--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Host: This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Host: More than 1,400 people are now known to have died in the earthquake in Afghanistan. We hear from the disaster zone. And the US says it's killed 11 narco-terrorists on a boat in the Caribbean. Also in the podcast, the relatives of disappeared activists in Tanzania seeking answers from the government.
--:-- Host: If we knew where he is, or where he's being held, or even if we knew he had died and been buried somewhere, at least we'd have a grave to visit and mourn properly.
--:-- Host: And could there be a song and dance about the Irish presidency with both Bob Geldof and Michael Flatley pondering their chances?
--:-- Host: The Chinese capital Beijing has today witnessed a huge display of military might and diplomatic unity, with the leaders of China, Russia and North Korea appearing together for the first time. Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un joined forces to commemorate the 80th anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender to China.
--:-- Host: On display at the parade were giant underwater drones, nuclear missiles and a laser air defence system. Donald Trump said the three leaders were conspiring against the United States. A Kremlin aide said he hoped the US president was being ironic.
--:-- Host: Watching their commemorations in Beijing was our China correspondent Stephen McDonald.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: A huge military parade in Beijing has marked the end of the Second World War in Asia, but also allowed China to show off its military might.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: The people's liberation army revealed its latest submarine drones as well as nuclear capable missiles and laser weapons.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: The event has been criticized by those worried that such weapons could be used by this country as it flexes its muscles on the world stage.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: However, China's leader Xi Jinping delivered a message advocating what he saw as peace through strength without being specific, he also warned against allowing more conflicts to brew in the world.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: The Chinese are a people that are not afraid of violence and are self-reliant and strong.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: Today, humanity once again faces a choice between peace and war, dialogue and confrontation, mutual benefit and zero-sum outcomes.
--:-- Stephen McDonald: The Chinese people firmly stand on the right side of history.
--:-- Host: Taiwan, the self-governing island that China has threatened to take by force, criticized the parade, arguing the war was actually won by the nationalists who eventually fled to Taiwan rather than the Communist Party, which it claimed didn't contribute to the war effort.
--:-- Host: But what should we make of the huge military display in Beijing?
--:-- Host: I asked our security correspondent Frank Gardner.
--:-- Frank Gardner: There are two aspects to this. One is the visuals, the optics. It's sending a very clear message, having three leaders of nuclear-powered countries, Russia, China, North Korea, autocratic countries opposed to the West, seen there together.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And then you've got this powerful display of weaponry.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And China has embarked over the last recent few years on an extraordinary buildup of its weapons in all domains in cyber, on land and sea, in the air.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And they've been very innovative in some of their designs.
--:-- Frank Gardner: I mean, they lead the world in something called hypersonic weapons.
--:-- Frank Gardner: These are weapons that missiles that travel at more than five times the speed of sound.
--:-- Frank Gardner: So they can be, you know, in theory, if you take it to extremes, some of these could fly at two miles a second.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And these are things that I think are going to be worrying the US Navy that is still trying to retain supremacy in the Pacific Ocean.
--:-- Host: Well, how worried should the West overall be?
--:-- Host: Are the leaders of Russia, North Korea and China conspiring, as President Trump said?
--:-- Frank Gardner: I think that's just words, but there's no doubt that there is cooperation when it comes to the Ukraine war.
--:-- Frank Gardner: North Korea has done it openly, sending thousands of soldiers to help Russia push the Ukrainians out of Kursk, that small salient they were able to get into last summer, in which they did successfully push them out of there at huge cost.
--:-- Frank Gardner: UK defense reckons they lost at least 4,000 killed.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And China has been certainly supplying dual use equipment that Russia has been able to use.
--:-- Frank Gardner: So components for drones and things like that.
--:-- Frank Gardner: It always denies helping Russia's war effort, but the West certainly thinks that it has been.
--:-- Frank Gardner: For China, it's really all about trade.
