All language subtitles for Global.Eye.S2026E09.1080p.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-7VFr33104D_track3_[eng]

Hello and welcome to Global Eye
from the BBC World Service.

In the next half hour, we'll bring
you some of the best journalism

from our teams across the world.

I am Kalkidan Yibeltal,
a journalist based in Nairobi,

and for the past week I've been here
in the world's youngest nation,

South Sudan, where renewed
conflict between the army

and rebels aligned with
a jailed opposition leader

is threatening
a fragile peace agreement.

The UN has warned that this country,
which is not 15 years old yet,

could be on the road
to a full-blown civil war.

I'll be guiding you through
as to what's happening here

and why the world needs
to pay attention.

Coming up on the programme...

With rare and exclusive access
to Puntland,

the hard to reach
semi-autonomous region of Somalia,

we are on the ground with
the region's defence force

as it battles fighters
from the Islamic State group.

The Horn of Africa has become
a crucial nexus for IS

since it was largely driven out of
the Middle East.

And as the US-Israeli war
on Iran continues,

we will reveal how Iranian
state media uses propaganda and AI

to push their government's
preferred narrative

about the course of the war.

This is South Sudan's largest state,
Jonglei,

some 250km north
of the country's capital, Juba.

It's not an easy place to reach.

Conditions are dangerous

and the roads are among
the least developed in the globe.

According to the UN,
the entire country had

just around 400km of paved road
by 2022.

Additionally, insecurity
makes road travel risky.

So to get here,
we had to join aid workers

in one of their
humanitarian flights.

CELEBRATORY GUNFIRE,
WHOOPING

The ongoing armed clashes
in Jonglei began

with a sudden upsurge
in late December.

Rebel forces known as

the Sudan People's Liberation Army
In Opposition, or SPLA-IO,

announced they would be marching
to the country's capital

to overthrow the government.

They had overpowered the army
in several positions

and took control
of local administrations.

The military responded
with air strikes

and civilians paid
the heaviest prices.

An unknown number of them
were killed,

villages were burned down
and masses fled.

I spoke to some Jonglei residents

who had been forced to flee
for their lives.

Alarms were sounded by the UN,
by the African Union and others

that South Sudan could be facing
a return to civil war.

So how did this young country,
once so full of hope, come to this?

To understand,
you need to know these two men.

Salva Kiir,
who's been the President of

the country since independence,
and Riek Machar,

his main opponent,
who until last year

was First Vice President

following a power-sharing agreement
signed in 2018.

But about a year ago,
Machar was put under house arrest

and was later charged
with several offences,

including treason.

His supporters, including those
in the SPLA-IO,

saw the move
as politically motivated

and vowed to fight
the authorities.

During the recent clashes,

rebel leaders called for
Machar's release.

As well as being the youngest,

South Sudan is one of the most
impoverished countries in the world.

Since independence,

it's been blighted by
a deadly cycle of violence,

and it's been heavily impacted
by the effects of climate change.

According to
the World Food Programme,

10 million of its 14 million people

are now dependent
on humanitarian assistance.

Besides security,

logistics is a key challenge
that humanitarians face here

in South Sudan as they seek
to reach to millions of people

in scattered and remote villages.

To get to many people
living in those areas

that are not accessible by road,

aid agencies often use
boats like this

that are currently being loaded
with all these essential supplies,

and they're going to be dispatched
on the River Nile.

When South Sudan
broke away from Sudan

and declared independence,

there was much euphoria
and optimism.

But the years that followed
were marked by recurrent violence

and administrative impotence

that continued to keep a nation
endowed with rich natural resources

in the shackles of poverty.

Several countries in this region

are grappling with
chronic security problems.

Sudan is in the middle
of a three-year civil war,

and Somalia is struggling
to contain Islamist insurgency.

The UN's Commission on Human Rights
in South Sudan

has expressed grave concern
over the situation here,

and aid agencies warn
the world shouldn't look away

as another country slides deeper
into disorder.

Nearly a decade after its defeat
in the Middle East,

the Islamic State group
has shifted its focus to Africa,

with IS branches emerging
across the continent.

In the Horn of Africa,
Somalia's semi-autonomous state

of Puntland has become one of
the group's main strategic hubs.

Last year, the UN estimated

there were about 800 IS fighters
in Somalia,

more than half of them
foreign fighters.

BBC reporter Sahnun Ahmed
travelled to Al-Miskad mountains

to embed with
Puntland Defence Forces,

who are leading the fight
against IS.

