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00:18Hello and welcome to Global Eye from the BBC World Service. Over the next half hour we'll
00:24be bringing you our very best in investigative journalism and reportage. I'm Katya Adler,
00:29the BBC's Europe editor, and I'm in Greenland to take a look at why Donald Trump is so keen
00:35to take control over this remote arctic island. The US president's threat to take Greenland by
00:42force has subsided for now, though the details of a deal still need to be negotiated. Is the
00:49row another sign that the transatlantic alliance that's defined geopolitics for over a century
00:54is under threat like never before. Later in the program we'll bring you an investigation into
01:01wide-scale abuse by Russia and other countries of Interpol, the body that helps police forces
01:07around the world share intelligence and chase international fugitives. We've been given exclusive
01:12access to leaked documents which suggest Russia is using Interpol to oppress government critics abroad.
01:34We also take a look at Bosnia-Herzegovina, a country scarred by horrific war, but where
01:40peace has held now for 30 years. We'll look at what lessons Europe can learn and examine the impact of
01:46past conflict on a young generation ready to move past old divides.
01:54Greenland is a land of extremes. Extreme cold, extreme distance from global economic centres and
02:00now extreme geopolitical significance. It is an island of ice, the biggest island in the world,
02:07though the population is pretty small here at under 60,000. The island was first inhabited by
02:14Norsemen in the Middle Ages and when they died out Inuit communities came here from North America.
02:20The Danes colonized this island in the 18th century but since 1979 it became a semi-autonomous territory
02:28with Copenhagen maintaining control over Greenland's security, defence and foreign policy.
02:34In World War II, Greenland became a strategic outpost for US military bases and it increased
02:41in importance during the Cold War when America and Russia faced off against each other here in the
02:47Arctic. After the collapse of the Soviet Union though, Greenland faded in significance. Its vast
02:54natural resources lay untapped and trapped under the ice sheet here. But now, Donald Trump. He's put
03:02Greenland back in the crosshairs of global politics. We need Greenland for national security very badly.
03:09If we don't have it, we have a big hole in national security. But why? What's so special about the
03:15Arctic island? Well, as the polar ice melts, potential new shipping routes have opened up, which have
03:22raised the prospect of new economic opportunities in the Arctic. And new military vulnerabilities. The US,
03:30Russia and increasingly China have been exploring their options in the Arctic in an attempt to exploit
03:35these new opportunities and try to prevent others from doing so. So Greenland, with its untapped mineral
03:42wealth now potentially more accessible, and with its historic economic and military ties to the US,
03:48has become a tempting prize for Donald Trump. They have a huge resource in rare earths. They tend to have
03:55relatively higher proportion of heavy rare earths, which are the most interesting and valuable ones.
04:01The challenge with these rare earth deposits, however, is the mineralogy. I mean, it doesn't
04:06mean it's impossible, but clearly there needs to be done some research. Donald Trump insists there's no
04:11economic motive for his need for Greenland, though. There's so much rare earth, and this to get to this
04:18rare earth. You got to go through hundreds of feet of ice. That's not the reason we need it. We
04:25need it for
04:27strategic national security and international security. This is consistent with a new doctrine
04:34in foreign policy that's come to define Donald Trump's second term in office. The US president
04:40believes that America should be able to influence what's going on in its own backyard, its sphere of
04:45influence, if you like. And that's what led to the Trump administration's military operation in
04:53Venezuela and threatening of Cuba, of Mexico and of Greenland, which politically is part of Europe,
05:00as part of Denmark, but geographically is in North America. This new doctrine is a total rejection of the
05:08cooperative global order that came into being after World War II, and that's symbolized by the United
05:14Nations, for example, or NATO, and it has really worried America's traditional allies. It seems that
05:22every day we're reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry, that the rules-based order is
05:31fading, that the strong can do what they can and the weak must suffer what they must. So is the
05:40Atlantic
05:40alliance in trouble? It's certainly being tested like never before. Donald Trump's attitude to international
05:47relations differs from that of his predecessors going back over a century. But although there is a powerful
05:53strain of American isolationism within the Republican Party, there are many powerful figures in Trump's circle
06:00who wish to maintain a strong alliance with Europe. After the symbolic deployment of a handful of European
06:06troops to Greenland recently, and threats and counter threats of steep tariffs on transatlantic trade,
06:12a deal is now being worked on to agree an increased U.S. presence on the island.
