the women visitors to the hospital is now reduced. We have no choice.

Speaker 8 I mean, women in Afghanistan have to accept it because they can't raise their voice and nobody cares.

Speaker 7 Zara Joya, who is speaking to Rebecca Kesby.

Speaker 7 Leaders in Johannesburg are pushing to reclaim the city as it prepares to host the first ever G twenty summit on the African continent later this month.

Speaker 7 Earlier this year, South Africa's President Sir Ramaposa demanded Johannesburg take action to address the spread of squalid residential buildings, many of which have been hijacked by criminal gangs.

Speaker 7 Despite the city's claim to be cracking down on crime, one former hijacker has told the BBC how gangs have bribed city officials and police to maintain their control of the blocks, as Ayanda Charlie reports.

Speaker 4 Welcome to Vanencourt, a residential building in central Johannesburg.

Speaker 4 One young resident gives us a tour.

Speaker 4 On paper, this block is owned by the council, but illegal networks of so-called hijackers have sprung up, collecting rent in their place, as 300 or so residents are left to endure squalid conditions.

Speaker 4 As we descend towards the underground car park, an overwhelming stench rises to meet us.

Speaker 15 That's the smell.

Speaker 4 Abandoned cars are visible, partly submerged in a growing lake of human feces.

Speaker 1 They should be taken, turned into living accommodation.

Speaker 4 Earlier this year, South African President Syril Ramaphosa urged the city to seize back abandoned buildings. But we have located at least 102 derelict and abandoned buildings in the inner city alone.

Speaker 4 So what prevents the city from cleaning up these buildings? We're on our way right now to meet a man who says that he used to be a building hijacker.

Speaker 4 He's agreed to speak with us on condition that we hide his identity.

Speaker 4 I ask him how he and his associates would avoid eviction. He's been voiced by an actor.

Speaker 17 Having a good relationship with city council and police is a matter of cash. If you don't take the cash, he must die.

Speaker 17 Some other time they can bring your kids back from school to your home and watch you in your eyes and tell you that, buddy, don't think this is the end. This is the start.

Speaker 4 You were involved in the drug trade.

Speaker 6 You were involved in hijacking buildings.

Speaker 4 You did cause misery to a lot of people.

Speaker 4 How do you feel about that?

Speaker 17 It's a pain to me because people died in these buildings. People went missing.
I'm sorry for the wrong path in my life.

Speaker 4 He has since left criminality behind.

Speaker 4 The Johannesburg police did not respond to the hijackers' claims, but we put the allegations of corruption and intimidation of officials to city spokesperson Ntatisi Modingwani.

Speaker 19 In our investigation thus far, we have not had any credible reports that seem to suggest that there might be any wrongdoing.

Speaker 19 Yes, some of the buildings are scary, to say the least, but we will intensify our operations.

Speaker 4 The sheriff for Johannesburg Central, Marks Mangaba, is responsible for carrying out legal evictions.

Speaker 4 He invites us to observe one.

Speaker 6 Morning, sir.

Speaker 17 Are you alone?

Speaker 4 This operation, however, isn't meant to remove hijackers. Instead, it's a single private tenant who has not paid rent from a well-maintained building.

Speaker 13 We're gonna go downstairs where your things will be safeguarded by yourself now.

Speaker 4 This apartment is stripped by the sheriff's team, and the resident is removed in 20 minutes.

Speaker 4 We know that there are many buildings in which people are occupying it who might be hijacking it and not paying. Why aren't you doing this at a bigger scale?

Speaker 13 Unfortunately, it's a question of a budget. This is a very costly exercise.

Speaker 4 The evicted tenant is left on the street with his belongings.

Speaker 4 In the face of such financial hurdles and gang resistance, President Ramaposa's call to clean up the city ahead of the G20 summit feels to many like a hollow appeal.

Speaker 7 Coming up on this episode:

Speaker 7 Red kite chicks are sent from Britain to help the survival of the species in Spain.

Speaker 20 If you've got a move coming up, you really need to look into United Van Lines, the do-it-all moving specialists. With United Van Lines, you don't worry about a thing.

Speaker 20 You have a dedicated moving coordinator, qualified drivers, and full value protection for your possessions.

Speaker 20 Compare that to a couple of dudes manhandling your family heirlooms or cramming your things in a container on your driveway. Rather than hope for the best, you deserve a hassle-free move.

