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The Current Transcript for July 14, 2021

Host: Mark Kelley

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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Space people tend to be elitist men like our space people, we're smart space people like having like groupies and stuff. We need to go back to the days where we accepted that we were custodians of life instead of like owners of it.

MARK KELLEY: Governments, sciextinguish billionaires. It doesn't matter who the space travellers are, they're leaving litter behind after every mission. The more we move into the final frontier, the more space junk builds up. We will revisit Matt Galloway conversation with Space Scientist more about your in about 30 minutes. Also this morning

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I don't want little black girls or boys to look at elite swimming and think it's not a something. I can't wear my hair the way I want to find another school. That's not what we wanted.

MK: A swimming cap made for natural black hair has been banned by the International Swimming Federation. We'll talk about yet another barrier for black people in the pool and how to make the sport more inclusive. We'll also return to Cryptoland with Episode two of the new CBC podcast that delves into the mysterious death of a young Canadian cryptocurrency CEO. But we begin with Afghanistan, a country on the brink as U.S. forces take their leave. Good morning. I'm Mark Kelley, and you're listening to The Current.

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Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan sparks fear, but others dispute group's 'propaganda'

Guest: Jim Davis, Muska Dastageer

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Our allies and partners have stood beside us shoulder to shoulder in Afghanistan for almost 20 years, and we're deeply grateful for the contributions they've made to our shared mission and for the sacrifices they have borne.

MK: That was the U.S. president, Joe Biden, in April telling his nation and the world that what has felt like an endless war has finally come to an end. Now, those words have become reality on the ground in Afghanistan as U.S. troops pull out. This week, the top U.S. commander relinquished his position at a ceremony in Kabul. The move has already emboldened a resurgent Taliban and could see the country return to that that group's ruthless rule. Jim Davis lost his son, Canadian Corporal Paul Davis, to the war in Afghanistan. Jim, good morning.

JIM DAVIS: Good morning, Mark.

MK: It's a sensitive conversation, and I do appreciate you making time with us, sir. What went through your mind when you heard the U.S. President Biden promise to end what's called the Forever War? We knew that they wouldn't be there forever. We knew this would end and now it's ending. How do you feel about that?

JIM DAVIS: Well, the first thing that crossed my mind was I was appreciative of President Biden saying that he was going to work with the rest of the NATO countries, in other words, work with Canada and et cetera. And how we do the withdrawal wasn't they didn't come across that it was just going to be a pullout. But since then, I'm a little nervous because you just look at what happened, 22 specials. So Afghan soldiers surrendered to the Taliban and were immediately executed. And I remember President Biden making the comment that these special Afghan soldiers are well trained by U.S. soldiers. And I know Canada has been over there training soldiers, too. So I'm, I'm scared to death. I'm very nervous because I think the inevitable is going to happen. I believe the Taliban will eventually take the country back because I think the current government will collapse.

MK: Well, let's talk about your son in the contribution that that he made.

JIM DAVIS: Well, I tell you, I've been giving a lot of thought about the comment that our soldiers died in vain. That means that somebody sacrificed their life hoping to make things better. And if things don't get better than they died in vain. But when you're asking me about my boy, I spent two hours with him before he boarded the plane to go to Afghanistan in Winnipeg. And we had quite the conversation. And I know deep down he honestly believed he was going to Afghanistan to make a better life for the people of Afghanistan, especially the women and the young girls. So what I know is that he died for a good cause, which has nothing to do with dying in vain. I just put the dying in vain, out of my mind completely, because I think Paul and the rest of his comrades that fell over there, they died an honourable death and they were doing a good cause. If I may take a moment, Mark, my son's funeral at the reception to women from Afghanistan came to me to give me their condolences through the interpreter. And I looked at them and I saw in their eyes and what I saw was broken souls. I thought here were two women that have come so far to a foreign country like Canada. AndI could see that I could immediately read the hardship that they were coming from. And that's when I knew my boy died for a good cause. If you understand what I'm saying.

