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

I'm Alex Ritson and at 14 hours GMT on Monday the 23rd of December, these are our main stories.

Joe Biden commutes dozens of death sentences in the United States.

Motoring giants Honda and Nissan take their first steps to merge.

And a former fighter pilot in Australia,

accused of training Chinese soldiers, faces extradition to the US. Also in this podcast.

I am also gay. Syrian gay. Yes, it exists. I am here.

What will happen with the millions of diaspora Syrians who escaped President Assad's tyranny now that the leader has left?

We start in the US, where in the last weeks of his presidency, Joe Biden has commuted the death sentences of all but three federal prisoners on death row.

37 inmates will have their sentences converted to life in prison without parole.

The other three include the Boston Marathonber and two other notorious killers,

and their execution is likely to go ahead.

The decision to commute the other sentences is likely to anger Donald Trump,

who will start his second presidential term next month.

So what's going on?

Our correspondent in Washington, Tom Bateman, told me more.

Well, on those sentences that have been commuted to life without parole,

Joe Biden said that he was driven by his conscience

and also he said his experience and his belief in abolishing the federal death penalty.

So that's why 37 men convicted of murder have been removed from death row at the federal level.

But three remain facing the death penalty.

That is because Joe Biden said he would keep an exemption for terrorism offenses and hate crimes,

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