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On Inside Geneva this week we talk to the people behind a new book about life in Gaza, told through the words of those who live there. 

“People are actually travelling in the middle of a war, in the middle of Gaza at midnight – the peak of the risk, if you like – to get somewhere where they can get a better internet so they can actually talk to us,” says Mahmoud Muna, editor of Daybreak in Gaza. 

This book, edited by Mahmoud Muna and Matthew Teller with Juliette Touma and Jayyab Abusafia, is about history, culture, food, music and life. 

“It’s not a football game. This is about our humanity and it’s about being able to sympathise with people wherever they are. This is not about taking sides. It’s about whether we’re human or not,” says Touma. 

“This book does not give voice to the voiceless. The people of Gaza, like people everywhere, have voices. The point of this book is not to give a voice; the point of this book is to amplify the voices of the people who are not being listened to,” continues Teller. 

In this episode, we also ask why human rights groups are uneasy about the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference (COP29) in Azerbaijan. 

“Dozens have been arrested in the months leading up to COP29, including 16 journalists, other society activists, and NGO leaders. There is still time for Azerbaijan to set the record straight, and they should release them. The UN should engage with Azerbaijan to ensure that it does so,” says Giorgi Gogia from Human Rights Watch. 

Tales from life in Gaza, climate change, and human rights. Catch this and more in the latest episode of our Inside Geneva podcast.

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Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
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The presidential elections in the United States (US) are just a couple of weeks away. What will they mean for international affairs, for Ukraine, for the Middle East, for humanitarian work, for international law and for the United Nations (UN) in Geneva?

“When I was in the US, I definitely saw that there is no interest for anything called multilateralism or collaboration globally. Because it’s a matter of support – political, financial and moral support for international questions and for international Geneva. I think Europe is there, yes, but I don’t think Europe will be able to match the US,” says Swedish journalist Gunilla von Hall.

Does it even matter who wins? Or is the waning support for multilateralism part of a bigger problem?

“Is multilateralism a system that allows all countries to deal with each other in a civil and non-violent way where common interest prevails? Or is it the appearance of a system that allows the continued hegemony of the old powers after the Second World War?” says Tammam Aloudat head of the international medical aid charity Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) Netherlands.

“There are two words that are key here. One is the notion of polarisation, not only in the United States, but internationally. We see it in Geneva, we see it everywhere. The second is the word transactional. Everything seems to be transactional: ‘what’s in this for me?’ instead of someone coming in and saying: ‘for the common good'," adds analyst Daniel Warner.

Would the multilateral system even be better off without the US?

“I don't think we can afford to sit in an arena where our hope for multilateralism, which still is in the UN and its institutions, [means we are] sitting still, taking the constant bullying of the United States,” says Aloudat.

Join host Imogen Foulkes on our Inside Geneva podcast to discover how important the US still is these days.

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It’s been one year since the October 7 attack by Hamas on Israel. Twelve months of violent conflict have followed, with tens of thousands dead. We look back at our coverage over the past year.

“What we have to deal with is the immense stupidity of the wars that currently are in place. And here we are having to deal with wars of a sort that were better found in the history books devoted to the 20th century and ought not to have a place in the 21st,” said Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein, former United Nations Human Rights Commissioner.

How have the aid agencies coped?

“People tend to believe we can do things that we cannot do. We have no army. We have no weapons,” said Fabrizio Carboni, regional director for the Near and Middle East at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

How do they respond to critics who believe they should do more?

“If we could release them all we would do it as soon as possible. If we could visit them we would visit them. And at the same time it takes place in an environment which is Gaza,” added Carboni.

Why are we so quick to war, and so slow to peace?

“There’s a focus on the centrality of my pain, the pain my community feels and I feel, and I want the world to stand with me whoever I may be, and I demand it as a recognition of my suffering. But then the obvious question is, but how often do we, as individuals, side with others who are experiencing pain,” said al Hussein.

Join host Imogen Foulkes for this special episode of the Inside Geneva podcast.

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For 40 years, there has been an absolute ban on torture. But it still happens…

“Horrific things can happen to you. Nobody is there to help you. Nobody is there to document it, etc. And I think sometimes we speak about torture without putting ourselves in the shoes of what this is,” says Gerald Staberock from the World Organisation Against Torture.

