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This week, Inside Geneva presents the newest instalment of our “Books to make you think” series.

We talk to an author who had a ringside seat as the US development agency USAID was being destroyed.

“The people who so recklessly tore down the agency [...] are still sitting in high government positions and have not been held accountable for their actions, so I intentionally named names in the book and explained exactly who was responsible and why,” says Nicholas Enrich, author of Into the Wood Chipper.

“USAID was destroyed by people who really had no idea what they were doing, and because of the vindictive ego of Elon Musk,” continues Enrich.

And we hear about a forensic analysis of the language used by US media to report the war in Gaza.

“The New York Times referred to the killing of Israelis on October 7 as a ‘massacre’ 124 times, and a ‘slaughter’ 53 times. In the same time frame, they used similar language zero times to describe the killing of Palestinians, despite the fact that, in the first 100 days, the death toll was seven or eight times higher than on October 7. Zero, not once, did they describe anything Israel did to the Palestinians in that period as a massacre or a slaughter,” says Adam H. Johnson, author of How to Sell a Genocide.

Did the mainstream media sanitise war crimes?

“Do you think that it is possible Israel killed 20,000 children at least – that’s the official number that no one disputes – over two years and never once committed a massacre or a slaughter? Does that feel statistically likely to you? I think the answer is, on its face, ‘no’,” says Johnson.

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On our Inside Geneva podcast this week, we host a debate on a key question: what’s the point of foreign aid?

“What’s the point of mobilising taxpayers’ money and sending it to faraway countries to assist vulnerable people? And how do you sell that to your own taxpayers?” says Gilles Carbonnier, former Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

There are more conflicts and greater needs, yet donor countries want to spend less.

“What’s the point of mobilising taxpayers’ money and sending it to faraway countries to assist vulnerable people? And how do you sell that to your own taxpayers?” says Gilles Carbonnier, former Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

There are more conflicts and greater needs, yet donor countries want to spend less.

Do we think some people’s tragedies are less important than others?

If a child is in pain in Khartoum, that’s exactly the same as a child being in pain in New York or London. If a mother is grieving in Gaza, that’s exactly the same as a mother grieving in Geneva,” says Chris Lockyear, former Secretary General of Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

How can aid agencies better explain what they do?

“What defines us is humanity, and humanity means we cannot stay idle when we see others suffering. We have to act and do something to try to protect them, assist them and prevent suffering, regardless of where this happens,” says Carbonnier. 

Listen to the full episode on Inside Geneva.

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On this week's Inside Geneva podcast episode, we take stock of aid cuts and what they mean for new crises such as Ebola.

“It is a catastrophe. It is not an opportunity. But now we have an obligation to transform the system: there’s no other way the humanitarian system can survive this crisis without any change,” says Professor Karl Blanchet from the University of Geneva.

A new report says aid delivery must change, but huge cuts are not the way.

“The suspension of funding by major donors, not only the United States but also the UK, Germany and others, [means that] there are going to be excess deaths. Millions of people are going to die who should not have died because of these funding cuts,” says Professor Esperanza Martinez from the Australian National University.

What happens in a crisis like Ebola if aid funding is driven by ‘anti-diversity’ ideology?

“Every process in society follows a gendered pattern, so it is often going to be women who are the caretakers of the sick. It is going to be women who are washing the bodies of the dead and preparing them for burial,” says Hannah Reinl from the Geneva Gender Champions organisation.

Who stands to lose the most from the world’s only superpower withdrawing from aid organisations such as the World Health Organization (WHO)?

“If the US had not withdrawn from the WHO, then we would have been part of the WHO’s response. Which means that when the WHO learned about this, the US government would have learned about it as well. Instead, [US Secretary of State] Marco Rubio is saying that he did not find out about this until ten days later. Well, maybe we should not have pulled out of the WHO, and we would have found out about it earlier,” says Nicholas Enrich, a former USAID official and author of Into the Wood Chipper.

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On Inside Geneva, we look at weapons contamination and the harm it causes.

“We have at least one casualty every single day in Afghanistan – someone killed or injured –and it is most likely a child,” says Nick Pond, from the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan. 

From old conflicts to new.

