This episode starts in the mines of the Democratic Republic of Congo, where workers as young as nine risk their lives to feed the world’s growing hunger for cobalt – the metal used in iPhones and electric cars. Our chief foreign correspondent tells the harrowing stories of those caught on the front line of this race for green technology. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Inside The Times

Christina Lamb on cobalt mining in the Congo

Billie Eilish is the home-schooled teenage superstar described by many as the future of pop. In an astonishingly honest conversation with our chief interviewer, Billie, who already has 25 million Instagram followers, opens up about therapy, her boyfriend and how success has changed her life — for better and for worse. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Decca Aitkenhead on the future of pop

How did a country with almost no football infrastructure or tradition, a high terrorism risk and searing summer temperatures become the host for the 2022 World Cup? When the Sunday Times Insight team received a cache of documents from a whistleblower, the Qatari success soon developed into one of the greatest sporting scandals of our time. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Jonathan Calvert on how Qatar bought the World Cup

We kicked off 2019 with Theresa May’s Brexit deal getting the thumbs down in parliament and ended it with Boris Johnson as Britain’s prime minister following the result of a momentous general election (and with Brexit firmly back on the agenda). From scoops to verifying sources, Tim Shipman of The Sunday Times talks us through his year in Westminster. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Tim Shipman on government chaos

What is it like to be one of the first journalists to bear witness to an unfolding crisis? Four years after the Saudi-led coalition entered the conflict in Yemen, 14 million people were facing a famine that, if left unchecked, would be the worst in a century. Our diplomatic correspondent travelled to the heart of the regions worst affected and recorded the devastating impact of the war on ordinary people’s lives. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Catherine Philp on the Yemen crisis

It took an extraordinary military blitz to rout Isis from its de facto capital, Raqqa. The trauma and terror of those final days were witnessed first hand by Richard Spencer. Here he describes what it was like to enter the devastated Syrian city and pick over the remnants of the once mighty caliphate. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Richard Spencer on the fall of Raqqa

Sometimes scandals happen under our noses. Over several months our head of investigations set about exposing the government’s complicity in facilitating forced marriages. Here he explains how he discovered that government officials were charging teenage British girls fees to be rescued from abusers. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Paul Morgan-Bentley on forced marriage in the UK

Four years ago Shamima Begum, then aged 15, ran away from her home in Bethnal Green, London, to marry an Isis fighter. Nothing more was heard from her until our renowned war correspondent tracked her down in a camp in Syria. His discovery stunned the world, setting in motion a chain of events that would change her life for ever. Here’s how he did it. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Anthony Loyd on finding Shamima Begum

Go behind the story on some of the biggest stories from the Times and the Sunday Times. From Anthony Loyd on Shamima Begum to Jonathan Calvert on how How Qatar bought the World Cup.

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Inside The Times

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