06:17Now it's a great deal for everybody. Is it possible that Donald Trump's sabre-rattling was all just a bit
06:22of Trumpian deal-making? But the row following on from previous transatlantic disagreements over Ukraine,
06:31tariffs, NATO and Russian expansionism has delivered yet another blow to the alliance.
06:37Donald Trump won't be president forever. Europe's leaders are hoping the post-World War II order isn't
06:44gone for good, though in this evolving world of big power politics with the U.S., China, Russia,
06:50India and more jostling with one another on the global stage, it's hard to see how Europe-U.S. relations
06:57go back to what they were before. Now to an exclusive investigation. For around 100 years,
07:06Interpol has helped countries track criminals around the world. Its strengths lie in sharing
07:12information and triggering alerts that can lead to arrests across borders. But BBCI has received leaks
07:19of files from within the organization suggesting large-scale abuse of its systems by autocratic regimes like Russia.
07:27With the war raging in Ukraine, allegations are being made that Interpol's information is being used
07:33to carry out repression beyond Russia's borders.
07:45Well, 2013, 2012, I didn't feel any pressure.
07:56I was a lot of opinions about the government.
08:01I experienced that Interpol's flight, already voted three people for their expertise.
08:03I would say that Putin is a crime ofæ», but you should have a far more
08:08It was always a crime of a crime, but it is a crime that Putin is a crime.
08:09But then I started feeling that there was a crime.
08:11But I did not feel that the government of saving resolution.
08:11That's what people realized that there was a crime in Ukraine.
08:14It was a single-house in Vancouver place for the people of the people of Ukraine.
08:16and when I decided to leave her.
08:22Eugene Lavrenchuk is a renowned Ukrainian director
08:25who ran a theatre company in Moscow until 2014.
08:32A few years after leaving Russia,
08:34he found himself on Interpol's wanted list.
08:38At the end of 2021,
08:40during what seemed like a routine business trip,
08:43Eugene was taken into custody.
08:46In Lviv, in Lviv, through Neapol,
08:50there was a passport control.
08:53And they stopped me there.
08:56Someone came to me,
08:58who owned an English language,
09:00and in Google, in the program,
09:02it was a terrible thing,
09:04that was just the key words.
09:06He was arrested, he was arrested,
09:08he was arrested, we don't know anything.
09:10And you will know if it will be a court.
09:12Eugene was arrested under what's known as
09:15an Interpol wanted defusion.
09:17It's a request from one country to another
09:19to detain an individual.
09:21Russia accused him of multiple counts of fraud
09:24and said that he was on the run.
09:26There is no truth in me.
09:35Russia alleged that Eugene had encouraged students
09:38to take out loans to help pay for repairs to his theater.
09:41It said these loans had not been repaid.
09:51Eugene believes the charges were a ruse,
09:54cover for his persecution.
09:56Within three weeks of his arrest,
09:58Interpol canceled the defusion notice against Eugene.
10:03But Russia then submitted a formal extradition request to Italy,
10:06keeping him behind bars.
10:09To support the arrested in Italy,
10:11the director of Eugene Levernchuk
10:12was sent to the Ukrainians to the heart of Milan.
10:15In these circumstances, it's a certain stress.
10:17And Eugene, it's all right, no one extradition.
10:20Why is this a dangerous threat to this extradition in Russia?
10:27Three months later, after Russia's invasion of Ukraine,
10:31Italy's Court of Appeals ordered Eugene's release.
10:57It's hard to tell which cases are genuine
11:00and which target innocent people.
11:03Like Italy, Interpol didn't take a view
11:05on the criminal case against Eugene,
11:07but canceled Russia's request because of doubts raised
11:10over whether it was politically motivated.