Speaker 20 Visit UnitedVanlines.com. Big moves, small moves, all moves.
Easy choice.

Speaker 22 No, it's not too soon to start holiday shopping. Ulta Beauty's early Black Friday event is happening now through November 22nd.
Shop $10 beauty minis from brands like Mac and Too Faced.

Speaker 22 Take 30% off Lancome and Touchland Fragrances and Body Mists. With new offers dropping every week, our associates can help you find the perfect gifts.

Speaker 22 Head into Ulta Beauty today to shop our early Black Friday event, Ulta Beauty. Gifting happens here.

Speaker 6 Tires matter. They're the only part of your vehicle that touches the road, and they're responsible for so much.
Acceleration, braking, steering, and handling.

Speaker 6 Tread confidently with new tires from Tire Rack. Whether you're looking for expert recommendations or know exactly what you want, Tire Rack makes it easy.

Speaker 6 You'll get fast, free shipping, free road hazard protection, and convenient installation options. Try mobile installation.
They'll bring your new tires to your home or office and install them on site.

Speaker 6 Tire Rack has the best selection of of tires from world-class brands and they don't just sell tires, they test them on the road and on their test track.

Speaker 6 Learn how the tires you want tackle evasive maneuvers, drive and stop in the rain, or just handle your everyday commute.

Speaker 6 Go to tirerack.com to see their tire test results, tire ratings, and consumer reviews. And be sure to check out all the current special offers.

Speaker 6 That's tirerack.com, tirerack.com, the way tire buying should be.

Speaker 14 With markets changing and living costs rising, finding a reliable place to grow your money matters now more than ever.

Speaker 14 With the WealthFront cash account, your uninvested money earns a 3.5% APY, which is higher than the average savings rate.

Speaker 14 There are no account fees or minimums, and you also get free instant withdrawals to eligible accounts 24-7. So you always have access to your money when you need it.

Speaker 14 And when you're ready to invest, you can transfer your cash to one of WealthFront's expert-built portfolios in just minutes.

Speaker 14 More than 1 million people already use Wealthfront to save and build long-term wealth with confidence. Get started today at Wealthfront.com.

Speaker 14 Cash account offered by Wealthfront Brokerage LLC, member FINRA SIPC. Wealthfront Brokerage is not a bank.

Speaker 14 Annual percentage yield on deposits as of November 7th, 2025 is representative, subject to change, and requires no minimum. The cash account is not a bank account.

Speaker 14 Funds are swept to program banks where they earn the variable APY.

Speaker 7 The Philippines has been hit by more than 20 tropical storms this year. Around 1 million people were evacuated ahead of the latest typhoon Fung Wong, which is now over the South China Sea.

Speaker 7 The typhoon lost some of its energy as it traveled across the Philippines, but it has caused damage, even if it's not as extensive as was feared.

Speaker 7 Our Southeast Asia correspondent, Jonathan Head, spoke to me from Luzon Island in the north of the Philippines.

Speaker 1 Well, it's not as bad as many people expected. I mean, the peak of the typhoon was in the middle of the night.
That's when the eye of the typhoon passed over the area I'm in now.

Speaker 1 I'm in a place called Cabanatuan City, which is in eastern Luzon.

Speaker 1 And at that point, the winds were very, very strong. You couldn't go out into the street because of the amount of debris flying around.
There were just...

Speaker 1 horizontal sheets of rain, huge amounts of water being dropped. Now, this morning, the wind has dropped quite a lot.
The storm has now passed over.

Speaker 1 Luzon, the main island in the Philippines, is now out in the South China Sea. It's still pretty windy.
There's an awful lot of water around. The rivers are very high.

Speaker 1 Some communities close to the river we've seen are underwater and flooded. But people were pretty well prepared.
Almost everyone in a vulnerable area took themselves off to an evacuation centre.

Speaker 1 So we've seen people coming back to look at the sort of the poorer neighborhoods where the houses are very flimsy.

Speaker 1 And some of those houses have definitely suffered quite a bit of damage, but they're made of very, very flimsy materials. But we're not seeing much other damage.

Speaker 1 Now, there are a number of communities on the island of Luzon which are completely cut off at the moment because

Speaker 1 bridges over rivers have been basically overwhelmed by the water. So it's not clear what's happened there.
We've still got to get full reports from quite a lot of parts of this main island.

Speaker 1 Also, power is down, which means mobile phone reception is down.