MK: Do you remember of conversations you had with your son or maybe letters or communication you had with him when he was in Afghanistan? Did he feel he was making a difference when he was on the ground there?

JIM DAVIS: Well, he unfortunately, he died in March of 2006 and he was on the search and destroy mission to root out the Taliban in southern Kandahar. Canada was just taken over the mission from the United States. So he was the first casualty that Canada lost. He was also the last one to die under U.S. commanders. Canada was just taken over the mission. But I've talked to so many veterans and so many families that have lost somebody since then. And, yes, I can tell you they were making a huge difference. Canada accomplished a lot there. And Sharon and I visited Afghanistan. The Canadian military sent us over to help us with our grief. And I could read how wonderful things were in Afghanistan with the Canadian soldiers. They were doing a good job. They knew it. And you could tell. And the message I would like to give the veterans that have come home with injuries, my son Paul would be so happy that they did come back that they made it home safely. And I want them to know that they've honourable work over there. It's just sad that it's 20 years have gone by and it's going to go back to the way it used to be.

MK: Is that your worst fear? Because as we know now, the Taliban is controlling at least 85 percent of the country and that's slipping day by day. We're hearing about the fact that women are now being told they can no longer go to school, that they must stay at home, they cannot leave their homes unaccompanied. Do you feel that all those gains that your son was part of that was made there are now being lost in a short a short period?

JIM DAVIS: And that is so true and that's what's disheartening. But we don't live in a perfect world. I don't know what the answer is, how we could have prevented that. It was NATO forces were there and it would have been so much nicer if the U.N. could work with all these other countries, like with Iran etc., even Russia and China, if we could somehow all get together and say, look, let's bring peace to Afghanistan, but unfortunately that's that was that will never happen. And it's just very sad. And my biggest fear is, is that it could get so bad that we may find ourselves back there again.

MK: I could I understand that you met former president Afghan President Hamid Karzai in 2006 in Ottawa, not not long after your son was killed. You said something to him. What did you say to him?

JIM DAVIS: I did meet President Karzai and it was at a reception in Ottawa, the House of Commons private reception. He was giving me his condolences for the loss of my son. And as he held my hand, I pulled my hand away and took his hand. And I said, Mr President, I have a message for you. And I told him about the two ladies that came to my son's funeral. And I said when I met them, that's when I knew why my son had to die in your country. And I said, there will be peace in your country someday, sir. And when I said that to them, it's incredible, Mark. I could see tears in his eyes swelling up in his eyes. He was emotionally touched by that.

MK: Jim, do you still believe there will be peace in Afghanistan one day, that perhaps your son will be part of that legacy?

JIM DAVIS: Well, that's was my wish. I wanted to go visit Afghanistan a second time and be there to really appreciate it, if that's where my son died. But I just can't see peace coming. So for President Biden to say, OK, it's got to come to an end. I agree with him. Yes, it's got to come to an end for the allies. But I don't know how you do that. Just worries me. And I do want to stress the point that our soldiers, the ones that have been injured, the 40000 that were there, they all deserve a medal of honour because they were there for a good cause. And while Canada was there, they did good work. And I believe they did make a difference. It's just unfortunate that it may not last.

MK: I appreciate your time today on this sensitive subject. Thank you so much.

JIM DAVIS: Well, thank you, Mark, for giving me the opportunity to say this. And I do want to stress the point to any veterans out there listening to me. I'm proud of all you. And there's one thing I'd like to say when I'm with a bunch of veterans at whatever ceremony is going on and I'm with veterans. I can feel my son's spirit is with all of you.

MK: [Unintelligible] Jim, thank you.

JIM DAVIS: Thank you.

MK: MK: Jim Davis is the father of Corporal Paul Davis, who died in Afghanistan as part of Canada's mission there. We reached him in his home in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia. Muska Dastageer has been listening in. She's an anti-corruption expert and a lecturer in peace and conflict resolution, political theory and gender studies at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul, Muska. Good morning.