11:13Why did Interpol feel that it couldn't trust Russia?
11:17Interpol aren't the global police.
11:20Instead, they act as a go-between for police forces,
11:23like a giant messaging system.
11:25A country has different ways to target someone through Interpol.
11:28It can issue a red diffusion, like the one for Eugene,
11:32this is sent directly between individual countries
11:35and asks them to locate and provisionally arrest a person.
11:40It can also ask Interpol to publish what is known as a red notice,
11:45alerting all member states to do the same.
11:48Interpol has multiple safeguards to prevent abuse of its system.
11:51One of these is the Commission for the Control of Interpol's files,
11:55known as the CCF.
11:57It's an independent body within Interpol
12:00which reviews complaints from those already subject to notices
12:03or diffusions to decide if they're legitimate.
12:08But critics warn that even with these measures, cases still slip through
12:13and some countries use Interpol to target journalists, activists
12:17and people caught in business disputes.
12:21For years, Interpol has been accused of being opaque,
12:24only releasing the most basic data about its red notices and diffusions.
12:30But now, for the first time,
12:32someone from inside the organisation has decided to provide evidence
12:36of how Interpol works and which countries are misusing its systems.
12:41We disguise their voice and identity.
12:44I've been working for Interpol for quite a while now.
12:47I won't say where.
12:48They claim to be transparent, but that's just not true.
12:52Everything is on a need-to-know basis,
12:54which sometimes is a bit ridiculous because it creates problems.
12:59For over a year, the BBC has been working with journalists
13:02at the French outlet Disclose.
13:05There you go.
13:06The source approached us with the documents
13:09after seeing how little transparency there was inside the organisation.
13:13There are statistics that are provided internally and they have an idea.
13:19That's why they put countries under restrictions, to prevent misuse.
13:24Interpol can impose corrective measures on countries,
13:27adding extra checks to their red notices and diffusions.
13:32This isn't usually made public, but in March 2022,
13:35Interpol confirmed Russia was under such restrictions
13:38because of the war in Ukraine.
13:40I think they want to stay neutral.
13:41They say we don't do politics.
13:44We don't put countries in the spotlight.
13:46I think in the case of Russia, they also didn't want to say,
13:51but they felt they just had to.
13:55The source gave us a list of complaints from those on Interpol's wanted list
13:58that had been reviewed by the CCF.
14:02Where the issuing country is known, Russia has the highest number of complaints
14:06about its red notices and diffusions.
14:09This has been the case for the last 11 years.
14:14And Russia also tops the list for red notices and diffusions overturned.
14:20Over half are subsequently cancelled for breaking Interpol rules.
14:31The BBC tracked down some of the individuals on the list.
14:35People who have been targeted by Russian red notices and diffusions,
14:39which were later found to have breached Interpol's rules.
14:43Individuals like Igor Pestrikov, a Russian businessman,
14:46now living in exile in the south of France.
14:48The life with red notices of Interpol, if you're a terrorist like Kusama Bin Laden,
14:54it's okay for you, because everything is ready for you.
14:57If you're a good-worthy citizen, it's on the ground of suicide.
15:04Solikamski Magniivy Zavod –
15:06a sovereign manufacturer of strategic metals for the Russian industry.
15:10Igor was once a major shareholder in Russia's rare earth metal industry.
15:15In the months leading up to the invasion of Ukraine,
15:18Igor says he was asked to stop selling abroad and supply only the Russian market.
15:23He knew this meant his products could end up in military hardware.
15:27Well, I was against such a position,
15:31that selling is cheaper, selling to those who the government says.
15:35It was not only a question of business, it was a moral question.
15:38Everyone understood that no one wanted to participate,
15:41even personally, in the production of something that kills people.
15:48Igor says his refusal and the fact that he had a Ukrainian wife
15:51led to his companies being nationalized
15:53and to him being investigated for financial crimes.
15:56He fled Russia in 2022 and applied for asylum in France.
16:10Despite being in France, Igor worried he could still be a target.