On our Inside Geneva podcast this week, host Imogen Foulkes finds out how the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment came about.

“The convention came in the 1980s, arising out of terrible situations in Latin America, the dictatorships in Chile and Argentina in particular. And of course, torture, enforced disappearances, and killings were used as a matter of course to suppress their populations and to suppress opposition,” explains Alice Edwards, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.

Today, some say torture might be justified in certain circumstances.

“We didn’t outlaw torture because it works or not. We didn’t outlaw slavery because it doesn’t work. We didn’t outlaw robbery because it doesn’t work, but because it is wrong,” says Staberock.

As of today, 174 states have ratified the convention…but are they honouring it?

“There is pushback, it’s definitely on the rise I would say because torture is also on the rise. Torture is universally condemned but widely practised,” continues Edwards.

How should we mark the 40th anniversary?

“So much more has to be done to really eradicate torture. We have to recognise that it is still a problem, and we have to recognise it as a problem. For a torturer, for individuals, for society. A society that tortures is a sick society,” says Staberock.

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.

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This month the United Nations (UN) will host the ‘Summit of the Future’ in New York. What's the point of this high-level event? Inside Geneva investigates.

“The UN is not an entity that does anything. I mean, we can all blame it, but what is the UN? It’s just the sum of its parts: the governments,” says Christiane Oelrich, journalist for the DPA German Press Agency.

Is the UN’s 1945 structure even fit for purpose?

“Historically the UN for many people is still associated with the West. And the question of including the global south still haunts the UN,” continues analyst Daniel Warner.

Does the UN have an answer to today’s brutal, intractable conflicts?

“Since World War Two there have been plenty of conflicts, but what we have seen in the last three or four or five years is the use of aggression and violence as an instrument of foreign policy. Yes, that’s right,” says Nick Cumming-Bruce, contributor for the New York Times.

Can more peaceful nations rescue the UN’s purpose?

“The fact that some countries follow the path of aggression doesn't mean that all the rest of the world has to talk about failure now,” adds Oelrich.

And is the summit a gamble for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres?

“We should tip a hat to Antonio Guterres for even trying to do this given all of the stuff that's going on,” says Imogen Foulkes, Inside Geneva presenter.

Join us on Inside Geneva to find out more about what we can expect from this summit. 

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The World Trade Organisation (WTO) Public Forum is underway in Geneva and its key theme is ‘re-globalisation’. Are we nervous of that word? Inside Geneva sat down with WTO officials to find out what it means.

“Trade has been a very powerful force for reducing between-country inequality. Since 1995, for example, since the foundation of the WTO, extreme poverty in the world has been reduced from 40% to 10%, because of growth in many countries that was also export-led,” says Ralph Ossa, WTO chief economist.

Many ordinary people think global trade makes them poorer. How can it benefit them?

“At the WTO, our members have gotten together and many of them have formed a working group on trade and gender to especially put the lens of women to trade policy and to see what more can be done so that they can take advantage of opportunities,” says Johanna Hill, WTO Deputy Director.

The WTO doesn’t tell countries how to run their industries, but it does hope they can learn from one another.

“Perhaps one member might say, ‘Well, you know, supporting women in my country has really been a tremendous success. Because now we see higher growth rates, lower poverty rates and so on. Why don't you give it a try yourself?’” says Ossa.

Can global trade help us face global challenges?

“Nobody questions the importance of regulating to protect the environment or to protect health - everybody agrees on that. It’s the how that might be the question,” says Hill.

Join host Imogen Foulkes for a trade special on Inside Geneva.

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Conflict-related sexual violence has existed for as long as war itself – forever.

“It is a weapon of war. I would say it’s a weapon of mass destruction. It is really maximising harm,” says Esther Dingemans, Executive Director of the Global Survivors Fund.

In Inside Geneva’s final summer profile, we talk to a woman working to support survivors of sexual violence…from Sudan, to Ukraine, to Syria, or Chad.

“Young girls have been raped in front of their parents. Fathers are bound to chairs and forced to watch that. Or that an older – a woman in her 80s is raped in front of her son-in-law,” says Dingemans.

The 1949 Geneva Convention prohibits wartime rape and enforced prostitution. But even today there are few prosecutions. And what about the survivors?