PHONE LINE RINGS

GENERATOR WHIRS

CHILD ANSWERS PHONE

Muna is an officer
in the Puntland Defence Forces.

For the last 12 months,

she has been fighting
the Islamic State group.

Her job has kept her apart
from her eight children.

In the last year,
she has only seen them twice.

I was born and grew up in Somalia.

For years, I've watched
militant groups take root here.

EXPLOSION

Since the state collapsed in 1991,

Somalia has been scarred
by civil war.

By 2006, groups like al-Shabab
filled the vacuum,

smothering Somalia's chance
at development.

The instability they have caused

has allowed another
dangerous player to take hold.

The so-called Islamic State group.

Allahu Akbar!
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!

The group had territorial
strongholds

in countries like Syria and Iraq,

until US-backed forces
and the Syrian army

began to drive them out.

By 2019, the group was thought
to have been largely defeated.

After losing ground
in the Middle East,

IS shifted its focus to Africa,

branches starting
to operate across the continent,

with Somalia's
semi-autonomous region of Puntland

functioning as a strategic hub.

It is home to terrorists who take
advantage of conditions in Africa

to grow and export their ideology.

ISIS controls their global network
from Somalia.

Known as IS Somalia,

this branch is now one of
the most influential hubs globally,

bringing in foreign fighters,
training them, embedding them.

The brotherhood is now established
and it's spreading everywhere!

Now it's right here in Somalia!

Puntland is leading the fightback.

Its security force
has managed to push IS Somalia

out of the key port city of Bosaso.

The Puntland Defence Force has only
held this area for a few months.

About 500 soldiers are based here,
including Muna.

SHE LAUGHS

Muna is one of the few women
in the Puntland army -

currently in a support role,

but she has fought
in battles against IS.

The army has managed
to regain territory from IS,

but at a great cost
for the soldiers.

The rule of IS in these mountains

has also taken a heavy toll
on the local community.

Nestled in the mountains
lies Daardaar, home to 600 people.

Once under the rule of IS,

the army retook control
in March 2025

with the help of US air support.

But the scars remain.

Said Mohamed has been the imam
in Daardaar for seven years.

When IS came to the village,
they removed him from the mosque.

IS has been active here
since late 2015.

For years,
they were largely overlooked,

allowing the group to grow
more entrenched in these mountains.

Local residents say
the arrival of foreign fighters

brought a new battle of ideology.

The most shocking,
the murder of a pregnant mother.

Shukri Musa was killed along with

her seven-year-old son, Saeed,
who was deaf.

The militants may have left,

but fear remains.

Fear that they could come back.

The group are still present
in this region

and sleeper cells
are launching attacks.

One not far from here

is a reminder of the threat
and the danger they still pose.

Defeating IS
requires international support.

A US strike here in May 2024
killed three IS fighters...

..a crucial part of driving
the group out of Daardaar.

Cooperation between
the Puntland Defence Forces

and the US is ongoing.

For the Puntland Defence Force,

the push to the front
is only days away.

I met 24-year-old Abdikhair,

a young soldier who captured
an IS foreign fighter alive.

Abdikhair had only been
in the front line

for three months when he helped
detain this IS militant.

In June 2025,

the UN estimated
that the Islamic State group had

up to 800 fighters in Somalia,

over half of them foreign.

Since then, local reports suggest
hundreds have been killed

or captured
in a government counter-offensive.

A little outside the camp...

..a drone scouts ahead.

We are with the army now.

They are moving in small groups
to a new staging area.

They have found a cave with 50 to 60
IS militants,

and from this new position

they are planning to launch
an attack on this IS hideout.

Despite the support of
an American surveillance drone

out of sight overhead, the closer
the soldiers go to the enemy,

the more I felt their mood darken.

Phase one - a surprise
mortar attack

on the caves from a distance.

They waited for the all clear.

Then they moved.

We are just approaching
where they set up their position

to launch mortar attacks
on IS's hideouts.

The army's vantage point offers

a bird's-eye view of IS positions
in the valley below.

Mortars, $200 a shot...

..slam across the mountain.

IS are at less than 1km away,

just opposite where we are now.

The militants didn't fight back.

With no return fire,

the enemy could be unharmed,
lying in wait.

The drone went up to see
if the target had been hit.

The entrance appeared damaged.

That's the cave.

That's the cave? Yes.

For the Puntland forces,

it was a strange kind of victory.

After months in the mountains,

the decisive blow
had come from elsewhere.

