Jamie Bartlett asks why, in so many parts of modern life, fakery is no longer punished - it's rewarded. And why so many of us seem strangely unbothered by it.

After a show trial in the Donetsk People’s Republic, Aiden Aslin has been sentenced to death. He endures months on death row, where his days are filled with further propaganda videos and psychological torment. But in September 2022, his life takes an abrupt and unexpected turn: he is hooded, and led onto a truck, awaiting what his captors term a ‘Russian Surprise’.

After making his video with Aiden, Graham Phillips faces his own reckoning. Their story becomes big news in the UK, and possible legal consequences of Graham’s actions become all too real. Will he be able to go back to a normal life outside war reporting, or is this the point of no return?

Our series concludes by exploring the lasting cost of war for both men.  How did the encounter between our two Nottingham lads fundamentally change their lives, and cement their status as symbols of a fracturing world?

Presenter: Paul Kenyon

A Message Heard production for BBC Radio 4

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine begins in February 2022, and Aiden Aslin finds himself fighting on the frontline. After a desperate retreat towards the port city of Mariupol, Aiden spends six harrowing weeks defending the massive steelworks, the final sanctuary for Ukrainian forces. As food and ammunition ran out, Aiden is forced to make an agonizing choice.

Graham Philips was in the UK when the full-scale invasion began, but quickly makes it back to the Donbas to continue his reporting. And it is not long before he makes his biggest scoop to date: the interview with Aiden Aslin. 

We return to this haunting video to understand what was going on behind the scenes, and discover why it was such a sliding doors moment for both men.

Presenter: Paul Kenyon

A Message Heard production for BBC Radio 4

Aiden Aslin and Graham Philips take very different routes to get to that prison in Donetsk in 2022 – but their journeys cemented their destinies in Ukraine.

For Aiden, his evolution from young truant to soldier takes place in the crucible of war in Syria – volunteering for the free Kurdish forces fighting against ISIS. But after trouble with the British state on his return, another conflict called: Ukraine. Aiden’s time fighting in the Donbas war confirms his commitment to the country, and leads to him being at the heart of some terrifying events.

Meanwhile, Graham is becoming ever more entrenched in his views. In the mid 2010s, his dispatches from the frontline of the Donbas war are becoming more vitriolic, but also more ambitious. He is going further down the rabbit hole, and finding more and more followers in the process – people eager to see the war up close from his unique perspective. This former stand-up comedian is finding his calling – and it will ultimately change his life entirely.

As 2022 draws near, the soldier and the independent journalist are operating just miles apart, both sensing that the regional trench war is about to erupt into all out conflict.

Presenter: Paul Kenyon

A Message Heard production for BBC Radio 4

Donetsk, April 2022. Two men find themselves face to face in a prison building. One is a prisoner of war, captured fighting for Ukraine. The other is a self-styled independent journalist, filming an interview for his online audience.  But these two men are not Ukrainian. They’re British – and they were both born in Nottingham.

Graham Philips had been documenting the growing war in the East of Ukraine since 2014, amassing thousands of followers keen to see the war from what appears to be a pro-Russian viewpoint. Aiden Aslin had been fighting for Ukraine since 2018, but was captured not long after the full scale invasion. 

This episode begins with a disturbing video - a peculiar, chilling episode which will change the lives of both men forever - and introduces our two protagonists, charting their backstories to understand how they found themselves on opposite sides of a foreign war. What motivated them to go to Ukraine in the first place? And how did their worldviews change so dramatically, when they were born in the same city?

Presenter: Paul Kenyon

A Message Heard production for BBC Radio 4

Aiden Aslin from Nottingham had been fighting for Ukraine since 2018. Graham Phillips, from the same British city, was a self-styled ‘independent journalist’ filming the war up close since 2014, from a viewpoint that appears to be sympathetic to Russia. But just months after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the pair had a chilling encounter in a prison in the occupied city of Donetsk. Aiden was now a prisoner of war, and Graham was his interviewer. The 44 minute video filmed by Graham Phillips was uploaded to YouTube - changing both of their lives forever.

Two Nottingham Lads begins with this disturbing video, and traces the lives of these two men back to understand how they got there and what motivated them? How did their parallel lives take such different turns, even if they ended up in the same dark place?

What makes you pick a side in a war that’s not your own?

It’s presented by Paul Kenyon, a reporter and author who has covered conflict and corruption for the BBC across his career. Over four episodes he recalls his own memories of the war in Ukraine, something he has followed up close for over a decade. Through interviews with Aiden, his family and comrades – and people who know Graham well – Paul explores the blurred lines between combatant, journalist, and propagandist in the digital age. This is a history series for the present moment—urgent, unfolding, and uncomfortably cle – about a war that is still shaping the lives of our two men from Nottingham.

Two Nottingham Lads is a Message Heard Production for BBC Radio 4

Augusto Pinochet is woken by his nurse around midnight and a few minutes later finds a handful of British police officers at the foot of his bed, with an international warrant for his arrest.

The dictator is furious, as are his supporters, but among his victims and their families there is joy and relief.

His arrest is unprecedented and is hailed by human rights campaigners as a landmark moment - a "wake-up call to tyrants around the world" - but will the general actually face justice?

The Arrest is presented by Philippe Sands.

Philippe Sands is the author of '38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia'.

When the Spanish judge pursuing Augusto Pinochet learns the dictator is about to leave London - for the safety of Chile - much sooner than expected, he makes a snap decision that will have enormous international consequences.

He needs Spain's legal machinery to act, but there's one big problem - it's a Friday afternoon, and almost everyone at Madrid's National Court has gone home for the weekend.

The Arrest is presented by Philippe Sands

Augusto Pinochet won't be in London for much longer, so the lawyer leading the case against the dictator needs to act fast if he is to secure the help of the UK authorities. But the Spanish judge in charge of the investigation is moving too slowly.

Meanwhile, there are powerful figures in the Spanish legal establishment trying to block the case, and the former Chilean dictator himself - now aware of the moves being made against him - has been applying pressure to shut it down.

So the lawyer takes a professional risk and looks to a different judge for help - one with a reputation for fearlessness and ruffling feathers.

The Arrest is presented by Philippe Sands.

Philippe Sands is the author of '38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia'.

When diplomat Carmelo Soria doesn't come home from work in July 1976 his wife, Laura, fears the worst. Augusto Pinochet has been in power in Chile for almost three years and the disappearances of his political opponents have become hard to ignore.

The Spaniard's body is found, floating in a Santiago canal, two days later. The police say he'd had a car accident, but his widow is convinced he'd been kidnapped, tortured, and murdered.

When, 20 years later, she meets a Spanish lawyer building a complaint against Pinochet, the legal case against the former dictator finds a powerful weapon.

The Arrest is presented by Philippe Sands.

Philippe Sands is the author of '38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia'.