The Fourcast

Aseem Malhotra is a deeply controversial British doctor who has just been appointed as Chief Medical Adviser of the Make America Healthy Again campaign group co-founded by Donald Trump's health secretary Robert F Kennedy Junior.

It makes him one of the US Health Secretary's most influential medical advisers - and that's alarming doctors and academics around the world, because Aseem Malhotra, like RFK JR, goes against mainstream, established opinion on many topics.

Most controversially he opposes the MRNA covid vaccines, claiming they cause more harm than good, and wants to end their use in America, even though people are still dying with Covid around the world.

In the UK hundreds of people are dying with covid every month yet Dr Malhotra claims the virus is no longer deadly. He also supports RFK Junior's decision to reinvestigate discredited claims of a link between vaccines and autism, amid alarming levels of vaccine scepticism in America, and outbreaks of deadly measles.

For the latest episode of The Fourcast Krishnan Guru-Murthy talks to Dr Malhotra, but we also examine his claims and scrutinise them by hearing from Stephen Griffin, Professor of Virology at Leeds University - who is a leading scientist in Britain and believes claims being made by Dr Malhotra and RFK Junior are not just wrong but dangerous. Produced by Calum Fraser, Alice Wagstaffe, Georgina Lee, Rob Thomson.

Russia is celebrating Victory Day, with 29 foreign leaders including the Chinese President Xi Jinping joining Vladimir Putin in Moscow to commemorate the Soviet Union's part in the defeat of Nazi Germany 80 years ago.

But is President Putin about to enjoy his own victory if the US pulls out of peace negotiations over the war in Ukraine? 

For the latest episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy talks to one man who thinks President Trump is doing everything in his power to make that happen.

The writer, historian and activist Vladimir Kara Murza has been poisoned and imprisoned for his anti-Kremlin campaigns. He was released from a Siberian jail last year as part of a prisoner exchange.

Produced by Calum Fraser, Toby Bakare, Rob Thomson

Pakistan has described India's missile attacks that killed more than 30 people 'an act of war’, but India says it was retaliation for a terrorist assault in Indian-controlled Kashmir. So is an all-out war inevitable between these two nuclear-armed neighbours. In the past the US has acted as a peace broker, but is the Trump administration willing to involve itself in another foreign conflict?  

To discuss this, Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined from Delhi by the Emmy-nominated journalist Barkha Dutt who has reported from the frontline in previous conflicts between India and Pakistan. And also by Ayesha Siddiqa from the Department of War Studies at King's College, London. She writes extensively on the Pakistan military after serving as the country's director of naval research.

Produced by Calum Fraser, Holly Snelling, Rob Thomson

Ukraine has now signed a mineral and natural resources deal with the US perhaps taking President Donald Trump a step closer to fulfilling his promise to secure peace there.

But now his National Security Adviser, Mike Waltz is set to step down. So what do the American public think about the latest twists in the Trump 2.0 drama? And what about the MAGA faithful? One person tapped into the aspirations and some anger, at times, of Trump's most ardent supporters is Natalie Winters.

She is a White House correspondent part of the 'new media' in The White House briefing room, though denied a membership to the professional body representing Washington Correspondents. She also Co-hosts The War Room podcast with right-wing provocateur Steve Bannon. She joins Mat Frei in Washington for The Fourcast to discuss how Trump 2.0 is unfolding.

Produced by Calum Fraser, Rob Thomson and Holly Snelling 

Donald Trump has reached his 100 day milestone but he might not be celebrating quite so loudly after Canadians voted in a new government aggressively opposed to his tariffs and talk of annexation, and new polling showed less-than-glowing approval ratings.

The President called it fake news. But if his policies aren't proving altogether popular they have had a major impact on America's system of government and global economics - though he has missed his deadline for stopping the war in Ukraine. By a mere 99 days.

To discuss all of this, and what the next hundred days might hold on The Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by our International Editor Lindsey Hilsum and our Economics Correspondent Helia Ebrahimi. 

Produced by Calum Fraser, Millie Teasdale and Rob Thomson

Tensions between India and Pakistan have escalated following a deadly attack in a tourist hotspot in Kashmir, with Indian Prime Minister Nerandra Modi saying he will pursue the attackers to the ‘ends of the earth’ after they killed 26 people.

With India blaming Pakistan for the attack, retaliatory actions between the two countries have ramped up. India has cancelled visas, excluded diplomats and suspended a landmark water-sharing treaty - while Pakistan has halted all trade. So, what will Prime Minister Modi do next? Could this attack lead to a bigger conflict between these two nuclear armed nations?

And how would this affect a world already reeling from wars in the Middle East and Europe. To discuss all this on the latest episode of the Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined by Manoj Joshi, who spent decades as a journalist in India and most recently advised the government on reforming the security forces, and our Foreign Affairs Correspondent Secunder Kermani.

Produced by Holly Snelling, Calum Fraser and Rob Thomson

With the world still reeling from Donald Trump's tariffs, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has slashed the UK's growth forecast and says the global economy will see a "significant slowdown" - add to that, wars in Europe and the Middle East, climate change and the promise and peril of AI.

So is it possible to find hope amongst this constant chorus of doom and gloom?

One person who thinks they have an answer is Rutger Bregman, a progressive historian famous for taking on the Davos billionaires.

He joins Matt Frei on the latest episode of The Fourcast.

Produced by Holly Snelling, Calum Fraser, Rob Thomson

Following President Donald Trump’s tariffs and President Xi Jinping's refusal to back down, the world is in a new era and the UK has a decision to make.

Does it line up behind the US President and freeze diplomatic relationships with Beijing? Or, with an increasingly radical leader in Washington DC, do they switch their allegiance? What does the UK do about China’s human rights record? In a world of strong men hostile to liberal democracies, where does the UK go?

On this episode of the Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined by Victor Gao, vice president of the Center for China and Globalisation, and Baroness Helena Kennedy, a Labour peer who was sanctioned by Beijing for her role as co-chair of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China.

Produced by Ka Yee Mak, Tom Gordon-Martin, Holly Snelling and Rob Thomson.

President Donald Trump’s second term is almost at 100 days. Unlike 2016, he is now surrounded by passionate supporters and close allies. One key figure in the second series of Trump is Vice President JD Vance, a pure believer in the MAGA movement. 

On this episode of the Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Dr James Orr, JD Vance’s ‘British sherpa’, self-described ‘national conservative’ and leading intellectual figure of the right. Orr is the UK Chairman of the Edmund Burke   Foundation and an Associate Professor of Philosophy of Religion at the University of Cambridge. 

Produced by Ka Yee Mak, Tom Gordon-Martin, Vik Patel, Holly Snelling and Rob Thomson.

Economic relations between the US and China are effectively over as the world’s two largest economies trade blows in a tit-for-tat trade war that’s brought the global world order into a new era.

As Xi Jinping calls on the EU to join him in opposing President Donald Trump’s ‘bullying’, where does this leave the rest of the world? Is globalisation over? 

On this episode of The Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, former adviser of Bill Clinton and former chief economist of the World Bank. 

Produced by Ka Yee Mak, Tom Gordon-Martin, Simon Stanleigh and Michael Saliba