MUSKA DASTAGEER: Good morning.

MK: You live and work in Kabul, as I mentioned, how is life in the capital changing as U.S. soldiers leave and the Taliban advances?

MUSKA DASTAGEER: Well, let me just first say that I'm hearing from the father of Corporal Paul Davis was extremely moving. And I think that the efforts of Afghans to secure peace right now, it is for Afghanistan. And it and it also honours the incredible sacrifice that young men and women from countries in the West gave. So just very grateful that I got to listen to that and very moving. So to come to your question, I am a woman. I'm an I'm an academic. I'm a lecturer. So events unfolding right now in Afghanistan do affect my life. Sure. But I don't see risks and vulnerabilities of the current moment, you know, and what lies ahead through the lens of my own life, just because I consider myself quite privileged. I'm educated, I write, I have a voice and so on. The risks and vulnerabilities I see them through the lens of the most disadvantaged, those most at risk in Afghanistan. So millions upon millions of little girls and young women who have not yet begun their schooling, who have begun it, who risk seeing it discontinued, they are at risk of seeing their lives, their existence diminished. And I think one of the most poignant ways that I can illustrate this danger to you is to conjure up to you the fate of millions of Afghan women of the older generations who lived through the 90s as adults, many of whom had been educated. These were doctors, engineers, scholars, architects, what have you not, nurses. And they've now spent decades essentially at home within the four walls of the home. And despite the fact the Taliban have not been in power for some 20 years, the after effects of those just five years that they were in power from 1996 to 2001, they were so deep rooted, they were so powerful that public space to this day still is hostile to women. You know, women going into the labour market, women getting educated. There are still so many challenges. So what risks befalling little girls and young women today is that same fate. And workers like those who were young during the Taliban years, many would not be educated or they would only be educated to a very limited degree. And it's really crucial for me to emphasise that this isn't just a personal tragedy that's going to be playing out, you know, in millions of hearts, millions of minds and millions of homes. It's a tragedy for Afghanistan. You know, holding back half of the population essentially means holding back the country, a country that disempowers its women, that limits the pursuit of knowledge. Also for men, by the way, of secular education is a country with which and against which anything can be done.

MK: But do you see that now as an unstoppable force? The fact that the Taliban are now controlling 85 percent of the country and that's and that's changing by day. Do you see that this is an inevitable reality of your life now that they will be controlling the country and they will be disempowering women like you?

MUSKA DASTAGEER: So first of all, the 85 percent, I would say, is disputed. Many have challenged it and have challenged the methodology. It coded or categorised contested districts as Taliban controlled district districts, which is categorically untrue. There's a great degree of volatility in the battlefield. So a lot of the districts that have been won by Taliban over the past couple of weeks, a proportion of those have been retaken by the Afghan security forces. And so that's just one thing. But it is absolutely true that there is an onslaught going on right now. They are, judging from their actions, judging from what they're doing, they're very much angling for a military takeover. And if that continues, you know, looking at what they're actually doing, there are video circulating right now showing them executing at close range a group of commanders last month in June. Another video I just saw today shows them killing an elderly man before they do so. The fighters, the fighters who eventually shoots them simply says he is Hazara, an Afghan minority. And then he shoots and said that, as if that is what that is, what determines his death sentence. You know, I hear from across the country there are reports that women are that girls are being told they can't attend school, but not all of it is documented, I have to say that. But from what is documented, including this clip that CNN aired yesterday, it looks like the tactics that they're employing are indistinguishable from what we saw in the '90s. So, yes, it's very much a deep concern

MK: US President Biden says that the Afghan forces are as well equipped as any army in the world. And yet we are hearing about areas falling to the Taliban without a shot being fired. Are you concerned about that vulnerability?

