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From Our Own Correspondent

Israel's Prime Minister in the dock

From Our Own Correspondent

BBC

News, News Commentary

4.41.3K Ratings

🗓️ 28 May 2020

⏱️ 29 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had his day in court at the start of his corruption trial this week. He denies charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust. The trial could last months or even years. Israelis are wondering what it means for their future, as Tom Bateman reports from Jerusalem.

In Zimbabwe, and in many other African countries, the numbers of confirmed Covid-19 cases are still low, not least due to swift lockdowns. But the coronavirus is not the worst threat the population faces, says Charlotte Ashton in Harare. Apart from TB, malaria and HIV, there's now hunger because the lockdown makes it hard to earn a living.

Sweden did not opt for a lockdown, deciding instead to trust residents to make their own judgements about social distancing. Shops, pubs and restaurants have been allowed to remain open, but as Maddy Savage is finding, it's quite a minefield to negotiate all the dilemmas that throws up.

Capoeira, a martial art with elements of dance and acrobatics, originated among enslaved Africans in Brazil. Now it has travelled eleven time zones east to Siberia's lake Baikal region in Russia. It means a lot more than exercise to the young locals there, as Olga Smirnova has been finding out. But how have they done under lockdown?

Malta is home to the second oldest stone buildings in the world, 5000-year old temples. The people who built them are something of a mystery but new research on elongated skulls from that time may be about to lay to rest some of the wilder theories about their origins – or are they, asks Juliet Rix.

Presenter: Kate Adie Producer: Arlene Gregorius

Transcript

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0:00.0

BBC Sounds, music, radio podcasts.

0:05.0

Good morning.

0:06.1

Today across the world, our correspondence

0:08.8

find that everyday life has been affected

0:11.0

in myriad ways by the pandemic as we hear from Zimbabwe and the impact of their

0:16.2

lockdown. While in Sweden we try going to the pub always daunting to visitors because of the

0:22.0

prices but now it's also a bit of an obstacle course.

0:26.0

In remotest Siberia, it's the martial arts groups which are struggling under lockdown,

0:31.4

and then we have a virus-free excursion into the past as we investigate

0:36.2

elongated skulls in Malta's ancient temples.

0:40.2

First to a Prime Minister in Trouble in Israel.

0:45.0

Benjamin Netanyahu has had his day in court this week at the start of his corruption trial, charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust. He had tried to get the whole process put

0:56.2

off but was eventually compelled by judges to appear in a process which might last months or even years.

1:03.7

Tom Batman looks at what this means for the future.

1:07.4

Some criminal defendants come into court in handcuffs.

1:11.0

Benjamin Netanyahu came with his own podium. It was placed in the courthouse corridor minutes ahead of his hearing.

1:18.0

Some suspects get a pat-down by the security before they go in along with a good chunk of the

1:28.8

government of Israel. Flanked by ministers in suits and surgical masks, he dissected the legal establishment,

1:36.4

lashing out at police, prosecutors and the press.

1:40.3

Netagnahu fans watched on live TV as his voice blared from speakers held by some outside the court.

1:47.0

They're trying to frame me, he declared.

1:50.0

His fist hit the podium.

...

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