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From Our Own Correspondent

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Kate Adie introduces insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents and writers.

Kate Adie introduces insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents, journalists and writers telling stories from around the world.

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From Our Own Correspondent: 24/04/2010

24/04/2010

BBC Radio 4 - From Our Own Correspondent, 24/04/2010

Kate Adie introduces BBC foreign correspondents with the stories behind the headlines.

Kate Adie introduces dispatches from foreign correspondents in Thailand, Algeria, Spain, Ghana and the North Pole, telling the stories behind the world's headlines.

Life in Bangkok's endless state of political chaos..

Are what Algerians call their "Black Years" finally coming to an end?

Spain forgets the lessons of history, and its orchards start to run dry...

And how Noah's Ark inspired the astonishing inventions of a Holy Man in Ghana..


For several weeks now, the centre of Bangkok has been a political battleground -- the scene of extraordinary tensions. Protestors, known as "Red Shirts", have set up camps and barricades and they've been living in the streets. They're demanding the government's resignation. They say it's illegitimate, having been the product of a parliamentary deal rather than an election. There's been serious violence, and there's always the danger of more. Rachel Harvey has been watching the crisis from the start. 

For too long, Algerians have been forced to live in the shadow of violence. All through the 90s the armed forces fought Islamist militants in a conflict that cost more than a-hundred-and-fifty thousand lives. And then in 2007 Al Qaeda began to strike. There was a long string of bombings as the government, the security forces and foreigners were targeted.But more recently there's been an easing of the tensions, and Chloe Arnold sees signs of a gradual..cautious..return to better times. 

West Africa is home to countless churches and spiritual groups. Among them is one in Ghana that goes beyond the traditional concerns for the souls of believers. The Kristo Asafo Church puts huge faith in the power of technology. Its leader, the Apostle Asafo sees the act of manufacturing as being a way to raise up and inspire his people. And as Neil McCarthy has been finding out, the church has got into the making of cars, aircraft...and some quite extraordinary lavatories.. 

Nothing in the world of sport has a history quite like the Marathon. Legend has it that it was first run by a messenger, bringing news of a glorious Greek victory. And the road from Athens to the battlefield at Marathon in the heat of summer will always be the classic route. But these days the great race is run all over the world. And one of my colleagues, Paddy Clark has just taken part in a marathon as far from the sizzling roads of Greece as you could possibly imagine.. 

Not so very long ago, Spain's Mediterranean coast was rather sleepy and forgotten...a place mostly left to its fishermen and shepherds. But recent decades of prosperity have transformed the Costas. They've become one of Europe's playgrounds, with the massive development of hotels and resorts and golf courses and so on. But of course, all of this consumes more and more water in what is an arid land..and Alex Bell points out, the regions problems are mounting up..

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24/04/2010

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