--:-- Frank Gardner: But as you heard there in those words, peace comes through strength.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And they think that their best way to achieve global dominance and of course they would very much like to be the number one economy in the world, is not only to acquire huge amounts of data, but also to build up its forces.
--:-- Frank Gardner: And it wasn't that long ago that they sailed a naval flotilla around the southern edge of Australia and carried out live fire exercises very far away from China, but certainly rattling the Australians, sending a warning.
--:-- Host: Among those attending the celebrations in Beijing was Kim Jong-un's daughter, Kim Joo-ae, who travelled with her father.
--:-- Host: Another possible sign that she's been groomed to eventually succeed him as leader of North Korea.
--:-- Host: Sung Yoon Lee works at the Sejong Institute, a foreign policy think tank in South Korea.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: Kim Jong-un has been projecting this very caring, loving father image by parading around his young daughter since November 2022.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: I think she's been seen in public in more than 30 high-profile events.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: And I think that is in his interest to keep this up.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: Why? Because in projecting this image he has nothing to lose and much to gain.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: You know his image as a dictator is somewhat softened up in showing that he loves his family.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: He projecting to his adversaries primarily the United States, that, hey, we have power that I will one day turn over to my daughter or a son, one of my children.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: We're a dynasty, whereas you in a democracy, you come and go, leaders come and go via elections every four or five years.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: So you'll be soon forgotten.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: But my power is here to stay.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: And we have all the time in the world, whereas you must chalk up a policy win, a legacy within a time limit.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: And perhaps, you know, that kind of psychological operation or pressure might push the United States to resign itself to accepting North Korea as a de jure de facto nuclear weapons-possessing state.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: Hey, he's a dictator, he's cruel, but look, he obviously loves his daughter, his family.
--:-- Sung Yoon Lee: He's not crazy enough to start a nuclear war, is he?
--:-- Host: I think that is also what Kim Jong-un has in mind in frequently showing off his daughter.
--:-- Host: North Korea is unique in that it is a communist system, but one that operates in a contradictory way as a dynasty.
--:-- Host: Hereditary power has been handed down twice now, so Kim Jong-un is the third generational dictator and his messaging to the world that one day he will also turn his power down to his daughter.
--:-- Host: So, you know, that's a fact.
--:-- Host: It's an oxymoron, a communist dynasty, but it is what it is.
--:-- Host: And that kind of regime enjoys great advantage, strategic advantage vis-a-vis democracies, because North Korea shows little regard for human lives, even the lives of its own people.
--:-- Host: You know, 10,000 casualties, 100,000 battle dead, no big deal for North Korea.
--:-- Host: Whereas for the United States or any other democracy, oh, it's a very grave deal.
--:-- Host: Sung Yoon Lee there.
--:-- Host: Three days after southeastern Afghanistan was hit by a magnitude 6 earthquake, the Taliban have said that at least 1,400 people have died and more than 3,000 been injured.
--:-- Host: Yama Baris from the BBC Afghan service has been to the epicentre in Kunar province and gave us this update.
--:-- Yama Baris: When we went to much affected areas, one was Mazardera, which is Nurgal Valley.
--:-- Yama Baris: We saw a huge devastation there, although to the far-flang areas where most of the damage has happened, still the roads are closed.
--:-- Yama Baris: But to some part which we got access, we saw a complete devastation there.
--:-- Yama Baris: We went to a village.
--:-- Yama Baris: There were around 30 houses in that village, and they were all destroyed.
--:-- Yama Baris: We saw the residents.
--:-- Yama Baris: They were in open air.
--:-- Yama Baris: They had spent the night in the open air.
--:-- Yama Baris: And now they had even been, there was rain and they told me that they had to stay there.
--:-- Yama Baris: They didn't have anywhere to go.
--:-- Yama Baris: They didn't have any shelter or any roof on their head.
--:-- Yama Baris: Then we went to another part of Kurnar.
--:-- Yama Baris: We are at Devago and that was also one of the places which has been affected very badly.
--:-- Yama Baris: We were there when we felt the aftershocks ourselves.
