Sunday Extra - Separate stories podcast

This week's mystery caller is a colourful summer migrant to Far North Queensland – the Buff-breasted Paradise-Kingfisher.

Omar El Akaad was at college in 2001 when the opportunity to become a writer opened up before him. Over the following decades this path would lead him through the violence of war in Afghanistan, the hidden injustices of Guantanomo Bay and the electric energy of the Arab Spring in Egypt. It would also allow him, in 2023 to voice his anger, disgust and outrage at the images he saw coming out of Gaza, which he has stilled in his latest book, part memoir, part searing manifesto, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This. 

Guest: Omar El A...

It is the 10th year of the ReelOzInd! short film festival which is open to filmmakers from both Australia and Indonesia. The finalists are shown in both Indonesia and Australia both at the launch and as a pop up festival. This year's theme for the festival was imajinasi. The winning film this year centres on a father facing life as an empty nester.

Guests: Jemma Purdey, Festival Director and Trivita Tiffany Winataputri, the winner of this year's competition for her fllm You, Me and that Chair 

Click here to find more about the ReelOzInd! festival a...

Anti-immigration protests have become a regular fixture of the Australian news cycle. In the UK, CNN reported that anti-immigration rallies in London in September were attended by around 110 thousand people. That is the context for the upcoming 2025 Colin Clark Lecture at the University of Queensland on 29 October

Raila Odinga 'a towering figure in Kenyan politics' died on 15 October 2025, aged 80. A former Prime Minister, and son of Kenya’s first Vice-President, Odinga also famously ran in every Presidential election since 1997 bar one, never actually obtaining that office. 

Thirteen years after U Thant left his position as a school teacher in a small village in Burma, he found himself appointed as Secretary General of the United Nations. 

He was highly involved in many peace negotiations in his 10 years at the helm of the UN, including the Cuban missile crisis, the Congo, the Middle East and many more. Why is his legacy as a peacemaker largely forgotten?

Guest: Thant Myint U, historian, academic and author of The Peacemaker:  U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World 

Getting fired isn't normally something to celebrate, but Laura Brown, along with co-author Kristine O'Neill have created a part-memoir, part-manifesto for the modern woman - All the Cool Girls Get Fired. And it considers why the corporate ladder was never built for women, and how getting knocked off can be a blessing in disguise. 

Guest: Laura Brown, co-author of All The Cool Girls Get Fired

50 years after the murder of the Balibo 5 and 18 years after a coronial inquest confirmed the Australian journalists were deliberately shot by Indonesian forces, no action has been taken for accountability of the war crime. But one campaigner, Professor Clinton Fernandes, has been rallying to have the Balibo files declassified. 

Guest: Clinton Fernandes, Professor of International and Political Studies at UNSW

Theresa Payton made history as the first female Chief Information Officer in the White House, where she steered digital transformation strategy and helped secure critical government systems. With an increase in cybercrime in Australia, what's her advice to Australians on how to stay safe online and how to harness the enormous capabilities of generative AI without losing the human touch?

Guest: Theresa Payton - CEO of Fortalice Solutions and former White House Chief Information Officer

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller is the architect of a suite of Donald Trump's hardline border policies, from the so-called “Muslim ban” to the ICE raids on undocumented immigrants. He has been described as a “race-baiting” nativist who is the “root of all evil” in the Trump administration. Who is Stephen Miller and why does he hold so much sway over the president?

Guest: David Klion, columnist for The Nation magazine and contributing editor at Jewish Currents. 

Stephanie Dogfoot is a comedian, poet and lawyer based in Singapore. They have been performing since 2008 and has established open mic nights for poets and comedians in particular encouraging women and the LGBTQI community to get up and perform. They have been forced to come out as bisexual in many different places and the reception is always different.

