The Fourcast

While COP30 gets underway in Brazil - Donald Trump is ripping up climate policy, blasting his allies for falling for what he calls the ‘world's greatest con job’ and trying to get big business to follow his lead - and yet in New York, Zohran Mamdani - a left-wing populist unafraid to tout a green agenda - has just won the mayoral race and in the UK, the Green Party has surged under Zack Polanski.So is the direction of travel really a climate rollback - or is a new left preparing to claim power and reclaim the climate argument? With me, from the COP in Belém, is our Chief Correspondent Alex Thomson - and in London, the financial journalist and author Andrew Ross Sorkin, whose new book 1929 investigates the Wall Street crash.

After months of a “vicious cycle of mutual retaliation”, as Xi Jinping has put it, Donald Trump and China's president seem to have come to a truce after their first meeting in nearly six years.Meeting in South Korea, Xi agreed to stop withholding China’s rare earth exports for a year and start buying soy beans from America again. While Trump said he would reduce tariffs and suspend port fees on Chinese ships.But how long will this amicable relationship last? Will all of this signal a closer tie between the world’s two biggest economies?On this episode of the Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Victor Gao, vice president of the Centre for China and Globalization in Beijing, and Dr Yu Jie, senior research fellow on China at Chatham House.

Is Keir Starmer’s immigration strategy doomed to fail? Despite tough language, a one-in-one-out returns scheme with France and speeding up the closure of asylum hotels,  Labour continues to plummet in the polls. So, why is it going so badly? Has Keir Starmer, as some of his critics say, just been playing into Nigel Farage’s hands by elevating the issue, or will it work out in the long run? To discuss all this and more on the latest episode of The Fourcast, Jackie Long is joined by Channel 4 News Communities Editor Darshna Soni - who’s just been to France to meet asylum seekers sent back under the government’s new deal and from Westminster by Channel 4 News Political Editor Gary Gibbon.

Is the UK government complicit in the destruction of Gaza? That's the assertion in the new book by journalist and polemicist Peter Oborne, with both Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak under fire for backing what he calls Israel's “criminal assault” following the Hamas attack of October 7.What's more, he says, the British media played its part too: colluding with the government as well as misrepresenting or under-reporting those voices opposed.On this episode of the Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to Peter Oborne and Edmund Fitton-Brown, a former UK ambassador to Yemen, previously a UN monitor, and now a senior fellow at the foreign affairs think-tank RUSI.

As Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s latest meeting reportedly descended into another shouting match, the war in Ukraine feels as volatile as ever - and, according to some, more dangerous for the world than at any time since the Cold War.In this episode of The Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Serhii Plokhy, professor of Ukrainian history at Harvard and author of The Nuclear Age. He warns that fear is once again driving nations towards the bomb - and that we could soon see dozens more nuclear-armed states. So is the world stumbling into a new nuclear era - and what does that mean for global security and for Ukraine’s fight to survive?

In 2011, Virginia Roberts Giuffre became known as the most outspoken victim of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Her campaigning against their abuse and trafficking helped to get justice for many women, but she was perhaps best known for a now-infamous photograph, taken when she was aged just 17, meeting with Prince Andrew. She claimed it was taken prior to one of three times she was forced to have sex with the King's brother. Encounters he vehemently denies took place but which have led to his public downfall, with Prince Andrew reportedly paying around £12 million to Roberts Giuffre, formally ending a civil case brought against him in the US without admitting liability. Earlier this year, Virginia took her own life. Before she died, she wrote a memoir, determined for the world to finally hear her story in her own words. In this episode of The Fourcast, Jackie Long speaks to Virginia’s brother and sister-in-law, Sky and Amanda Roberts, about the woman behind the headlines, the legacy she leaves, and the campaigning she wanted to be remembered for. They also express their frustration with the Metropolitan Police response - but the Met reiterated to Channel 4 News today that they do not consider themselves the appropriate authority to investigate alleged crimes in the UK related to the Jeffrey Epstein case.This episode includes conversation around suicide and abuse.

In this enlightening discussion, entrepreneur and futurist Jerry Kaplan, renowned for his insights on Silicon Valley, warns of a looming AI bubble reminiscent of past market crashes. He discusses the risks of overhyping AI technology and the potential consequences for investors. Economics correspondent Helia Ebrahimi, reporting from the IMF/World Bank meetings, explores valuation comparisons with the dot-com era, addressing macro risks. Together, they highlight the challenges of distinguishing AI's genuine potential from inflated expectations.

After two years of war, a deal has finally been struck. Hostages are coming home, Palestinian prisoners and detainees are being released, and Israel and Hamas have declared that the fighting is over. But can this really be the end?In this episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to Israeli negotiator Gershon Baskin - a man who has spent nearly five decades talking to both sides of the conflict, including Hamas.From back-channel talks to the Trump administration’s surprise role, Baskin reveals how this ceasefire came together, what it means for Gaza’s future, and whether it can last.

After two years of relentless war, devastation, and loss in Gaza — a ceasefire has finally been agreed that will see all remaining Israeli hostages freed in exchange for thousands of Palestinian detainees. It’s a stunning diplomatic breakthrough, driven by Donald Trump’s personal intervention — but can this fragile deal really end the war, or is it just another pause before the next explosion of violence? In this special episode of The Fourcast from Hostage Square in Tel Aviv Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined by Palestinian filmmaker and journalist Yousef Hammash and former Israeli peace negotiator Daniel Levy.

As Kemi Badenoch fights for her political life at the Conservative Party conference, the Tories face a growing threat from the right. With high-profile defections to Reform UK and deep internal divisions, is this the beginning of the end for the Conservative Party?In this episode of the Fourcast, Cathy Newman speaks with former deputy prime minister and Conserative MP Baroness Therese Coffey, and Lord Daniel Finklestein, columnist for The Times and also a Tory peer. They unpack the party’s identity crisis and ask whether the Tories can survive or if British politics is undergoing a major and irreversable realignment.