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Hello, this is the global news podcast from the BBC World Service with reports and analysis from across the world. The latest news, seven days a week. BBC World Service podcasts are supported by advertising.

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This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Alex RedZone. And in the early hours of Saturday, the 24th of October, these are our main stories. Libya's rival factions agreed to a permanent ceasefire in the hope of ending nine years of civil war. President Trump announces that Sudan will normalize relations with Israel, becoming the third Arab state to do so in recent months. And the World Health Organization warns that too many countries are suffering a huge rise in coronavirus infection rates, particularly in Europe.

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Also in this podcast, the Czech health minister refuses to step down after flouting the government's own coronavirus restrictions.

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And we've landed again, that has all of that flavor, all of the Guinness experience you'd expect, just not of the alcohol.

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Is alcohol free beer the future? Is it too good to be true? That's the question many Libyans will be asking themselves after their country's warring factions signed an immediate permanent ceasefire to end nine years of civil war.

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For years, the country has been divided between a unrecognized unity government based in Tripoli and the parallel administration based in the east and supported by strongman Khalifa Haftar. Speaking after the accord was signed, the UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, said it was now up to Libyans themselves to cement the internationally brokered agreement.

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There is a very clear commitment of the parties to themselves implement the agreement and at the same time to ask for the support of the U.N. in that implementation. But it is a Libyan led process of implementation and of monitoring.

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What is important is from now on that the global ceasefire is agreed by the parties. From now on, what is important is implementation, implementation and implementation.

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So what are the main points of the agreement? Julian Marshall has been speaking to the UN's acting special envoy for Libya, Stephanie Williams, who brokered the deal.

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They have come together first and foremost to agree a permanent cease fire all over Libya. Throughout the land, they have agreed that all military units and armed groups on the front line must return to their camps. And this shall be accompanied by the departure of all mercenaries and foreign fighters from all Libyan territories land, air and sea within a maximum period of three months from today. From the signing of the agreement, they have agreed to set up a joint police operations room, which is going to work.

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The special arrangements in the areas in that central region which have will be cleared of military units and armed groups. They have also agreed to form a limited joint military force comprised of regular military personnel, which will have its own joint operations room. They have very easily come together to agree on the need to begin what will be a long process of DDR demobilization, disarmament and reintegration through the identification and categorization of all armed groups and entities throughout Libya. And this mechanism is going to be developed to really ensure reintegration of these armed group members.

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But on an individual basis, they wouldn't come in as groups per say. This is quite a substantial agreement that they've come to. So the task now is to reconvene as soon as possible, preferably in Libya.

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So, you know, Libyans want to reassert their sovereignty and what better way to reassert their sovereignty than to have this now joint military commission meet on Libyan territory who actually signed this agreement said Khalifa Haftar put his signature to it.

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This military commission is comprised of five general officers who come under General Haftar forces, the so-called Libyan national army. And then we have the forces that fall under the unrecognized government of national accord. Again, five general officers who report to their commander in chief, who is the president of the the presidency council. So, yes, this agreement has the imprimatur of both of those parties.

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I mean, you don't have to be told that ceasefires have been and gone in Libya many times in the course of this nine year conflict. What makes you think that this one is going to work?

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Well, look, today was the beginning of a very long process. But what I saw and what I saw even going back to Monday of this week was a build desire for Libyans to come together. Libyans are exhausted. This long conflict, many years of division, fragmentation, deprivation, deteriorating socioeconomic conditions, and then the cockpit pandemic, you know, it hits them very hard. They are tired. They are also very concerned about foreign intervention, foreign interference, the violations of the arms embargo.

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I believe, you know, they felt that their country was slipping away. This was a Libyan Libyan agreement. The UN was there. We were in the room to facilitate what emerged was a Libyan consensus. For instance, the issue of the departure of foreign mercenaries and foreign fighters was one of the first points of consensus that they reached.

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Okay, so the Libyans want all those foreign fighters and mercenaries out. But do those countries who've been backing either side and I'm thinking here of Turkey. Russia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt. Are they willing to pull their fighters out? Are they willing to stop supplying weapons despite the U.N. arms embargo?

