 Welcome once again to the breakfast here on PLOS TV Africa and now to a little bit of history. I'm going back to 2005 actually. This week we've spoken a little bit about international collaborations, foreign interests and some of all of that and that includes the Afghanistan issues. And I made mention of the parts where Russia and China may also be involved politically that we may not understand entirely yet. And if you remember also when the crisis in Syria was at its peak when there were also militants trying to take over the government of Assad back then there was you could you could tell that there were interests between two different countries the United States and Russia. They both had different interests on the same issue. Russia was of course supporting Assad. The United States used every single bit of its media to try to paint a particular story and Assad was bombing his people with biological weapons and some of all of that. But of course his politics is war you know. So on this day in 2005 there was the first ever joint military exercise between Russia and China. They somehow some way have always had you know pretty much similar interests politically and of course you know maybe economically also. It was called the peace mission and it was in 2005 we began on this day. The exercise started on the 19th of August and consisted of a combined land, sea and air elements, simulated an intervention in a state besieged by terrorist or political turmoil. The force practiced air naval blockades and amphibious assault and occupying a region. Approximately 8,000 Chinese troops took part along with 2,000 Russian troops. But listen the United States was not invited to observe the exercise. They stated the reason is the reason stated was that the exercise was for counter-terrorism and so they were not invited. It was just Russia and China. So that's why you know I started with the Assad narrative you know because of the roles that they played and if you if you see a lot of times there's always some interest. In the United States and South Korea you know would always you know be brothers you know in war with same with France and the UK all you know in the same space but sometimes you would always see that Vladimir Putin always has a totally different perspective with regards war politics. Yeah this was interesting the war games of 2005 it was a military operation that lasted eight days. We know first of all that China and Russia have you know some of the actually the top two or they are among the top three you know largest you know military in the world. So they did this military drills for eight days basically simulating an imaginary country that was under a terrorist attack and what exactly they would do. China and Russia brought the armed forces together to do those drills and I think that's great you know maybe the key to you know solving our own security threats is you know international collaboration with you know other armed forces of other countries who knows you know. No it's not it's it's been able to it's been to do your issues by yourself and Afghanistan is a perfect example of why you should be able to sort out your own. Who are your horses. I mean it's pretty simple you know I listened to the Daily yesterday I think it's the podcast yesterday and so there was a build up to this as a particular reporter who has been she's from Afghanistan but she's reported for Washington Washington Post for a couple of years. So there was a daily countdown just before they eventually took a couple she was you know sharing you know voice notes with the Washington Post trying to get out you know of Afghanistan till you know yesterday when the podcast was put out she still was you know in Afghanistan and her life is in danger. Yeah lots of reporters are trapped in there. Yeah but the point is you know one of the things that was mentioned you know one of the people that I interviewed she stated how much corruption you know is a key factor in why Afghanistan fell and how Ghani and his and his government and every other person who has been in there in the last 20 years has really just been stealing you know from Afghanistan and not doing anything to actually boost the army or make the army better or make their defense better. So the US will only help you for as long as it can you know and of course benefits for as much as it can but if you can't help yourself then you're on your own absolutely on your own. Okay let's go to 2003 where on this day a cab bomb actually attacked the United Nations headquarters and that was in Iraq and it killed the agency's top envoys and about 21 other employees. It was a very sad day in history and it wasn't the first time we've seen attacks on humanitarian agencies, aid workers, people who you know volunteer their time you know to go help out countries like Iraq, even Nigeria where they're a humanitarian crisis and then they end up becoming victims of the situation they stepped in to resolve. So it was a cab bomb at the canal hotel in Baghdad in Iraq. It killed 22 people including that United Nations special representative Sergio Viria de Mello, wounded over 100 people including a human rights lawyer. That blast targeted the United Nations assistance mission in Iraq which cross created just five days earlier after that bombing about 600 UN staff were withdrawn from Iraq and it had this ripple effect across humanitarian services across the world. It's weird how you know this happened you know two years after 9-11 in 2001 and at this time the United States was already in Iraq carrying out their own war to try to you know defeat you know al-Qaeda and the Taliban and you know some have been laden. There was still of course you know the influence and the effect of these terrorist groups at that time. Iraq has not really been in the news lately for some of all these things but it's just really really sad how lives need to be lost every now and then. Yeah terrible and it just cast my mind back to two years ago when we saw the killing of aid workers here in Nigeria you know I'm staff of the Red Cross abducted and killed you know it's it's it's terrible that these continues to happen and just a weird situation where you also consider what's happening in Ethiopia the Tigray region how you know humanitarian workers become victims of the of circumstances you know but that's what happened in the same history in 2005. We'll take a break here and when we come back we'll be talking about the situation in Zamfara state where kidnapped students of the College of Agriculture in Zamfara will send them surface in a video where they're pleading to the federal government to make sure that they are released and also communicating the wishes of these bandits for Iran some of about 350 million Naira stay with us.