“Ukraine is the breadbasket of Europe and billions of square metres of land are suspected to be contaminated, which means they can’t be farmed,” says Paul Heslop, from the UN Mine Action, Ukraine. 

And from old weapons to new.

“This is proliferating well beyond Ukraine. Ukraine and Russia are the two leaders in drone technology, but the level of proliferation is scary,” says Sean Moorhouse, from Mine Action, UN Development Programme. 

In response to Russian aggression, the Baltic states are pulling out of the landmine convention.

“We did not say yes to landmines; we said no to unilateral disarmament constructs,” says Jonatan Vseviov, Secretary General, Estonian Foreign Ministry. 

But others are joining.

“We heard that Lebanon will be joining the convention. This is a massive achievement and a massive push for the convention itself,” says Rana Elias, from the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining. 

As warfare changes, weapons contamination becomes more complicated. Who is responsible when a weapon fails to hit its target and harms someone years later? Who should pay for the clean‑up? And are we turning away from our opposition to indiscriminate weapons?

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On Inside Geneva this week, we mark Press Freedom Day. Is there anything to celebrate?

Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression: “The role of journalists has never been under such pressure, and the sector itself is suffering. So these are very, very important times to take a deep breath and make sure that freedom of expression, and media freedom as part of that, is protected, because it is an extremely important pillar of democracy.”

Increasingly, journalists are being attacked simply for reporting the facts.

Antoine Bernard, Reporters Without Borders: “We are in times where facts have become a target; hence, journalists have become more of a target, and this means that they are the ones who are suffering most from the growing polarisation of the public debate.”

And are people manipulating press freedom and freedom of expression?

Chris Morris, CEO, Full Fact: “Regulating information is a really difficult thing to do well. Getting the right balance between the absolute need to protect freedom of expression and the need to protect people from harm online is really difficult.”

Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression: “You have the First Amendment warriors talking about freedom of speech without any limit. But what they actually mean is freedom of speech for me, but not for you. Because when that happens, when you have freedom of speech without any barriers, then what happens is that we’ve seen a surge of hate speech, attacks against migrants, and terrible misogynist attacks against women politicians.”

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On Inside Geneva this week, we ask: in a world of violent conflict, is the UN – which was founded to keep the peace – doing its job?

“On many fronts the UN is doing indispensable work every day, bringing food to hungry people and ensuring practical standards for how we cooperate on the planet. Most countries follow the UN’s rules and principles on an everyday basis, so not too bad. [Former UN Secretary-General] Dag Hammarskjöld said that the UN was not made to take us to heaven, but to prevent us from going to hell, and that’s still true: after 1945 there have been no new world wars,” says Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide. 

But with the big powers causing conflict, does the UN need a different structure?

“It’s worth remembering that when the UN Charter was adopted in 1945, 50 countries were present at the table, and today there are 193 member states. So almost three‑quarters of the UN’s membership have not had a say in the rules of the game that they are now bound by, and they are very frustrated by that lack of voice and representation,” says Heba Aly, director of Article 109.

Can a new, reformed UN restore some peace in the world before it’s too late?

“History shows that after every severe crisis we come together and try to create a better system, which is what happened after the two world wars. First we had the not‑so‑successful attempt of the League of Nations, but then the much more successful UN, learning from what had gone wrong with the League of Nations. I hope we don’t need to relearn this through a third world war or anything like that,” says Eide. 

“For the UN overall, I think it’s going to go through a very difficult and dark period. You know, sometimes you just have to hit rock bottom. I hope that, coming out of that, we can emerge with a new global social contract. And if that difficult period leads us to something better, then that is something worth fighting for,” says Aly. 

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On Inside Geneva this week: who are the peacemakers?

“Women are completely absent in high-level politics and from high-level peacemaking at the moment. However, this is only the visible part. Our focus has been so much on US President Donald Trump,” says Sara Hellmüller, professor of International Relations at the Geneva Graduate Institute. 

Two peace experts, both women, give us their take.

“Traditionally, we have seen a low representation of women as mediators. There is a systemic issue inherent in how we understand peace processes, in which women are excluded,” says Hiba Qasas, executive director of the Principles for Peace organisation. 

Can a few men in suits create real sustainable peace? Is there a role for women?