--:-- Yama Baris: I was there, I was speaking to a family which had lost seven members and I was speaking to the head of the family there when that shock, a strong shock happened.
--:-- Yama Baris: It was really scary at that time and we saw rocks falling down from the mountains because it's a very mountainous area.
--:-- Yama Baris: But luckily nobody was hurt in that part, although we received some reports that some people were hurt in other parts of the Conard province.
--:-- Yama Baris: Today I went to the hospital and one another aspect of this disaster is the psychological impact of Earth-Covicon people.
--:-- Yama Baris: We spoke to many people and we spoke to the doctor.
--:-- Yama Baris: The doctor said that now the patients which they come to them, they cannot sleep at night.
--:-- Yama Baris: Memories of their loved ones which they have lost is very painful.
--:-- Yama Baris: And they told us that this psychological problem can get very much serious in the coming days, months and even years.
--:-- Host: Yes, this is a very remote area.
--:-- Host: Afghanistan, of course, a poor country.
--:-- Host: I've read about aid workers having to walk 20 kilometers to get to the scene.
--:-- Host: How is the rescue effort going and does Afghanistan need more help?
--:-- Yama Baris: Well, the rescue efforts are still going on.
--:-- Yama Baris: As I say, that close to the epicenter, there are villages that they have not been patched yet.
--:-- Yama Baris: The rescue teams have not been able to get there.
--:-- Yama Baris: Only what the authorities have done, they have sent in commandos and also helicopters to rescue those that they were injured or get some aid to them.
--:-- Yama Baris: But the rescue teams are not there in order to bring those dead from the rebels.
--:-- Yama Baris: They are still under the rubble.
--:-- Yama Baris: And the Taliban, they have asked for more aid.
--:-- Yama Baris: They have told an international community that they need help.
--:-- Yama Baris: And some promises have been made.
--:-- Yama Baris: For example, Britain, they have promised one million pounds.
--:-- Yama Baris: Likewise, many other countries, including Sweden, Germany and also regional countries.
--:-- Host: A cyber incident has caused major production problems at the carmaker Jaguar Land Rover.
--:-- Host: Both of its two main factories in Britain are affected.
--:-- Host: The company, which is owned by the Indian firm Tatar Motors, said it took immediate action and is working quickly to restart operations.
--:-- Host: Maura Fogarty has the details.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: Jaguar Land Rover is saying that they're classifying it as severely disrupted.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: They actually never called it a cyber attack.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: They called it an IT incident causing global issues.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: I think the exact language they use.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: But the result is this.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: It caused two factories in England to be shut down.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: We understand that they discovered the attack while it was ongoing.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: And then they shut down their IT systems in order to kind of minimize any damage.
--:-- Maura Fogarty: So the security protocols they had in place, I guess you could say, were working to the point where they could detect it and then shut it down.
--:-- Host: The incident occurred at a key time for sales in Britain.
--:-- Host: New batches of cars are released in March and September with updated number plates.
--:-- Host: And this attack hit Jaguar Land Rover on the first day of the change.
--:-- Host: The former CEO of car manufacturer Aston Martin, Andy Palmer, says the timing is hugely damaging.
--:-- Andy Palmer: We have two plate changes a year in the UK.
--:-- Andy Palmer: September 1 is particularly relevant.
--:-- Andy Palmer: This is the time of the year where you sell the greater majority of your car sales.
--:-- Andy Palmer: You've got your whole systems for production, making sure that you've got cars in stock, cars ready to go to the retail and your retail operations.
--:-- Andy Palmer: And to have to stop them all right in this prime time is really, really bad news for the company.
--:-- Andy Palmer: We have software that very much links the ordering of parts to the manufacturing of vehicles.
--:-- Andy Palmer: And if you think about the complexity of manufacturing a car you got about 100 parts which are assembled about one car per minute
--:-- Andy Palmer: You break one part of that chain and everything stops
--:-- Host: And still to come on the Global News podcast.