Guest: Stephanie Dogfoot, poet and comedian. She will be reading some of her poems at Queersland as part of the Brisbane Writers Festival and performing her stand up comedy show Gold Star Bisexual at the Melbourne Fringe Festival

From his early news on the business desk at a number of newspapers to a stint behind the scenes in Victorian state politics to the founding of the online news site Crikey, Stephen Mayne's career has occurred at the nexus of business, politics and journalism.

And while those worlds are often the scene of a lot of shenanigans and grubbiness, Stephen has made it his business to let some light in.

Stephen is now what could be called a professional corporate trouble maker, though his official title is full-time shareholder activist and publisher of The...

If you have ever had a medical procedure in a hospital, you might have noticed that much of the medical equipment that you came into contact with went straight into the bin afterwards. 

Since resigning as UK Prime Minister in 2007, Tony Blair has maintained an active interest in the Middle East through his think tank The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change. Carole Cadwalladr has been an investigative journalist for over 20 years and is now writing for the media outlet The Nerve. She has been digging into who funds his institute and whether this will compromise his proposed role in the running of Gaza. 

Guest: Carole Cadwalladr, investigative journalist with The Nerve and author of the Substack How to Survive the Broliarchy

Josh Neille took home his first animal to care for when he was eight years old. Now he is a registered wildlife carer in Gippsland VIctoria where he, his partner Amber and daughter Ashlee care for all sorts of wildlife from wombats to kangaroos, birds and snakes and turtles. Now Josh has a huge social media following as he tells the stories of both his successes and failures as a wildlife carer.

Guest: Josh Neille, wild life carer and author of Growing Up Wombat (Affirm Press) You can follow Josh on Tik Tok, Instagram or Facebook too.<...

Dr Margaret Leggatt and Sandy Jeffs are the authors of Out of the Madhouse: From Asylums to Mental Health Reform – Who Cares? 

The book focuses on the now-closed Larundel Psychiatric Hospital in Melbourne, but it has been re-released this week with updated coverage including of Victoria’s Royal Commission into the Mental Health System handed down in February 2021.

University of Sydney academics Dr Nick Riemer and Professor John Keane will be facing the Federal Court on Monday 13th October after university colleagues made a complaint of anti-Semitism against them under Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act. The case hinges on whether criticism of Israel and Zionism equates to anti-Semitism.

Guest: Dr Nick Riemer, Senior Lecturer in Linguistics, University of Sydney

While the physical condition of the 20 living hostages is unknown, it is anticipated that the 2 years spent in captivity has had an extreme impact on all aspects of their health and will require ongoing treatment.

Historian Dr. Emily Gallagher believes that the playtime of a generation is as much a reflection of a cultural history of a time and a place as it is an individual memory. 

Murray Hunter is a retired academic and author who writes a substack column on Southeast Asian politics, with an emphasis on Malaysia where he lived and worked for thirty years. Now living in Thailand he was arrested at Bangkok airport and charged in relation to defamation charged brought against him by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission. After a night in a Thai jail he was granted bail.  He believes that this is an another example of cooperation across ASEAN in transnational repression.

Guest: Murray Hunter, retired academic, author and journalist

Murray Hunter's Substack

Syria will mark a major milestone today when it holds its first election since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime late last year.

Geraldine Cox started her long career with DFAT with a posting to Cambodia in the 1970s. In 1993 she was working for a bank when she went back to Cambodia for a visit.  The trip changed her life forever when she decided to give up her city life to run an orphanage in Cambodia - which she is still doing 30 years later. 

Guest: Geraldine Cox, founder of Sunrise Cambodia and author of Home is Where the Heart is.

Snakes and serpents appear in the stories of cultures all over the world. What can these tales tell us about the world today?

Cultural institutions that find their collections contain artefacts have been stolen or obtained illegally are reckoning with how to return important pieces of cultural history.

This week's croak is the Easter Sign Bearing Froglet.

The latest ABS data shows the amount of sugar in the food and drinks we consume has reduced significantly since 1995. 