Speaker 1 It may take a while before we've really got a full sense of the damage, but where reports are coming in, people seem to have got through the night fine. They took shelter when they needed to.

Speaker 1 The rain was tremendous, but the winds were not as strong as they've been in some typhoons, and the damage is not as severe as the authorities feared.

Speaker 1 What there will be is an enormously difficult clean-up operation. There's just so much debris everywhere, broken tree branches, signposts, bits of timber.
They're all over the place.

Speaker 1 But we've not heard of any damage that comes close to what was experienced in the central Philippines last week when they suffered flash floods.

Speaker 1 Now with the amounts of rain that have fallen, the big worry now is landslides. This is a very mountainous area.

Speaker 1 They often suffer landslides, and once you've got those huge amounts of water being absorbed into the soil, these are deforested mountains as well, so they tend to be unstable.

Speaker 1 Landslides can occur sort of 48, 72 hours afterwards. That will be what people will be watching out for.

Speaker 1 But I suspect given the size of this storm, and it quite literally blanketed the entire country, it was about the size of Western Europe.

Speaker 1 I think the authorities will probably feel that they got off fairly lightly.

Speaker 7 Jonathan Head reporting.

Speaker 7 It's been a year since an Indian woman, Hashita Brella, was found dead in the boot of a car in London.

Speaker 7 Her husband, Pankaj Lamba, also an Indian national, is charged by Northampton police with her murder. Mr.
Lumba fled to India soon after the killing and is yet to be caught.

Speaker 7 Speaking with our South Asia correspondent Yogita Limai in Delhi, Hashda's family say they're disappointed and saddened by the lack of progress in her case.

Speaker 23 I'm on my way to meet the family of Harshita Brella. They live in an area in the southwest of Delhi.
They've got a home which is in bustling narrow lanes. It's a two-story structure.

Speaker 23 It's quite bare and sparsely decorated from inside. They're a middle-class Indian family.

Speaker 23 Over the past year, they've gone from pillar to post, from one court in India to another, from one police station to another, in search of justice for Harshita.

Speaker 23 And I'm going to be speaking now to her father, Sadbir Singh Brella, her sister Sonia,

Speaker 23 and her mother, Sudesh Kumari.

Speaker 23 Harshita's mother tells us not a moment goes by when she doesn't think of her daughter. She shows us the shoes she's wearing.

Speaker 23 They're Harshita's,

Speaker 23 among her possessions, which were returned to her family by UK officials a few months ago.

Speaker 25 Neither the UK government nor the Indian government are doing anything. My daughter should get justice.
Only then will I feel at peace.

Speaker 23 Two months before Harshita was killed, she had filed a domestic abuse complaint against Pankaj in the UK.

Speaker 23 The Northamptonshire police had arrested him and he was later released on bail. An investigation is underway to determine if the police had been negligent in following up.

Speaker 23 Harshita's sister Sonia says they were.

Speaker 3 We are very disappointed with the UK police because we feel like because she was not a UK citizen, that's why they're not taking the case seriously. And now the Delhi police are also being negligent.

Speaker 3 Why have they not caught him so so far?

Speaker 23 The Northamptonshire Police didn't respond to our questions but stated that Pankaj was charged with murder in March 2025 and that Indian authorities have been made aware of this decision.

Speaker 23 The police here in Delhi didn't comment on whether they've been informed of the UK charges, but say they've investigated Pankaj and his family on a separate complaint filed in India and have issued notices offering a reward for information about Pankaj.

Speaker 23 We've driven roughly two hours from the capital Delhi to come to the state of Haryana to Pankaj Lamba's village Dharoli.

Speaker 23 Pankaj has of course been charged in the UK with murder, rape and sexual assault.

Speaker 23 But his family here in India, Pankaj, his parents, his sister and two other relatives have been charged, accused of dowry harassment. We've come to his home.

Speaker 23 It's a single-story rural home which was being painted when we walked in. We actually did go in and we managed to see his father and his mother.

Speaker 23 They didn't want to do an interview with us, but we asked them about the charges that their son is facing in the UK and the charges against them here in India.

Speaker 23 They say their son is innocent. They say they're innocent.

Speaker 23 They say these are all false cases that have been made against them and then they've spent the last year facing a lot of difficulties because of that.