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I mean, I certainly hope that at this point, given it an agreement reached between the Libyans themselves, that the international community will do its utmost to fully support the clauses in this agreement. And that includes, you know, implementing the U.N. arms embargo and respecting the will and desire of the Libyan people and the parties, you know, for these for these foreign elements to depart.

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The UN's acting special envoy for Libya, Stephanie Williams, speaking to Julian Marshall.

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President Donald Trump is calling it an historic peace agreement. The Palestinians are calling it a betrayal. Sudan has become the third Arab country in recent weeks after the UAE and Bahrain to agree to normalize its relations with Israel. In return, the U.S. said it would remove Sudan from its punitive list of governments that sponsor terrorism.

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And the timing is beneficial to Mr. Trump, as I heard from our North America correspondent, Ali Maqbool.

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We do have an American election just around the corner. And, you know, there was a sense in the way this was all announced that the election was very much in the forefront of Donald Trump's mind. All of the reporters at the White House were called into the Oval Office while Donald Trump was on the phone with Israeli and Sudanese leaders. And at one point, Donald Trump asked Benjamin Netanyahu, do you think you would have got this deal under sleep?

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Joe, of course, referring to Joe Biden. And there was a very awkward moment. Prime Minister Netanyahu didn't give him the quote he wanted, but it was clear that was what this was about for Donald Trump. Foreign policy sort of win just before the election. Yes.

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So the timing not a coincidence, but are there really votes in it?

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You know, he is keen to show that he is a statesman, that he is presidential. You know, that there may be some votes in that, but it's not a traditional election this year. So it's unlikely to sway many people who have already made their decision on what this election is really about, the character of Donald Trump. But clearly, the president thinks it's important. But in any case, Israel has got a win here. It's going to send a commercial agricultural delegations over to Sudan to build relations.

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Of course, Palestinians feel they've lost out. They've called this a new stab in the back by an Arab nation who wants, like many other Arab nations, said, that any kind of deal with Israel, a prerequisite for that would be the withdrawal of lands that Israel occupied from the Palestinians in 1967. Well, that's been pushed aside now.

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Aleem Maqbool and Al-Saleem was just saying Palestinian leaders have denounced the agreement. Hazem Kassem, a spokesman for Hamas in Gaza, said the deal was damaging to the Palestinians and Sudanese alike.

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This announcement harms our people and our case, and it encourages the occupation to commit more crimes and to deny our rights. And it also harms the national benefits of Sudan and will harm the Arab interests in the region.

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This announcement serves the Zionist occupation and its expanding policy in the region. For sure, it only serves Trump's election publicity and Netanyahu in his eternal conflict.

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So that's the Palestinian view. But how's the deal being seen in Sudan and how important is the agreement for the people there? I asked our senior Africa correspondent and soy this deal has been linked to a different deal which Sudan has been pursuing for years.

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So the deal Sudan has been pursuing was to be delisted from the state sponsors of terrorism list. It got onto the list in 1993 after the United States decided that it was harboring groups that the United States considered terrorist. And that has meant that they cannot access international financing, for example. And many other organizations that would want to come and invest in Sudan cannot do so. Right now, the country is on its knees economically. The prices of bread and basic commodities have risen far beyond the levels they were at when people started going to the streets to protest against President Omar al-Bashir that led to his toppling last year.

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So people have been desperate that the leaders have been desperate to be delisted so that the economy can start to recover. Now, the United States also wanted the normalization of ties with Israel. What we have seen today is that shortly after President Trump announced that he had notified Congress officially of his decision to strike Sudan off. State sponsors of terrorism list, there was that phone call between himself and the prime ministers of Israel and Sudan announcing the normalization of ties.

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So will there be some resentment that the two issues have been linked because the dictator Omar al-Bashir, is no longer in power? It's completely different people.

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Indeed, there has been some anger, especially when Sudan agreed to pay compensation, 335 million dollars as compensation to victims of the bombings in the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania in 1998. Now, it was asked to do so partly because of being in that list and also because the United States thought that it had been harboring Osama bin Laden. And therefore, that's where the link comes from between Sudan and al-Qaida. So this was an attack by al-Qaida, which Sudan is now paying for.