“Survivors doubt themselves. Most victims of sexual violence will always question themselves. ‘Am I to blame?’” explains Dingemans.

The Global Survivors Fund works for reparation – not just money, but health care, counselling, and above all, recognition of the harm done.

“What is really important, particularly for survivors of sexual violence - which is often surrounded by so much shame and stigma - is that they are acknowledged, that harm has been done to them, and that it was not their fault,” concludes Dingemans.

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.

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It’s three years since the Taliban took back control in Afghanistan. Inside Geneva talks to an Afghan human rights defender.

“I was scared and I could see it coming. Yes, I mean, I think for the women of Afghanistan, we knew that the Taliban taking over would mean a dark future for women,” says Fereshta Abbasi from Human Rights Watch.

In three years, women’s rights have been steadily, and brutally, repressed.

“No matter what we have done in the past three years, we haven’t been able to reverse a single decree of the Taliban that is restricting women’s rights,” continues Abbasi.

“In 2024, Afghanistan remains the only country in the world where women do not have access to education beyond the sixth grade. Women do not have the right to most employment. Women do not have the right to freedom of movement. Women do not have the right to protest and assemble. So, I think we need to speak about it,” says Abbasi.

What can we do to support Afghan women?

“I think it’s very important to stand with them, to listen to them, and to amplify their voices. It’s very difficult to think of a better Afghanistan, a brighter future for women under Taliban rule. And I don’t want to think about that. I want to believe and hold my strength together, that this madness cannot last.”

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva.

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Join us for a special extra edition of Inside Geneva to mark World Humanitarian Day, with testimonies from aid workers who have given their all – and who have often lost a great deal.

“So I had taken him to the airport together with our child, and, yes, it took me in fact many years to be able to use the same elevator in the airport where I last kissed him,” says Laura Dolci. 

Dolci’s young husband Jean-Selim was killed, just weeks after the birth of their son, in the bombing of the UN’s headquarters in Baghdad in 2003.

Twenty years on, WHO cameraman Chris Black was sent to Gaza, to support, and document, medical care there.

“Something I really will never forget is a woman, with a young child, saying to me: ‘Are we safe here?’ And I wanted to say: ‘Yes, you're in the grounds of a hospital, under international humanitarian law this is a protected space, you should be safe here.’ But I couldn't say to her: ‘You're safe here,’” says Black.  

More than 200 aid workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023.

 “People have told me oh you must be very brave for going to Gaza. And I don't think so. I think what's brave is the people who have been doing this work since early October and who go back every day to do it again and again and again,” continues Black.  

“The aid worker, the humanitarian worker, the peacekeeper; ultimately it's a human being that decides to put its own being to the service of humanity,” says Dolci.  

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva for an inspiring listen.

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In the fourth episode of our summer profile series on Inside Geneva, we talk to a Geneva career woman and a Geneva asylum-seeker about a project to unite communities through sport. Surely the world’s humanitarian capital is good at welcoming refugees and immigrants?

“We have all these international organisations working on various global challenges. But when you talk to people from Geneva, they don’t really know what’s happening in this bubble,” says Lena Menge, from the Geneva Graduate Institute and co-founder of Flag 21.

For asylum-seekers, arriving in a new country, even a safe one, can be hard.

“I was very lonely. It wasn’t easy. You feel lost and don’t really know what’s happening or where you are. It takes time to realise where you are and what you are supposed to do,” says Mahdie Alinejad, an asylum-seeker from Iran and a coach with Flag 21.

Flag 21 is a project that brings locals and asylum-seekers together – to run, swim, do yoga, and much more.

“Sport was actually a meaningful tool to include people in need, people that needed a community around them as well,” continues Menge.

The project benefits everyone.

“It’s not easy to have this confidence and grow in society as an immigrant. So this is a very good thing that they’re doing, giving opportunities to people who really need it, to find themselves, their space, their place and their confidence,” says Alinejad.

“They have such resilience and so much strength to share that you come away thinking ‘my God, my little problems are really nothing’,” concludes Menge.

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva to listen to the full interview.

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Thank you for listening! If you like what we do, please leave a review or subscribe to our newsletter. 

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Host: Imogen Foulkes
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