Speaker 23 They say they haven't seen or spoken to Pankaj in a year and their last communication with them was over the phone in the UK on the same day that Harsita's family last had communication with her.

Speaker 7 Yogita Limai

Speaker 7 Now to a successful conservation story, red kites are majestic birds of prey, but they're on the brink of extinction in Spain.

Speaker 7 To tackle this, more than 100 red kite chicks have been sent from England to southwest Spain to revive the population there. This report from Catherine DaCosta.

Speaker 28 Four decades ago, red kites were extinct in most of the UK, with just a few mating pairs left in Wales.

Speaker 28 In the late 80s and early 90s, chicks from Sweden and Spain were released in the Chilterns and in Scotland in what became one of the most successful ever conservation stories in the UK.

Speaker 28 It's estimated there are now more than 6,000 pairs across the country.

Speaker 28 But while our population's thriving, the species has been nearly wiped out in southern Spain because of predators like the eagle owl, illegal poisoning by farmers and electrocution from power lines.

Speaker 28 Over the last four years, 126 chicks were collected from central England and moved to Spain, where they were fitted with a GPS backpack and tracked after they were released.

Speaker 28 Only a quarter of them have survived, but there is hope. There are now three mating pairs, and with more birds due to begin breeding next year, it's expected those numbers will multiply.

Speaker 7 Now, finally, if you're planning a holiday and come across an offer for three days of free travel, accommodation, and food, you probably leap at the chance, right? But there is a catch.

Speaker 18 Shh!

Speaker 7 You have to stay very, very quiet. It's part of a Swedish campaign to promote calm reflection.
The newsroom Stephanie Zachrasson has the details.

Speaker 21 In the heart of the forest, surrounded by trees that have turned red and yellow in the crisp Swedish autumn, Josefin Nudlund steps into a small wooden cabin.

Speaker 21 On the door handle hangs a sign with the words, stay quiet, the challenge for anyone spending a few days here.

Speaker 21 She's the project manager for Visit Skwana, the county's tourism agency, and she shows how the guests will be monitored by a small sound-level level meter that's constantly sending updates.

Speaker 21 You're not allowed to make noise louder than 45 dazebels which is about the level in a library or a quiet soft spoken conversation.

Speaker 21 If you fail you'll receive a text message instructing you to check out in the morning.

Speaker 21 The idea is to push visitors to make the most of the calm and tranquility found in the woods to enjoy the quiet moments and the closeness to nature.

Speaker 21 German sisters Lisa and Johanna took on the challenge and spoke to Swedish TV just before they moved in.

Speaker 15 Now I'm very grateful to just breathe in, breathe out, and come to myself, reconnect with myself, with nature. Do you think you will be able to relax knowing that you're supervised?

Speaker 4 I think it's actually more like an advantage because then you really are focused because we don't want to fail this, of course.

Speaker 15 Do you think you will be able to stay quiet for three days?

Speaker 18 I think we're going to begin.

Speaker 5 I think a big challenge will be not to sing. We have a very magician family.

Speaker 18 Quiet,

Speaker 18 if it is.

Speaker 21 Well, after three days, how did it go? The sisters said it actually wasn't that hard once they got used to the silence and that it helped them slow down and find a sense of peace.

Speaker 21 A sentiment echoed by some of the other visitors. Here's Laura and Matz from Denmark.

Speaker 30 We had to do a fire ourselves in the forest and of course we know what a fire sounds like but just to hear it with all the other nature sounds and like don't talk while we did it was kind of special and very relaxing.

Speaker 19 We felt a little bit like alone in the wilderness.

Speaker 21 The guests have spent their time exploring the forest, crafting, reading, and watching the night sky through the roof window.

Speaker 21 And so far, none of the visitors have been kicked out for failing to stay quiet.

Speaker 7 Stephanie Zacherson with that report.

Speaker 7 And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global Global News Podcast later. If you want to comment on this episode or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email.

Speaker 7 The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service, or you can use the hashtag global newspod.

Speaker 7 This edition was mixed by Russell Newlove, and the producer was Ed Horton. The editor is Karen Martin, and I'm Uncle Desai.
Until next time, goodbye.

Speaker 16 Despite wintry conditions and heavy traffic, the holidays have to go on. That's why Mercedes-Benz SUVs come equipped with the latest safety technology to keep your festive plans on track.

Speaker 16 Discover the incredible offers for yourself at the Mercedes-Benz Holiday Love Celebration.