We were later told American drones
struck the fighters in the caves.

Here is some more
thought-provoking content

that the World Service
has produced this week.

The Lives Less Ordinary podcast
sat down with Ramla Ali,

a British-Somali boxer
and Unicef ambassador,

to hear her inspiring story
about how,

against the odds, she became

the first Somali boxer
to compete at the Olympic Games,

after hiding her career
from her family for many years.

She recently returned to Somalia
for the first time

since coming to the UK in the 1990s.

Lives Less Ordinary episodes
are now posted

in-vision on the BBC World Service
YouTube channel,

or you can catch the podcast

on BBC Sounds
or wherever you get your podcasts.

Since the beginning
of the US-Israeli war on Iran,

journalists have been finding ways
to report on what's happening,

often in the face of incredible
logistical and legal challenges.

But for those working
for Iran's state-run media,

their assignment is a different one.

Their job has been
to broadcast the message

that the Iranian government
wants people to hear.

Reha Kansara, from the BBC's
Global Disinformation Unit,

has been looking into
how Iran's state media

has been flooding its services
with propaganda

to distort the reality
of what's happening on the ground.

State media in Iran announcing
the beginning of the war,

when US and Israeli airstrikes
hit Tehran.

It was quick and decisive -
typical of news outlets.

But it wasn't long before facts
were muddled with falsehoods

and half-truths.

Later that day, Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

suggested their joint forces
had killed Iran's leader,

Ayatollah Khamenei, at his home.

Iran's silence was loud,

until a regime spokesperson called
the reports of Khamenei's death

"enemy psychological warfare"

and state media dismissed them
as rumours.

Then, the following morning,
hours after US President Trump

publicly confirmed
the supreme leader's death,

state media ran the news
that Khamenei

had been killed by Israel
and the US.

HE WEEPS

Reporters Without Borders say

Iran is one of the most
repressive countries

when it comes to press freedom.

Now, in its attempt to control
what people hear, see and watch,

all broadcasting on TV, radio,
social media and news websites

is controlled by the state,

and Western media outlets,
including BBC Persian,

are banned from reporting
in the country.

The internet has been cut off,

and people can't have access
to the internet

to get the news from there.

It has been like this for decades,

since the birth
of the Islamic Republic in 1979.

And I think in Iran,

censorship is the lock
and disinformation is the key.

And it doesn't let the people see

exactly what's going on
inside the country.

Iranian media has also routinely
published bogus claims,

inflating the number of casualties
behind enemy lines.

One such report claimed
that Iranian forces had killed

or injured 650 American personnel
in the first two days of the war.

At the time, the Pentagon
had confirmed

only six soldiers had died.

New technology
is also helping state media.

This video, showing the aftermath
of a strike in Bahrain,

was posted online by
the Iranian state-owned

English-language news outlet
Press TV.

But it's not real.
It was made using AI.

A closer look and these two cars
are dissolving into one another.

A reverse image search brings
no credible reports of the hit.

Instead, it brought up
another version of the AI video.

Like much of the AI-generated
content about the war

that's flooded social media,

it's unclear who made it
and where it came from.

They have a narrative
they're pushing,

which is that
they are quite victorious,

their military is very strong.

And so we've been seeing
various different examples

of AI-generated content
coming out of state media -

state media, you know, X accounts,
Telegram channels -

that kind of show either fake
or exaggerated examples

of their attacks against
US air bases or Israeli targets.

But the information space
is distorted

even by the regime's critics.

When Iranian state media reported
the funerals of 160 children

and staff, killed in what experts
say was likely a US operation

targeting a military base
close to a school in southern Iran,

opposers of the government
claimed that this view

from the mass funeral
was AI-manipulated.

The government's track record
of feeding kernels of truth

alongside lies has sown doubt
amongst many -

except, this time, their reporting
was factually correct.

This wider shot shows the area
surrounding the graves.

Within the image's metadata
are the coordinates

for where it was captured.

We geolocated it to a cemetery
roughly 3.7km away from the school.

Satellite imagery
shows that these trees,

the road layout
and this nearby building

match those visible
in the footage.

Other satellite imagery
from the day after the funeral

provides a clear image
of the graves.

AI manipulation, the denial
and inflation of deaths -

these tactics aren't new.

But in the state's attempt to
display its might internationally,

half-truths and lies
have spilled over.

Iran may see this
as a battle it can win.

Thank you for joining me
in South Sudan.

We want your feedback,
so please let us know

what you think on social media

We will be back next week. Goodbye.