16:15He contacted Interpol and was told that Moscow had issued a red diffusion against him.
16:20This was despite the organization announcing there would be tougher checks on Russia
16:24following the invasion of Ukraine.
16:27He decided to challenge the diffusion through the CCF, arguing it was politically motivated.
16:49In spring 2024, after spending almost two years on the wanted list,
16:54the CCF ruled Igor's case was predominantly political.
16:58They said that the information provided by Russia was generic and formulaic,
17:03and there had been an inadequate explanation of the alleged crime.
17:07Although the diffusion had been lifted,
17:09Igor says being on the wanted list had turned his life upside down.
17:54So does Interpol realize it has a problem?
17:58Publicly, it says that the checks and balances introduced over the years have solved many issues.
18:06But the BBC has obtained another batch of documents,
18:09which includes confidential memos and emails between executive bodies within Interpol.
18:15These include reports showing statistics for how many Russian notices and diffusions
18:20passed initial checks in 2024.
18:23Despite stricter checks on Russia, Interpol initially approved approximately 90% of its requests.
18:30And yet, the reports show that when the CCF were reviewing complaints about Russia's requests,
18:35they were still overturning roughly half for breaking the rules.
18:40One also notes that Interpol has expressed to Russia
18:43serious concerns about the willful misuse of Interpol's systems,
18:48stating that there were instances of flagrant violations of its rules.
18:53So what is Interpol's response,
18:56after years of abuse by Russia and the failure of its safeguards to stop it?
19:01In a surprising move, our source told us there's evidence that Interpol has weakened some of its
19:07restrictions against Russia.
19:09I was surprised when I learned that it had been casually announced in a team meeting.
19:12I later found out that it likely happened months ago.
19:15Again, it's just a total lack of transparency.
19:19Why do people need to forgive and sympathize your stories?
19:24Why?
19:25No, of course they should not.
19:27They should not be happy that they were not in the situation, in which I was.
19:30They should be happy that they could be able to go to the street,
19:33but they could be able to go to the street,
19:35and they could be able to go to the street,
19:37because they were in the interest of Interpol.
19:51In response to our investigation, Interpol said…
19:55And it's been threatening also it can mean to be a one-種.
20:43This week on the World Service, BBC Persian has continued to track and report on the protests
20:48that broke out in Iran last month.
20:50It's incredibly difficult to report on the country and to verify the scarce videos
20:55that are able to be seen by the world.
20:58Here's Gonshay Habib Yazad, a reporter from BBC Persian,
21:01to tell us more about how she and her team have been bringing Iranian stories to a global audience.
21:09BBC Persian journalists like me face serious threats from Iranian authorities
21:13that can go beyond Iran's borders.
21:16Our families in Iran have been subjected to ongoing intimidation and pressure.
21:21We are not permitted to report from inside Iran,
21:24so we rely on material sent to us directly by Iranians, as well as monitoring social media.
21:29The continuing internet blackout in Iran means less new material is being shared.
21:35The 8th and 9th January saw exceptionally large crowds flood the streets across the country.
21:40This followed a call for nationwide protest by Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of the late Shah.
21:46Iran's streets were set alight during clashes with security forces, with protesters chanting slogans against the supreme leader
21:53and the Islamic Republic.
21:55For verification, we need to check videos to see when they were filmed.
21:59To verify these videos, I carried out reverse image searches to make sure that they are new,
22:05as sometimes old footage is reposted claiming to show something happening now.
22:10I also look for things like banners and the names of the shops written in Persian,
22:14so that I can check resources like Google Maps to make sure that they were filmed in the location claimed.
22:21We are trying to gather tributes to the dead being posted on social media,
22:26as well as videos of funerals being held for those killed during the protests.
22:30But this has also become very difficult.
22:33I have also worked with BBC Verify during these protests.
22:36Recently, we analyzed a leak of 392 photos and were able to identify 326 victims.
22:46Now to Bosnia-Herzegovina, a country once torn apart by war and ethnic strife.
