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From Our Own Correspondent

Ukraine and the battle for the Donbas

From Our Own Correspondent

BBC

News, News Commentary

4.41.3K Ratings

🗓️ 30 August 2025

⏱️ 29 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Kate Adie presents stories from Ukraine, Greenland, the US and Germany.

Ukraine has this week come under its heaviest bombardment in weeks, with the UK and the EU summoning their Russian envoys after their offices in Kyiv were hit. Quentin Sommerville has been in Donetsk, the area Vladimir Putin wants to fully control in the resource rich region of the Donbas, as residents flee attacks and soldiers tell of the intensification of the battle there.

Greenland’s status has been thrust into the spotlight after the US president has repeatedly said he wanted to annexe the semi-autonomous nation for its strategic position and mineral wealth. And despite having broad self-government since 1979, Greenland’s foreign and defence policy is made in Copenhagen. On an island of just over 55,000 people, where fishing is the primary source of income, independence for Greenland would mean either increasing tourism or allowing the mining of minerals like rare earth metals. Bob Howard has been to the capital Nuuk.

In the US, a record number of people are being held in immigrant detention, following President Trump’s crackdown. One controversial site has become the subject of several lawsuits attempting to shut it down: Alligator Alcatraz in Florida. Josephine Casserly reports from the centre, which sits on an abandoned airstrip amid the marshes, forests, mangroves and estuaries and wildlife of the Everglades.

James Naughtie has been in the German city of Weimar, at a cultural festival in the state of Thuringia in Eastern Germany – which reflects on the historical legacy of the Weimar Republic. Among the performances and installations, he found echoes of the past in the present.

Series Producer: Serena Tarling Production Coordinator: Rosie Strawbridge Editor: Richard Vadon

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.

0:05.1

Hello, today we have a report from the front line in Ukraine.

0:10.0

Denmark summons the US top diplomat over reported attempts to influence Greenlanders on their future.

0:17.0

We're in the capital Nook to hear what the locals are saying.

0:21.0

In the US state of Florida, we traverse through alligator-infested swamps to visit a hastily built detention center in Donald Trump's immigration crackdown.

0:32.3

And finally, we're in the German state of Turingia, now a stronghold of the far-right AFD party at a cultural

0:40.0

festival in Weimar that's pushing against the tide. First, while the world seeks a path to

0:46.5

peace, Russia responds with missiles. So said the EU's top diplomat, Kayakalas, following a week in which Russia made slow but steady advances

0:56.5

in the Donbass in the country's east.

1:00.0

Donbass is the resource-rich, greater region, made up of Donetsk and Luhansk, and has long been in

1:06.6

Moscow's sights.

1:08.5

Vladimir Putin has reportedly said he'll freeze the war in return for full

1:13.5

control of Donetsk. It currently controls 70% and nearly all of Lujansk. It's believed Russia has over

1:22.2

100,000 troops now standing by, waiting to exploit another opportunity around Dobrapilia.

1:31.3

In a stark reminder of Russia's unrelenting advance, the capital Kiev has also sustained

1:37.2

heavy missile bombardment in recent days, in which more than 20 were killed and still rising,

1:43.8

and several homes destroyed.

1:47.1

The city's mayor declared a day of morning on Friday following the attacks.

1:53.4

Quentin Somerville has been in the country's east following the Russian advance in Donbass

1:59.0

and the evacuation effort underway.

2:02.7

Sometimes in this job, it's the people standing on the sidelines

2:06.3

who can tell you as much about a situation as those in the thick of it.

...

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