Saturday Extra - Separate stories podcast

To discuss the Washington attack and the broader trajectory of the Trump presidency we’re joined by one of the most influential observers of American politics. 

As US negotiators head to Moscow next week, doubts are mounting over what - if anything - Russia is willing to concede in a Ukraine peace deal. New reporting suggests Washington’s proposal clashes with core Kremlin demands, and a leaked call in which envoy Steve Witkoff is heard advising a senior Russian official has ignited political fury in Washington. Meanwhile, Ukraine and its European allies insist any agreement must deliver real security for Kyiv.

China is an engineering state, obsessed with building megaprojects, while America is a lawyerly society, reflexively blocking everything, good and bad. That’s the framework for a new book by Dan Wang which explores the merits and madness of Beijing’s engineering state – and how it compares with Washington.Through personal insights from living in both countries, Dan Wang explores China’s strengths and weaknesses, and offers a critique of how American leadership could lose the technological arms race to its rival.

As the popularity of Indian films surge in Australia,  a new era of bilateral film collaboration is being cemented through a cultural trade deal in India. The International Film Festival of India (IFFI) is on in Goa, and filmmaker Rachel Griffiths is part of an Australian delegation there to sign a historic agreement that will open up new, reciprocal opportunities between the two countries, including a major distribution deal, academic knowledge exchange and program and career development schemes for film makers.

The widow of murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi says she is hurt and disappointed that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman received a warm welcome at the White House this week.US President Donald Trump fiercely defended the Crown Prince saying he wasn't aware of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, effectively contradicting CIA assessments that the Saudi ruler likely ordered the murder of Khashoggi in 2018.Jamal Khashoggi was critical of the Saudi regime, and his widow says his brutal murder up-ended her life.

As we enter the final parliamentary sitting week of the year Sussan Ley seems to have just survived the political killing season. The Liberal Party leader's climbdown over net zero by 2050 has quelled a mutinous party room, for now at least.With the Coalition in disarray, and One Nation surging in the polls,  the centre has been left wide open for Albanese's Labor government.

South Africa is hosting the G20 this weekend and it should be the country's big moment, a chance to showcase its diplomatic and economic potential.But Donald Trump, Xi Jinping, and the leaders of Argentina and Mexico are skipping the meeting.Without the participation of major powers, is the G20's ability to function as a credible forum fundamentally undermined?

A US proposal to end the war with Russia has been widely leaked and interpreted as favouring Moscow's peace terms.Russia's President Vladimir Putin has backed the US plan for ending the Ukraine war, saying it can form the "basis of a final peace settlement."In an address to the nation, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine faced one of the most difficult moments in its history and faced either the loss of dignity, or the risk of losing the United States as a key partner.

From an office boy in 1950s Manchester, Norman Foster has become one the world’s most admired and influential architects.He’s designed Apple stores and the company's circular headquarters in California, the Reichstag Building in Berlin, Wembley Stadium,  the so-called  Gherkin Tower in London and two buildings in Sydney; Parkline Place and the Deutsche Bank building.Civic Vision in Sydney is a exhibition of Lord Foster's architecture, drawings and the 3-D models scale models made by Foster + Partners.

Grandparenting has been an overlooked role in Australian history, and so researchers from the Australian National University (ANU) are conducting a large scale research study looking at their role post WW2.