22:52But remarkably, peace has endured there now for three decades.
22:56Grigor Atanazian from the BBC Russian service has been to Bosnia to hear from a new generation
23:01determined to look beyond the divisions of the past.
23:12This is the road to Banja Luka, the administrative and political center of Republika Srpska,
23:19an autonomous ethnic Serb entity in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
23:23Every year, people here come together to celebrate Serb culture and history.
23:35And to remember their heroes.
23:38Among them is a familiar and notorious face.
23:44Ratka Mladic is an ethnic Serb general now serving a life sentence for crimes against humanity
23:50during the Bosnian war in the early 1990s.
23:54It was a brutal conflict that tore this region apart.
24:04ethnic Serbs fought against Bosniaks and Croats.
24:09More than a hundred thousand people were killed.
24:12And another two million, about half the population, were displaced.
24:23The war ended in a 1995 peace deal negotiated by the United States.
24:29The presidents of Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia have reached a peace agreement to end the war
24:36in Bosnia.
24:41This created modern-day Bosnia-Herzegovina, a country with two autonomous entities.
24:48The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where mostly Bosniaks and Croats live, and the ethnic Serb Republika Srpska.
24:59The peace deal still holds to this day, but it's deeply resented by many ethnic Serbs and
25:05their political leaders, who talk about breaking away from Bosnia.
25:11Bosnia-Herzegovina is the most powerful politician in the Republic of Srpska and leader of the ruling party.
25:19Bosnia-Herzegovina is the most powerful country in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
25:23It is created by an agreement.
25:26The agreement is from the three-stories of the parties, and the first of the Clinton administration.
25:32It was not the best of the nation, but the best of the nation.
25:37We are united in Bosnia-Herzegovina in Bosnia-Herzegovina,
25:40where the Republic of Srpska and the Republic of Srpska are united with their rights,
25:44and they want to return the rights.
25:47But not everyone feels the same.
25:51In Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bosniak Muslims, Serbs and Croats live side-by-side.
26:03Mr. Dorik is not a popular figure here in the Federation.
26:09Ramo Isak is the minister of the interior of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina.
26:15He opposes Dodik's plan to divide the country.
26:18He opposes Dodik's plan to divide the country.
26:19Bosnia-Herzegovina was before Milorada.
26:22Dodik's will be and after Milorada.
26:25Bosnia-Herzegovina is a whole country, which will be managed.
26:29So nothing can be done.
26:31Nothing can be done.
26:33Bosnia-Herzegovina is a stable, strong country.
26:35Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
26:37Across the country, though, many young people live outside the ethnic divide that dominates
26:42Bosnian politics.
26:44I love that I'm Serbian.
26:46I'm proud of it.
26:47I love our history.
26:48That doesn't make me someone who will hate any other kind of nation.
26:54Nina Regoje teaches Serbian folk dances in the town of Ternovo, not far from Sarajevo.
27:02Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats all live together here too.
27:08Nina is a Serb and her friend Eldien is a Bosnia-Herzegovina.
27:12Muslim. During the war, their fathers fought on opposite sides.
27:18I don't feel any difference in that question.
27:23I don't do any difference here.
27:30For me, all are the same.
27:32It's important for me, but it's just what it needs.
27:35I have lost two of my uncles in the war.
27:40And that is some kind of personal reminder to me what is the price of the conflict.
27:47So many people and so many families were in such pain, in such anguish.
27:52Someone was a neighbor, and now I have to kill him or he will kill me.
27:57And for what? For nothing.
27:58Thirty years after the war ended, Bosnia remains at peace.
28:03And while politicians cannot agree on the country's future,
28:06many young people are clear that it shouldn't be defined by divisions of the past.
28:12Republika Srpska is my homeland.
28:15Republika Srpska is in Bosnia.
28:17So that makes Bosnia my homeland.
28:19And that's it.
28:27Thanks for joining me in Greenland.
28:30Global Eye will be back next week.
28:32Goodbye.
28:33Bye.
28:43Bye.
29:01Transcription by CastingWords
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