The Documentary Podcast

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Who killed my grandfather? Apr 16, 2022

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Beirut, 1974. It is the height of the Cold War. A prominent Yemeni politician is shot dead in his car. Some say, had he lived, Yemen would be a different country today. The killer was never caught, the assassination never investigated.

Political assassinations in the Middle East are almost always unsolved, and reliable evidence can be extremely hard to find. The lack of accountability in these cases is often seen as the reason for the pervasiveness of assassinations in the region. In Yemen, power struggles over the last 60 years have left a long list of murdered political figures. One particular case, the unsolved murder of Yemen’s former foreign minister in 1974, sent shockwaves across the country, and was covered widely in the region and then in the West. Mohamed Noman was a liberal and progressive politician who was building a different path for Yemen, away from authoritarian rule. His death at the early age of 41 had arguably paved the way for decades of military rule in Yemen.

In this documentary, his granddaughter, Mai Noman, sets off on a mission to investigate who could have been behind his murder, almost 50 years after his death.

Russia's unwelcome new exiles Apr 14, 2022

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Hundreds of thousands of Russians have fled abroad since its invasion of Ukraine, afraid of growing repression in their country, and increasing international isolation. Most of the new exiles are young, well-educated professionals – writers, teachers, artists, IT workers – who fear they could be arrested and jailed for expressing opposition to the war, and even drafted into the army. Tens of thousands have escaped to Russia’s neighbour Georgia, where some are involved in humanitarian efforts to help the Ukrainian victims of the war.

But Georgia itself, invaded by the Kremlin in 2008, has a tense relationship with Russia. Tim Whewell travels to Tbilisi, Georgia's capital, to meet some of the new exiles, and finds they’re not universally welcome. They’re accused of arrogance, of raising property prices – and possibly providing a pretext for the Kremlin to intervene again in Georgia.

Healing with fire on koala country Apr 12, 2022

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In the forests surrounding Biamanga, a sacred mountain for the Yuin people of south-eastern Australia, traditional indigenous fire practitioners are preparing to bring fire back into the landscape. Not the raging fires that threatened to destroy it in the deadly Black Summer bushfires of 2019, but cool fires that will help protect and revitalise the land and help restore habitat for the elusive population of koalas who have survived in this forest against the toughest of odds.

Helping Ukrainians Apr 09, 2022

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With Russian forces withdrawing from some areas of Ukraine, details are emerging of the death and destruction they have left behind. In Borodyanka, 60 km north-west of Kyiv, the main road through the town is lined with destroyed and burnt-out buildings, vehicles and tanks. Olga and Ira lived there and have sent us messages, describing how their homes were bombed. We hear from Vitaliy Shevchenko, the Russian Editor for BBC Monitoring, who as well as covering the war for us, has been trying to get his parents out of Ukraine to safety.

The shadow of Algiers Apr 09, 2022

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It is 60 years since the Algerian War of Independence. But it still casts a shadow over the present. As France goes to the polls to elect a new president, Edward Stourton presents stories from the country's colonial past which still affect day-to-day life. He tells the surprising story of how, in the 1870s, a tiny insect called phylloxera created the climate for the Algerian War. He hears about the intriguing story of a knife abandoned in a house in Algiers on a night in March 1957. And he talks to the "Milk Bar Bomber", immortalised in the film The Battle of Algiers.

Dying to hunt in France Apr 07, 2022

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Just before Christmas, 2021, Joel Vilard was driving his cousin home on a dual carriageway just south of Rennes in Brittany. Suddenly, a bullet flew through the window and hit the pensioner in the neck. He later died in hospital of injuries accidentally inflicted by a hunter firing a rifle from a few hundred metres away. A year earlier Morgan Keane, was shot dead in his garden, while out chopping wood. The hunter says that he mistook the 25 year old man for a wild boar.

Mila Sanchez was so shocked by her friend Morgan’s death that she collected hundreds of thousands of signatures to change the hunting laws. She gave evidence to the French Senate and put the topic on the political agenda. The Green Party is now calling for a ban on hunting on Sundays and Wednesdays. But the Federation National des Chasseurs, which licenses the 1.3 million active hunters across France, is fighting back. It argues hunting is a vital part of rural life and brings the community together. Its members were delighted when President Macron recently halved the cost of annual hunting permits.

Yet public opinion, concerned about safety and animal rights, is hardening against hunting and the battle for la France Profonde is on. On the eve of presidential elections, Lucy Ash looks at a country riven with divisions and asks if new laws are needed to ensure ramblers, families, residents and hunters can share the countryside in harmony.

Presenter: Lucy Ash Producer: Phoebe Keane Editor: Bridget Harney

(Image: Anthony, from the Ile de France branch of the Federations of Hunters, in the forest of Rambouillet west of Paris. Credit: Amélie Le Meur)

A coastal town in fear of the sea Apr 05, 2022

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The ocean is central to the Esperance community’s lifestyle and identity. But three fatal shark attacks in three years have had a profound impact on this remote western Australian coastal town. As this small community slowly comes to terms with these recent fatal attacks, they are also navigating their relationship to the ocean and the apex predator that swims within it. ABC producer Fiona Pepper travels to Esperance to hear how this coastal town is grappling with the impact of the great white shark.

Talking to Ukraine's children Apr 02, 2022

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An estimated four million people – mostly women and children – have escaped from Ukraine and its war. Host Karnie Sharp hears from two Ukrainian mental health professionals who discuss the impact of war on the minds of children. One is a psychiatrist who remains in the capital Kyiv, and the other a child psychologist who fled the country a few weeks ago and is now safe in Germany with her family.

Life's big questions Apr 02, 2022

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What are the big mysteries that people want to understand about life? How to be happy. How to accept old age and death. Wit questions sent in from all over the world, Buddhist nun Sister Dang Nghiem and Sufi Imam Jamal Rahman offer their wise words on some of life’s eternal questions.

Shipwreck Mar 31, 2022

Show notes

In April 2015, more than 1000 refugees and migrants drowned when the old fishing boat they were travelling on sank in the Mediterranean. It was the area's worst shipwreck since World War Two.

But the people who died are not forgotten. Not by their families and friends, and not by a professor of forensic pathology at the University of Milan.

“There’s a body that needs to be identified, you identify it. This is the first commandment of forensic medicine,” says Dr Cristina Cattaneo.

Assignment tells the story of the raising of the fishing boat from the Mediterranean's seabed, and Dr Cattaneo's efforts to begin to identify the people who lost their lives on that moonless night on the edge of Europe.

Producer/presenter: Linda Pressly

(This programme was originally broadcast in December 2020)

(Image: Ibrahima Senghor, a survivor of the tragedy of 18 April, 2015 - he was prevented from boarding the boat in Libya. Credit: Ibrahima Senghor)

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