--:-- Host: Going down with a submersible and being able to move around the ship and look at points on there, understand the actual condition of the wreckage and the amazing ecosystem that it's become was really key to it.
--:-- Host: The wreck of Captain Scott's polar ship Terra Nova as never seen before.
--:-- Host: America is changing.
--:-- Host: And so is the world.
--:-- Host: But what's happening in America isn't just a cause of global upheaval.
--:-- Host: It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere.
--:-- Host: I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C.
--:-- Host: I'm Tristan Redman in London.
--:-- Host: And this is The Global Story.
--:-- Host: Every weekday, we'll bring you a story from this intersection, where the world and America meet.
--:-- Host: Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Host: Tanzania is due to hold its presidential election at the end of October.
--:-- Host: The ruling party has been in power in the East African nation since independence in 1961.
--:-- Host: The government has been accused by rights groups of silencing dissent and opposition leaders.
--:-- Host: That's a charge the state denies.
--:-- Host: Activists have found themselves at odds with the authorities.
--:-- Host: Some have disappeared and relatives are seeking answers.
--:-- Host: As Alfred Lastek reports from southern Tanzania.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: At a home in Southern Bear, 57-year-old Yusuf Chaula sits outside his house.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: He has been calling relatives for any information on his son.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: He hasn't seen him in over a year.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: We have made every effort to find him.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: We are exhausted.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: The police are just telling us that they are continuing with the investigation.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Chaula's son, 25-year-old Shredra, was arrested, convicted, and fined for banning a picture of the president on a viral TikTok video in July 2024.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: He was released by the police, but a month later he was abducted outside his shop.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Shadrach Chaula is not alone.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Artists, opposition politicians, human rights activists have been abducted in recent years.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Some are never heard from again.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Others are found and they have horrific tales.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: I begged them to help me because I couldn't walk.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Instead, they started beating me again, this time with a flat side of a machete.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: 28-year-old Edgar Mokabela was abducted in Dar eslam by men he believes were police.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: He claims he was targeted after participating in a business owner strike against government tax policies.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: They beat me and started dragging me.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: I was pulled all the way into the forest close to a river.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: After a while, then I heard what sounded like instructions coming from that vehicle down the hill.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Shoot him.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: That's when I was shot in the head.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: The ordeal has left him fearful and uncertain of his future.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Madu William is an activist with the Tanzania Legal and Human Rights Center.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: These people have families, they have dependents, and sometimes family members has been urging them to stop, engage themselves on this particular aspect.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Security agencies, they always promise to conduct a thorough investigation, but at the end of the day we don't get feedback on what is happening.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Tanzania's opposition party Chadema has also faced challenges.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Party leader Tundulisu, who survived an assassination attempt in 2017, and lived in exile for eight years in Belgium, is now facing treason charges.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: Human rights organizations have accused the government of being behind the forced disappearances, something which the government denies.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: The government did not respond to the BBC's request for an interview.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: When asked for a comment on the allegation against them, the police did not respond to the BBC.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: But in a video statement, police spokesperson David Misime said the force acts on information about those missing and investigates the circumstances of those allegations.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: In June, while addressing the parliament, President Samia Sulu Hassan directed the police to step up efforts to end incidents of people going missing.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: For Yusuf Chaula, these words are of little comfort.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: This is disturbing us.
--:-- Alfred Lastek: If we knew where he is, or where he's being held, or even if we knew he had died and been buried somewhere, at least we'd have a grave to visit and mourn properly.
--:-- Host: One of the world's most famous shipwrecks has been filmed in detail for the first time.
--:-- Host: The Terra Nova carried Captain Scott and his men on their doomed Antarctic expedition more than a century ago.
--:-- Host: The British team lost the race to reach the South Pole first and died on their return journey in 1912.
--:-- Host: The ship, though, remained in service before sinking off Greenland during the Second World War.
--:-- Host: The wreckage was first discovered in 2012.