“Women are still working for peace every day in different conflict contexts. They are still involved in peace processes. Maybenot at the kind of transactional, deal‑making level that Trump is engaged in, and that the media mostly focuses on, but these activities have not simply stopped,” says Hellmüller. 

So is there a recipe for peacemaking?

“It is very hard to say there is a blueprint. I don’t believe in blueprints. I don’t believe in toolboxes. I believe that peace is a much broader concept than political peace, and that it needs to be felt and experienced by people,” says Qasas.

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On Inside Geneva this week, we look at women fighting for justice.

In 2017, Myanmar’s military launched an assault on the Rohingya population. Almost a million were displaced, there were reports of horrific violations: rape, the murder of children, including babies.

“The accounts that affected me most are those of children. Now I’m a grandfather, I sit there and listen and I think of my own kids when they were young and my grandkids now. How can you not?,” says Chris Sidoti from the Myanmar fact-finding mission.

The UN investigators who documented the evidence were shocked, but feared there would be no accountability.

“They asked me for justice and when I asked them 'why are you here, why have you been waiting all day in the camps', many of them were not able to walk, they had not eaten and they wanted justice. And at that time, I really thought it would not be possible for justice to come,” says Antonia Mulvey from Legal Action Worldwide.

But now, almost a decade later, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is hearing a case of genocide against Myanmar.

“To see now, action in the ICJ: I still know how many years it’s going to take. I still know that the Myanmar butchers who are responsible for what happened may never individually be brought to justice. But I certainly live in hope that one day they will,” says Sidoti.

Mulvey is at the ICJ, supporting women who are testifying about what happened. “If you were in that court, I can assure you, international law is alive and it is fighting very hard,” she says.

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In August 2021, the Taliban took back control in Afghanistan. Women face unprecedented repression. 

They can’t go to school or work; public parks are banned to them; they are not allowed to speak or sing too loudly. Are we turning away?

“This is the time for the international community and for other countries, especially the EU, to step in and to make sure they respond to the crisis in Afghanistan and stand with the women of Afghanistan and to do everything they can to protect their rights,” says Fereshta Abbasi, from Human Rights Watch.

Diplomats in Geneva have backed a powerful UN fact-finding mission for Afghanistan.

“As an ambassador, and as a woman, [I know that] women have fought for decades if not centuries for their rights, and I also personally do not want to see a back-peddling on those rights that we, and generations of brave women before us, have fought for for so long,” says Deike Potzel, EU Ambassador to the UN in Geneva. 

Women inside Afghanistan need to know there is support.

“Women and girls in Afghanistan resist in ways that don’t form a single movement. It’s about 1,000 quiet and important uprisings and day-to-day revolutions: a resistance that is fierce and creative to show that they exist and that they will never accept that kind of domination,” says Sahar Fetrat, an Afghan campaigner for women’s rights.

The fact-finding mission can gather evidence and hold Afghanistan’s government and individual Taliban leaders to account. But ordinary women across Europe can help too.

“Here in Europe, in Geneva, we have the wonderful opportunity to actually make our voices heard and to be heard. So use that chance, get engaged. Open your eyes and then do something,” says Potzel. 

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On Inside Geneva this week, we unpick the divisive topic of migration and asylum. Why are some countries closing their doors?

“In Europe we are seeing one country after another erect barbed wire around their country and around a continent,” says Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council.

When does restricting immigration turn into human rights violation?

“We believe it’s within the rights of any government to set immigration policies that they believe make sense for their country and electorate. But setting lawful immigration policies does not mean that you have the right to mistreat migrants,” says Philippe Bolopion, executive director at Human Rights Watch.

Is immigration really a threat to our jobs or services?

“Overall, most studies are clear that migrant workers are not in competition with national workers in the labour market. [...] In Western countries, the medical sector depends on migrant workers,” says Vincent Chetail from the Global Migration Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute.

Why are some of us so angry about immigration?

“We are reaching a peak in violent anti‑migrant rhetoric, which has nothing to do with reality,” continues Chetail.

Many countries are cutting foreign aid and limiting immigration. A recipe for disaster?

 “If you want to live in a stable world without uncontrolled migration, pandemics and insecurity, then you invest in hope for people who have been displaced,” says Egeland.

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