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And the people have been saying the man who was in charge when that happened and when Osama bin Laden took refuge in Sudan is no longer in power. So why are Sudanese taxpayers paying it, especially at a time when they are really poor? The economy is really down. A third of a billion dollars to Sudan is an enormous amount of money. And this is a country which is on the breadline. Absolutely.

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Things are really difficult right now. The pharmacists the other day said that because it's very difficult to access international currencies, the dollar in particular, it's difficult to buy medicine into the country. And they were afraid they were running out of basic essential medicines. People have been queuing for hours for fuel and for bread. So things are really dying in Sudan. And they were made worse by some of the worst flooding ever witnessed in Sudan recently.

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Very briefly, what will people in Sudan feel about recognizing the state of Israel? Very mixed reactions.

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We expect very strong reactions, particularly from the Islamist groups. And we are already seeing people saying that they feel the Sudanese leaders did this under duress.

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Sorry. The World Health Organization has warned of a critical moment in the fight against the coronaviruses. Many European countries suffer an exponential rise in infections. The head of the agency, Tedros Adhanom process called for immediate action to prevent health services from being overwhelmed.

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Danny Eberhart reports.

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Alarm bells are ringing right across Europe. The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control said it was seriously concerned about all but a handful of EU nations. A string of countries, including Russia, Poland, Italy and Switzerland, have again seen their worst daily figures yet for coronavirus infections. And there are increasing reports of intensive care units under severe strain in one particularly hard hit area of Belgium. Doctors liken the situation to trench warfare in Paris, a senior hospital administrator said the current second wave risked being worse than the first.

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Restrictions are being tightened. But many on the front line fear it's too little, too late.

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Tony Abbott subscription streaming services have come to dominate the way that many people around the world now listen to their music. But the BBC has found that some of the world's largest platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music, have been hosting songs with explicitly racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic lyrics.

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That's despite a crackdown on this type of content three years ago. Our music reporter Steve Holden has the story.

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The sheer amount of music on streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, Dieser and YouTube is mind blowing. But just like the Internet, there are some dark corners.

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We found songs across those platforms with explicitly racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic lyrics, some of them included references to the Aryan race, white supremacy, and in one case featured an excerpt of a Hitler speech.

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In some cases, an album or songs original title had been changed by removing words such as Arean and quite possibly to avoid detection. But when we listen to the content, the lyrics remain the same. Eric Ward is a civil rights strategist with the Western State Center in America.

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There is an attempt by White Power Music Acts to manipulate the titles of their music. But the onus is on streaming platforms to to do a better job at monitoring and searching for this music. They simply need to invest more.

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After a similar issue was highlighted in 2017, Spotify introduced a new hate content policy, vowing to remove songs and artists which breached it. But campaigners like Eric don't think that's good enough.

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People trust streaming services. They believe in the credibility of them, even unconsciously. People are not coming on to streaming services to be presented with music and hate lyrics. It is expensive. It is hard work, but it must be done.

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Music linked to the far right has existed for decades and across many genres, and it can be used as a recruiting tool to sell a white supremacist ideology.

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Nick Spooner is from the British antifascist organisation Hope Not Hate the growth of the white power music scene in the 70s and 80s run in parallel with the growth of members in fascist party in the UK. So there's clearly a big worry that that could happen again. And that's why we need Spotify, the Apple Music, to take this problem seriously and deal with it.

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Back in the day, pre Internet and social media, you couldn't just walk into any store or record shop like this and buy the music that we're talking about. It was underground, but critics now say streaming services have made it easily accessible. We were able to play these songs by the band with a few searches and clicks.

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So in response to this, Spotify said the music in question has been removed and it's continuously developing and improving technology that identifies such content. Apple Music says it's hidden the majority of the tracks we highlighted. YouTube says hate has no place on its platform and has reviewed the videos shared by us. And Dieser isn't commenting at the stage, but is looking into the issue.

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Steve Holden with that report.

