Sunday Extra - Separate stories podcast

Tundu Lissu, the leader of the opposition in Tanzania was arrested last month and has been barred from running in this years election race. Now that his trial for treason is underway, activists from Kenya have been arrested and deported with a warning from President Samia Suluhu Hassan that they were not welcome in Tanzania.

Guest: Oryem Nyeko Senior Researcher, Africa Division, Human Rights Watch 

Navi Pillay has been awarded the Sydney Peace Prize for 2025, following in the footsteps of Arundhati Roi, Julian Burnside and Mary Robinson. She is a former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and has spent a lifetime advocating for for accountability and responsibility in the face of crimes against humanity.

Guest: Navi Pillay, winner of the Sydney Peace Prize 

It was the biggest political demonstration in Australian history, when a quarter of a million people marched across the Sydney Harbour Bridge in support of reconciliation back in 2000.

This week marks 25 years since that momentous day, and reflections on the march will be a key feature of Reconciliation Week which starts tomorrow.

It’s also the second Reconciliation Week since the 2023 referendum on an Indigenous Voice, which also put forward constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians, was defeated with a 60 per cent No vote.

GUESTS 

Reconciliation Australia CEO Karen Mundine 

Melody Ingra Goodstart Early Learning’s National Cultural Liaison

When newly qualified zookeeper Erna Walraven started work at Taronga Zoo in 1983, it was a dream come true. Some of her male co-workers were not so welcoming of a female zookeeper. So Erna started studying the female animals in her care to try and work out how they managed domineering males in the pack, and she realised that the females were not as passive as she had she had been lead to believe.

Guest: Erna Walraven, retired Senior Curator, Taronga Zoo and author of Hear Me Roar (Affirm Press)

Melanie Cheng was  seven when her family moved from Australia to Hong Kong. So finding her favourite authors in the Hong Kong City Hall library made the adjustment so much easier. Melanie is speaking at the Sydney Writers Festival about her significant library along side other authors including Markus Zusak and James Bradley.

Guest: Melanie Cheng, author of several books including her latest The Burrow. She is appearing at the Sydney Writers Festival in several sessions including The Library that Made Me and the Stemminist Book Club. 

The Glen Innes Examiner closed just two issues short of 150 years of service. It's the latest in a series of more than 200 regional and community newspaper closures over the last decade. Financial instability is one of the foremost problems.

But not for the new volunteer-led Glen Innes News! With a strong community focus, and support from residents, it broke even in just two weeks.

Guest: David Lewis, President of Glen Innes News.

There is a finite amount of gold and other heavy metals on earth because they were formed before earth came to existence in its current form. New research shows that gold may be formed from magnetar flares as well as the merging of neutron stars. 

Guest: Anirudh Patel, doctoral student in astrophysics at Columbia University and lead author on a new paper on magnetars published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Sally Gould has been working as a paramedic for 15 years. Over that time she has has dealt with all sorts of emergencies and plenty of time wasters too. She loves her job and while it can be very stressful, there is a lot of laughter too, and she has developed  a very healthy attitude to death. 

Guest: Sally Gould, paramedic and author of Frog: The Secret Diary of a Paramedic (Simon and Schuster)

Chris Garrett, a bomb disposal expert who was killed whilst operating in Ukraine last week, reportedly cleared between 5000-6000 tonnes of landmines from the country. He worked as part of an extraordinary team at the charity Prevail Together. Garrett was the founder and chair of the organisation, and was working alongside Nick Parsons, a former Australian soldier, at the time of the explosion.

Shaun Pinner reflects on both Chris Garrett's contributions and his own time as a prisoner of Russia, tortured by Putin's secret police.

Guest: Shaun Pinner, decorated former British soldier and Ambassador for Prevail Together.

Can you guess this week's tweeter?