--:-- Host: Leighton Raleigh was part of the team.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Discovering the ship was really done on a budget when you look at some of the big projects.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: We had a ship and we needed to test its sonars.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: We were transiting across the Atlantic via Greenland and we wanted to do the survey test in the area where we knew it sank.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And we actually found the wreck in 16 minutes.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: We didn't have any high-tech equipment at that time, so we put a camera rig down and we filmed the wreckage.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And there were points that gave away that it was the Terranova, but it's only now recently that we've been able to get a submersible and people down there to verify that.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Why go back?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: What didn't you see or didn't you find the first time you were starting to interact with this wreckage?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: When we first went there, you know, we could see key points, but we had no control.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: It was a towed camera.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: So this time, going down with a submersible and being able to move around the ship and look at points on there, understand the actual condition of the wreckage and the amazing ecosystem that it's become was really key to it.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And we were able to see points that we could match to the historic pictures from that expedition as well.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: What sort of points?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Because are you talking about how they steered or just to paint a picture?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Yeah, we could see the ship's wheel.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And you know that ship wheel which is used to you know turn the ship port to starboard that been touched by some of the most famous explorers of our age
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And we could see that sat at the stern of the vessel
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And we could also see the cargo hatches where a lot of the expedition stores would have been put
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And there's a famous picture of one of the polar party who, a parish, stood on one of those hatches with the winches behind them.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: We were looking at right at that spot where that picture was taken.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And it was somewhat eerie.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Is it all as intact as it was when you first went there?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Are you able to make that comparison?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Have things been taken?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Should something actually be brought up to the surface and preserved better?
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: It's in generally poor condition for the nature of its sinking.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: It wasn't given a coup de grace by the American Coast Guard to help it sink at the time.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: So it's quite mangled.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Nothing's been taken from it.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: It's in a really remote location.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: And anything that could be salvaged from that, that has to go through the people of Greenland.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: The wreck is in their waters.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: It's their property.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: Ideally, in the future, maybe something small like a steam whistle could be taken to, say, Dundee, where it was built, and be able to, so the people that are there, can hear the sound of what the Terranova was like from the museum there.
--:-- Leighton Raleigh: But that decision rests firmly with the Greenlandic government.
--:-- Host: President Trump says US forces have killed 11 people he described as narco-terrorists on a boat allegedly transporting illegal drugs in the southern Caribbean.
--:-- Host: He said they were from a cartel under the control of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, who he accused of being responsible for mass murder, drug trafficking, sex trafficking and acts of violence against the US and Western Hemisphere.
--:-- Host: The Trump administration has offered a $50 million award for information leading to the Venezuelan president's arrest on drug trafficking charges.
--:-- Host: He has said that Venezuela will fight any attempted US military intervention.
--:-- Host: Our Central America and Caribbean correspondent, Will Grant, reports.
--:-- Will Grant: The strike on the alleged drug vessel comes amid much heightened tension between Washington and Caracas following the deployment of several US warships to the Southern Caribbean.
--:-- Will Grant: President Trump said the US military had intercepted what he called a drug-carrying boat, which his administration claims was being operated by the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
--:-- Will Grant: We took it out, he added.
--:-- Will Grant: The Pentagon later confirmed 11 people were killed in the strike.
--:-- Will Grant: Further details were also provided by the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, on social media, who wrote that the vessel had departed from Venezuela and was being operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization.
--:-- Will Grant: President Trump said the boat was in international waters.
--:-- Will Grant: Yet the strike could further escalate tensions with the government of President Nicolas Maduro, who the Trump administration accuses of involvement in the illegal drug smuggling trade and has offered a reward of $50 million for his arrest.
--:-- Will Grant: The US accuses him of heading a drug smuggling group called the Cartel de los Soles, meaning Cartel of the Sons, something that President Maduro robustly denies, saying it is a fabrication and a pretext by Washington for regime change in oil-rich Venezuela.