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Still to come, credible thing to do. I mean, I'm just a busker and, you know, he's an international rock star. I got a Fender custom strap I wanted to strap for a while. It's incredible.

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We hear from a busker whose misfortune turned into a pleasant surprise. With the words, we can't preach water and drink wine, the Czech prime minister, Andre Babish, slapped down his own health minister. Roman Primula had been spotted leaving a restaurant despite the government having ordered all of them to close. Mr. Babish called on him to resign, but the health minister wants to stay put. Our correspondent Rob Cameron is in Prague.

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I've been observing politics for, what, 23 years now. And this was definitely one of the most surreal days that I can remember. It started with the report in a tabloid newspaper with a photograph of the health minister, Ramon Primula, apparently leaving a restaurant very late at night with no mask. The restaurant is located in a clifftop fortress overlooking the river. Vltava is a very mysterious location for a start. He was there to meet a senior official from Prime Minister Bubblicious Party.

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He was challenged on this photograph because, of course, restaurants are closed. You can't go to restaurants at the moment. He said that. No, I had this political meeting late at night on Wednesday evening in a back room of the restaurant. And we were just served coffee and that was it. And then he said as soon as I came out, I went to my car, put my mask on. So they then followed this extraordinary series of denials and explanations and live press conferences from him, from the prime minister, from the church, the Catholic chapter that owns the building in which the restaurant is located to various versions of this story, culminating in Mr.

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Premolar refusing to resign because he said that he had not broken the rules. So if he won't resign, will he be sacked? Mr. Babish, the prime minister has said that he will sack him. He's gone to see the president who has to approve such a move and has to sign off on it and appoints the next minister. But even that he went to see the president in his sort of country seat outside Prague. The press conference after that was hijacked by conspiracy theories for some reason.

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So instead of just journalists, it was lots of people shouting, there is no pandemic. Tell us the truth. So it's a very unedifying and toxic political crisis in this country.

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Now, Rob Cameron in Prague.

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More than 300 schoolchildren in Japan have taken their lives in the last year because of bullying. That's the assessment of the Japanese authorities looking into the matter. They say the number of severe cases of bullying leading to prolonged absence from school has reached an all time high. Our Asia Pacific editor, Celia Hatton, explains why this is happening.

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Well, it seems to be a bit of a toxic soup that's been created in Japanese schools. So first, we have a real emphasis on conformity in Japanese schools. A lot of really strict rules that students have to abide by. Now they can go from anything from appearance. So a lot of Japanese students are actually forced to dye their hair if their hair isn't considered to be the certain shade of black that the school wants and even down to the way that students eat their lunch.

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I remember I was doing a story in Japan about two years ago and I was told that Japanese students have to eat their lunch in order so their lunch is given to them on a tray and they need to eat everything at one section of the tray before they can move on to the second section and so on. So they really are policed very carefully. And that means that anyone who stands out a bit or really can't conform the same way that other students might really becomes a target for bullying if you couple that with sort of excessive competition to get into top schools.

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And really, the fact that friendship isn't emphasized in Japanese schools are a UNICEF report out just last month showed that only 15 percent of Japanese children say they have confidence in making friends. So put all that stuff together and it really means that bullying is a problem in Japan.

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Celia Hatton. Now here's an advert for a famous alcoholic drink. The sound of a recent commercial for Guinness, the Irish brewery has been making its renowned stout for centuries, but the beverage has just undergone a revolution as the company recently launched a zero alcohol version of the drink. Groaner Wafer is the global brand director at Guinness. My colleague Rob Young asked her how the new zero alcohol brew is made.

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It's actually brewed in exactly the same way as Guinness with water, barley, hops and yeast.

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But then at the end of the process, the alcohol is removed through cold filtration, which is a really gentle way of treating the beer, which means there's none of those harsh flavors that sometimes can emerge when heat is used in the making of nanospheres. And that process means there's no stress to the beer and it really retains all of that amazing Guinness flavor and character.

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So if you are to do a blind taste test, then between alcoholic Guinness and non-alcoholic Guinness, does the way it is made mean that there is just no difference in the taste? Absolutely.

