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Episode details

World Service,27 Jul 2024,23 mins

Fears of a wider war between Hezbollah and Israel

From Our Own Correspondent

Available for over a year

Max Pearson introduces correspondents' and reporters' stories from the Israel-Lebanon border, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ukraine and the Indonesian island of Bali. The ongoing conflict between the Israel Defence Force and Hezbollah may be on a smaller scale than the war in Gaza, but it's still causing devastation on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border. And there are acute fears the fighting could still escalate further. Orla Guerin speaks to Lebanese firefighters trying to contain blazes sparked by shelling, and a Syrian refugee whose two sons died in an apparent drone attack. The city of Goma, in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, has for many years been a place of shelter for internally displaced families fleeing attacks by dozens of different militias in the area. But more recently the city itself has been under siege by rebels of the M23 movement, heavily armed and reportedly backed by Rwanda - and the DRC's own armed forces have had limited success fighting back. Hugh Kinsella Cunningham crossed the frontlines around the city with a group of medics trying to treat and counsel civilians - particularly women - trying to survive. The Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, is physically far from the battles raging against Russian troops along the country's eastern border. But the war can still break into its bubble of "somewhat normal life" at any moment. Yana Lyushnevskaya works for BBC Monitoring in the city, her hometown, and reflects on what it meant to return there in wartime. After the tourist industry was shut down in Bali during the pandemic, millions of visitors per year are now set to flood back in. They come for the beaches, the landscape - and many for the island's unique culture, fusing elements of Hindu and Buddhist traditions. But some artisans and craftspeople worry that tourist money isn't coming their way, and wonder how long their traditional arts can survive. Michelle Jana Chan met a master mask-carver and temple dancer looking for 21st-century ways to make ends meet. Producer: Polly Hope Editor: Tom Bigwood Production co-ordinator: Katie Morrison

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