Steven Freeland is the Chair of the UNCOPUOS Working Group on the Legal Aspect of Space Resources Activity which means that he tries to get 110 countries to agree on the rules regarding space. Given the current state of hostiles on earth, that would seem to be a daunting task, but Steven Freeland remains optimistic, while acknowledging the challenges in getting agreement on what the rules in space should be.

Guest : Steven Freeland, Chair of the UNCOPUOS Working Group on the Legal Aspect of Space Resources Activity and Emeritus Professor at Bond University and the University of Western Sy...

The Australian Native Food Festival has been in the works for many years, delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. But finally, more than 20 First Nations vendors will gather as part of the festival's market. Several talks and demonstrations will also be taking place.

The founders of Australian Wrongful and Arbitrary Detention Alliance have a unique and unenviable qualification in common. 

Sean Turnell, Kylie Moore-Gilbert and our guest today Cheng Lei all experienced wrongful and arbitrary detention in a foreign country.

Cheng Lei has written about her life and the experience of being deprived of her freedom in the book she calls a “Memoir of Freedom”.  

Can you guess this week's tweeter?

The Rocky Horror Picture Show was released in American cinemas on 26 September 1975 and despite disappointing early performance, the sexually adventurous satirical sci-fi musical has been running ever since … thanks to its uniquely devoted fan base. 

18-year old Nila Ibrahimi fled her home in the days after the Taliban retook the city in 2021. 

She now gives a voice to Afghan girls and women who are suffering severe repression at the hands of the Taliban. 

Nila won the 2024 International Children’s Peace Prize and will present this year’s Gandhi Oration at the University of New South Wales.

Guest: Nila Ibrahimi, human rights activist.

Robotics and farming. That’s the subject of an address given in Perth earlier this week by Salah Sukkarieh, Professor of Robotics and Intelligent Systems at the Australian Centre for Robotics, which is part of Sydney University.

Japan could have its first female Prime Minister next week, as 5 candidates compete in a leadership contest for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

A snap general election was called after the last Prime Minister, Shigeru Ishiba, stepped down.

One of the key considerations in the election is which candidate is best placed to deal with US President Donald Trump whose tariffs are crippling Japan’s car industry.

Guest: Roger Pulvers, playwright and commentator on Japanese politics.

Europe is closely watching Moldova’s parliamentary elections which will help determine if the former Soviet republic continues on its pro-western path or falls back under Moscow’s orbit. Russia has been accused of election interference using information warfare, illicit financing, cyber-attacks and a plot to incite riots.

Guest: Linnea Wickman, Swedish MP and election observer.

Vivian Pham started writing her novel, The Coconut Children, when she was 16. After publishing in 2020, she was asked to convert it into a stage play. At the time, she had never watched a contemporary theatre performance. Now, it's set to be the largest production of Belvoir's season.

Set in a south-west Sydney Vietnamese-Australian community in the late 90s, the Coconut Children was inspired by her father's experience fleeing Vietnam at 17 years old.

Guest: Vivian Pham, author of Coconut Children.

Monash University academics Dr Daniel Heller and Dr Farid Zaid noticed their students were increasingly unwilling or unable to discuss controversial or uncomfortable conversations and were instead staying silent in class, while a minority of voices on the extremes dominated debates.

This week's mystery caller is the largest of a family of four unique, tiny Australian birds – the Red-browed Pardalote.

In 2024 a record 13,350 million students sat for China's gaokao university entrance exam. Chinese students start preparing for the test in primary school and the result can determine the course of the rest of their lives.

Gary Stevenson used to be a  successful trader, making millions of pounds betting on the economic downfall of the economy. But his real success has come from leaving the world of high-flying traders and starting a YouTube channel, Gary's Economics, in which he breaks down the causes of financial inequality and offers bold solutions on how to restart the entire western financial system. 

Guest: Gary Stevenson, Inequality Economist, YouTuber and author of The Trading Game: A Confession.

Gary Stevenson will be touring Australia in Feb-Mar 2026.