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I mean, in our independent taste tests, the product actually really surpassed all expectations in a series cast as outstanding. It exceeded all expectations from consumers. And so absolutely, I'm really pleased to say that I think we've landed a Guinness that has all of that Guinness flavour, all of the Guinness experience you'd expect just with none of the alcohol.

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Maybe this is a stereotype, but the people I know who like the odd pint of Guinness, I'm not sure they go for an alcohol free beer. How big do you think the potential market is for this?

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The potential market for Nunnally Guinness is significant. It's an amazing product. And Guinness is loved, as you know, around the world. And what we see is that people are choosing to drink Guinness across a wide variety of different occasions, whether that's watching a rugby match in Europe or watching football in Africa or football in the states, that they're choosing to have different occasions and they're looking for different ways to enjoy their their Guinness on that occasion. And Guinness zero is a great way of giving them more choice on the occasions when they're choosing not to consume alcohol.

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There has been strong growth in rich countries in recent years of sales of non-alcoholic beverages. Will you try to sell this globally, though? Will this work in developing countries, too?

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This is going to draft in terms of zero and as you know, for an extra state is the common form of Guinness that's consumed across Africa, Southeast Asia and then Guinness Draft tends to be bigger in markets like Europe, the US, Korea and South-East Asia as well. So obviously we're launching right now in GB and Ireland and more markets to come in the very near future.

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Grania Wafa speaking to Rob Young. 5000 Japanese leaflets are being unleashed in the Netherlands to tackle the threat from Japanese knotweed. The invasive plant has become a menace across Europe, as Simon Ponsford reports.

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When a German botanist first brought Japanese knotweed to the Netherlands in the 19th century, it seemed like a good idea. It was even named most interesting new ornamental plant of the year. But over the decades, it's shown its darker side and invaded much of Europe. Japanese knotweed grows swiftly. Its roots are tough enough to break through concrete. It chokes out other plants and it's very hard to eradicate. Now, Dutch experts hope that the tiny Japanese leaf fleas will succeed where other methods have failed.

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Simon Ponsford, a Street musician or busker in Scotland, has had his guitar smashed by a drunken woman who started an argument with him in the street. But there's a twist to this tale involving crowdfunding and the musician Jack White, best known as the lead singer and guitarist of the band The White Stripes, busker Matt Grant has been telling the BBC his story.

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It was crazy, it was the craziest thing that's ever happened in 10 years of busking. I was just out doing my thing as usual on FINSA Street and a woman came up who was obviously playing really drunk. Then she started swearing at me, telling me, you know, what I was playing, I wasn't really playing, can't really play guitar. And then she was accosting us to buy drugs for money. And I stood up, told where to go, basically, and she wasn't having any of it.

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Next thing I know, she's swinging my guitar in the air and it's broken on the floor.

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I'm on Princi Street now, right now, because this lady has come over. I should have smashed my guitar. And that's a 300 pound guitar if anyone knows me. And I remember the note on our in every single day. I've never seen anything like this happen to me.

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I was thinking that other guitar I can't bosk. It's as simple as that. I still go fund me page. So I expected maybe to raise a couple hundred pounds for a new one. I set the bar up at 300 pounds and amazingly, within about five, six hours of putting the post up, it gone viral online and it is over 4000 pounds. And then the next day I'm in the guitar shop and it turns out Jack White's manager I've been trying to track me down.

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You call me and leave me. I'm on the phone digitalize manager and the guitar shop.

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And I get told that he wants to help me out and that he's happy to get me any guitar I'd like, basically.

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I'd love to thank him properly, you know, because it is an incredible, incredible thing to do. I mean, I'm just a busker and, you know, he's an international rock star. I've got a fender. I got a custom strap I wanted to strap for a while. It's an incredible, beautiful guitar.

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Busca, Matt Grant, and that's all from us for now, but there'll be an updated version of the Global News podcast later. The producer was Jay Sangli, the studio manager, Johnny Hall, and the editor, as always, Karen Martin.

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If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email.

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The address is Global Podcast at BBC, Dot c0. Dot UK. I'm Alex Ritson. Until next time. Goodbye.