--:-- Will Grant: Venezuela is confronting the biggest threat that has been seen on our continent in the last 100 years, Mr Maduro recently said of the US deployment of warships.
--:-- Host: Could Bob Geldof become the next president of Ireland?
--:-- Host: The lead singer of the Boomtown Rats and organiser of Live Aid is reported to be considering throwing his hat into the ring alongside the likes of dancer Michael Flatley, MMA fighter Conor McGregor and numerous politicians.
--:-- Host: I heard more from our Ireland correspondent Chris Page.
--:-- Chris Page: Bob Geldof, as you say, is the latest high profile person to be linked to a potential candidacy for the Irish presidency.
--:-- Chris Page: The election is going to be held on the 24th of October.
--:-- Chris Page: He has said it would be an enormous privilege to succeed the current president, Michael D. Higgins, who has been in office for 14 years, but he's got to the end of his second term.
--:-- Chris Page: So that means there will be a new Irish president elected come later this autumn.
--:-- Chris Page: So the fact, I think, that the job hasn't been available, as it were, for so long has led to a huge amount of interest, a huge amount of speculation even.
--:-- Chris Page: The question for Bob Geldof, who certainly has a very high international profile, never mind in Ireland itself, is whether he can actually get on the ballot paper.
--:-- Chris Page: That process isn't quite straightforward.
--:-- Chris Page: Does it matter if a celebrity wins this election rather than, say, a professional politician?
--:-- Chris Page: That's one of the questions really being debated.
--:-- Chris Page: A candidate who is very close to being selected is a man called Jim Gavin.
--:-- Chris Page: He is one of the most successful managers in the history of Gaelic football, the most popular sport in Ireland.
--:-- Chris Page: So he's been selected by the party that's currently the leader of the Irish government, Fianna Fáil.
--:-- Chris Page: He is on a par in Ireland maybe with sporting coaches on the likes of Luis Felipe Scolari or Carla Wanchelotti or Alex Ferguson in the soccer world.
--:-- Chris Page: So certainly even the political parties might be looking to celebrity candidates, as it were, to boost their chances.
--:-- Chris Page: For the likes of Bob Geldof, Conor McGregor, the mixed martial arts fighter, Michael Flatley, the Irish dancer, has also expressed an interest.
--:-- Chris Page: Well, they would likely try to get on the ballot paper by securing the backing of four local councils.
--:-- Chris Page: Councils will be holding meetings in the coming weeks to hear from potential candidates, decide whether to endorse them.
--:-- Chris Page: There are 31 councils in Ireland in total, so that's the route that, like Bob Geldof, would be likely to go down.
--:-- Chris Page: But there'll be plenty of competition with other political parties also putting candidates forward through getting the endorsement of more than 20 members of Parliament.
--:-- Chris Page: Yeah, if you had to put your money on it, do you think it will be a politician or a celebrity who wins?
--:-- Chris Page: Oh, it's really hard to call at the moment, Oliver.
--:-- Chris Page: I certainly think Jim Gavin, he hasn't been formally selected yet, but looks like he will be, would be among the bookies' favourites.
--:-- Chris Page: Also two veteran politicians in the race, Heather Humphreys from Fine Gael, another centre-right party currently in the coalition government, former minister in the Irish government, and Catherine Connolly, a veteran left-wing backbencher.
--:-- Chris Page: She's being backed by a range of left-wing parties.
--:-- Chris Page: One of the questions also, Sinn Féin, currently the main opposition party in the Republic of Ireland, the biggest party in Northern Ireland, they're yet to decide if they stand.
--:-- Chris Page: So a lot's still up in the air, but it's an interesting mixture of veteran politicians and potential celebrities.
--:-- Host: And that is all from us for now, but there'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast very soon.
--:-- Host: This one was mixed by Rebecca Miller and produced by Oliver Burlough.
--:-- Host: Our editor is Karen Martin.
--:-- Host: I'm Oliver Conway.
--:-- Host: Until next time, goodbye.
--:-- Host: Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
