After weeks of protests against Ayatollah Khamenei’s regime earlier this year, the Iranian people cried out for American help as they were massacred in their thousands. Over the weekend, the Americans and Israelis did finally intervene in Iran, killing the Ayatollah, but leaving a flood of questions in their wake. Who will now fill the political vacuum? Will there be regime change? And what next for the Iranian people?

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This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guests:

• Rana Rahimpour, Iranian journalist.
• Ali Ansari, professor of Iranian history, the University of St. Andrews. 

Host: Rosie Wright.

Producers: Harry Stott, Julia Webster. 

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Read more: Who will replace Ayatollah Khamenei — a moderate or an ‘Iranian Putin’?

Further listening: Iran's supreme leader killed - is the Middle East in all out war?

Clips: BBC, AP, EuroNews, State Department / Instagram, 60 Minutes.

Photo: Getty Images, The Times, Dana Chan.

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For decades, a chilling rumour has haunted Sarajevo: that foreign tourists paid to visit the besieged city in the early 1990s to shoot at its residents. Today, Italian authorities are investigating several cases of alleged ‘tourist snipers,’ thrusting these accusations back into the headlines. Now, an eyewitness to these so-called ‘human safaris’ has spoken to The Times about what he saw more than 30 years ago.

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This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guest: Tom Kington, the Italy correspondent, The Times

Host: Manveen Rana

Producer: Sophie McNulty

Translator: Aleksa Antic

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Read more: Sarajevo sniper tourists ‘killed children by day, then partied at night’

Clips: BBC, ITN, FRENCH 24 English. 

Photo: Getty Images, Tom Kington.

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Early on Saturday morning, the US and Israel launched a wave of attacks on Iran, killing the supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Iran has retaliated, with strikes reported in the UAE, Qatar and across the region. But will Trump get his regime change or could Iran become just another failed state? And is the middle east on the brink of all-out war?

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This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guests:

• Gabrielle Weiniger, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza correspondent, The Times.
• Sir Peter Westmacott, formerly Britain’s Ambassador to the United States of America, and Britain's political secretary, Tehran.

Host: Manveen Rana.

Producers: Olivia Case and Sophie McNulty.

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Read more: Iran latest: UK plans mass Middle East evacuation as Tehran strikes back

Further listening: Four years of war: can Ukraine continue to deny Putin?

Clips: The White House / YouTube, CBS, Truth Social, ABC, BBC, The Times. 

Photo: Getty Images.

This podcast was brought to you thanks to subscribers of The Times and The Sunday Times. To enjoy unlimited digital access to all our journalism subscribe here.

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Next week, the BBC launches a new three part documentary, Hostage, based on our award winning Times podcast series Last Man Standing. It's the story of British photojournalist John Cantlie who was kidnapped in Syria by Islamic State in 2012. While his fellow hostages were released or murdered, he remained captive. Then, a series of Isis propaganda videos emerged, fronted by Cantlie. He hasn’t been seen since. So what happened to him? In this episode, The Times War Correspondent, Anthony Lloyd, begins his investigation.

This episode was first published on 24 June 2022.

Listen to the whole series: Last Man Standing 

Hosts: Manveen Rana and Anthony Lloyd, War Correspondent, The Times.

Clips: BBC, 5Live, CNN, NBC, BBC.

Further reading: The murky truth about Britain’s forgotten hostage John Cantlie

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From men wanting to buy her breast milk, to going undercover in the IVF wild west, investigative journalist and author Alev Scott has immersed herself in the murky, and often unregulated world of fertility. What she found was a trillion dollar industry, where the maternal body is a hot commodity. It also raised some serious ethical questions: How much, if anything, should breastmilk cost? Who should be allowed to buy it? And is it right that you can pay more for ‘VIP’ egg donors?

We've launched The Story's first ever listener survey! If you can, please take a few minutes to fill it in. You can find it here: The Story survey

This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guests: Alev Scott, investigative journalist and author of Cash Cow.

Host: Manveen Rana.

Producer: Dave Creasey. 

We want to hear from you - email: [email protected]

Read more: Undercover in Europe’s infertility and surrogacy industry

Photo: Getty Images & Mark Harrison for the Times magazine.

You can buy Cash Cow: How the maternal body became a global commodity – and the hidden costs for women at the Times Bookshop.

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The end of Britain’s political duopoly now looks complete, as Labour suffers a catastrophic by-election defeat to the Greens in Gorton and Denton. Reform comes second, while the Tories lose their deposit with just 2% of the vote. Keir Starmer is now a prisoner of the left, and Britain is undergoing a tectonic realignment of its electoral politics.

This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Hosts: 

• Steven Swinford, political editor, The Times
• Patrick Maguire, chief political commentator, The Times
• Gabriel Pogrund, Whitehall editor, The Sunday Times

Producer: Euan Dawtrey.

Executive Producer: Molly Guinness.

We want to hear from you - email: [email protected]

Photo: Getty Images.

This podcast was brought to you thanks to subscribers of The Times and The Sunday Times. To enjoy unlimited digital access to all our journalism subscribe here.

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After a six-month-long investigation into maternity care in England, the government has published its initial findings. The report reveals a catalog of failures at 12 NHS trusts – from inadequate staffing and poor facilities to racial discrimination. So what do bereaved families make of the findings? And can this broken system be fixed?

This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guests: 

• Eleanor Hayward, health editor, The Times. 
• Poppy Koronka, health reporter, The Times. 

Host: Luke Jones.

Producer: Micaela Arneson. 

We want to hear from you - email: [email protected]

Read more: NHS ‘incentivised’ to record baby deaths as stillborn

Further listening: Inside England's maternity scandal, part one

Photo: Getty Images.

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First Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested, then Peter Mandelson. The fallout has been swift, dramatic, and is still unfolding. Hosts Manveen Rana and Luke Jones answer your biggest questions about the two men and what comes next. 

Neither men have been changed and they both deny any wrongdoing. We don’t know what evidence was used in their arrests. 

This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Hosts: Manveen Rana & Luke Jones.

Producers: Sophie McNulty & Harry Stott.

We want to hear from you - email: [email protected]

Read more: Commons Speaker reported Peter Mandelson as flight risk to Met Police

Further listening: Andrew is arrested

Clips: The Times, Parliament TV, Newsweek.

Photo: Getty Images.

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On Monday, the government released its plan to reform SEND, the system that supports children with special educational needs and disabilities, in England. It’s used by around one in five children and Keir Starmer is promising £4 billion over 3 years to overhaul it. But what’s changed, who’s affected and how will the government pay for it?

This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory

Guests:

• Georgia Lambert, education and news reporter, The Times.
• Hayley Harding, SEND campaigner. 

Host: Luke Jones.

Producers: Olivia Case and Micaela Arneson.

We want to hear from you - email: [email protected]

Read more: Keir Starmer: I’ll ensure no child with special needs is left behind

Further listening: Broken trust: Inside England's maternity scandal

Photo: Getty Images.

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