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The Fifth Floor

Factual: Life Stories

Global stories from the BBC’s 40 Language Services, with Faranak Amidi

Faranak Amidi presents global stories from the Fifth Floor, home to the BBC’s 40 Language Services.

Faranak Amidi presents global stories from the Fifth Floor, home to the BBC’s 40 Language Services

The Fifth Floor: Inside the Taliban Psyche

Inside the Taliban psyche

24/05/2013

Inside the Taliban Psyche

BBC World Service - The Fifth Floor, Inside the Taliban Psyche

Is there such thing as "Good Taliban, Bad Taliban"?

Good Taliban, Bad Taliban?; Farewell Chinua Achebe; Loo paper politics; Kyrgyz underworld, and Eritrea at 20.

Good Taliban, Bad Taliban
Just two weeks after the bloodiest elections that Pakistan has ever seen at the hands of the Taliban, the winner of those very same elections has called the Taliban to the table for talks.  There has been an ongoing media debate about who are the good Taliban and who are the bad Taliban.  Who would we like to bring to the negotiating table and who are the bad ones spilling blood? How do you differentiate between the two? We hear from Mohammed Hanif in Karachi and Saqlain Imam from BBC Urdu  talks us through how we have come to this point so fast.

Farewell Achebe
As Chinua Achebe is buried this week, BBC Africa's Bilkisu Labaran and Veronique Edwards remember the great Nigerian writer.

Loo Paper Politics 
In an attempt to avert an economic crisis, the Venezuelan government imported 50 million toilet rolls last week. Apparently the lack of toilet paper was one of the final indignities that put the nail in the coffin of the Soviet bloc almost 25 years ago. A Fifth Floor Venezeulan, Vietnamese and Azeri wonder what it is about toilet rolls and communism. 

Kyrgyz Underworld
One of the stories that has recently been dominating the Kyrgyz section is the row over the release from prison of a criminal boss Aziz Batukayev. Questions have been raised over why he was set free. Batukayev  was running most of Kyrgyzstan's prisons. The tradition dates back to Soviet times but is still very much alive.  Hamid Ismailov, Olexiy Solohubenko and Alexander Kan explain. 

Eritrea at 20
It's officially 20 years since Eritrea's independence from Ethiopia. We bring together the only Eritrean working at the BBC, Efrem Gebreab with Hewete Haileselassie an Ethiopian who works for BBC Africa to talk about identity issues and growing up in the diaspora.

Image: A former Taliban fighter looks on after joining Afghan government forces during a ceremony in Herat province on March 26, 2012.  
Credit: AFP/Getty Images

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