MUSKA DASTAGEER: I mean, yes, but I think it's also important to say that Biden, when he proclaimed the deadline, the withdrawal deadline back in mid-April, that it was going to be in September, you know, it was it was very sudden, I would say, and it may have caught the Afghan government slightly by surprise. You know, I know that Taliban has been asking for a cease fire recently now that they've made territorial gains, a proportion of which, like I said, has been retaken by ANDSF, now they're suddenly overtures from their side to reignite intra Afghan peace talks with the government. And some speculate that it has to do with their capture of border points, where a lot of money, a lot of goods passed through, where anyone who consolidate power on the ground essentially stands to earn a lot of money. Right now, they're unable to capture cities. And if they consolidate their presence and power over border areas, which a cease fire would allow them, would allow them to do by effectively stopping ANDFS from retaking that lost territory, then they could spend the next couple of months, next couple of years growing financially. And one of the benefits of that would be that they'd be able to point to a logical pathway of cause, when it comes to acquiring more sophisticated weaponry as a group, as a proxy, much more than an insurgency. And this is where Western experts get it wrong. They definitely are not alone. But there are limits to how overt that support, that state level support to them can be from regional countries. So then controlling an area that enriches them financially is something that they can point to when acquiring weapons. So, I mean, coming back to your question, are the Afghan forces vulnerable? I think they are on the battlefield, they're actually doing quite well; they're retaking districts. But there is also a psychological war happening here. The psychological warfare, propaganda warfare component of this war is extremely decisive. They've been, you know, the Afghan government, the republic side has not been doing very well. And you know, what I what I've described here is one of the likelier battlefield scenarios I see firming up. But if we move to if we move our eyes to the macro level of reality and to what lies ahead for the country, it's really difficult to prognosticate based on the facts that we have right now.

MK: Just recently, Canada's acting chief of defence staff put out a press release about the fall of Panjwaii. That's an area where many Canadian soldiers had served. And he asked the question, which really struck me, says many of us, these are Canadian soldiers. Many of us have been asking for some years. Was it worth it? How do you answer that question?

MUSKA DASTAGEER: Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, the what has been put into place over the past 20 years is the building blocks of what one day could become a just political order. But it's been less than 20 years since that process began. So the administrative state in Afghanistan, the grid of institutions, including the army, including our defence forces, they're all still incredibly nascent. They're all young. So, you know, that newness, that nascence is something you need to factor into account when you when you see, for instance, within the state, within the administrative state when you see dysfunction like corruption. You need to take that into consideration. And when you consider that newsness, hat nascence, ANDSF is doing incredibly well, you know, they are they are quite impressive, you know, their battlefield performance, despite of the propaganda being propagated right now. But they're doing quite well. And I it's my hope that that that mainstream media is is going to be able to reflect that, reflect that more must go.

MK: I appreciate your time today. Thank you so much. And please stay safe.

MUSKA DASTAGEER: Thank you so much. Thank you.

MK: Muska Dastageer is an anti-corruption expert and a lecturer of peace and conflict resolution, political theory and gender studies at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul. The CBC News is next, then:

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The mission statement that I wrote inside my spacesuit was to turn the dream of space travel into a reality for my grandchildren, for your grandchildren, and for many people who are alive today, for everybody.

MK: Well, I don't know about everybody, but billionaires, astronauts, space tourists. It sure is getting crowded up in space. Problem is, it's already cluttered with something called space junk, what it is and what we can do about it. Matt Galloway a conversation with aerospace engineer, more of a job. It's coming your way in about six minutes time. I'm Mark Kelley. Stay close. You're listening to The Current.

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Why space junk could have damaging consequences

Guest: Moriba Jah

MK: Hello, I'm Mark Kelley and you're listening to The Current.

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MK: Still to come, we will return to A Death in Cryptoland. Episode two of the CBC hit podcast will delve deeper into the mystery of the reported death of cryptocurrency CEO Gerald Cotten and the millions of dollars that disappeared with him. And also, we'll look at the newest barrier for Black swimmers in Tokyo. But first, space as the final frontier for junk.

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VOICE 1: Like most kids, I have dreamt of this moment since I was a kid and honestly, nothing could prepare you for the view of Earth from space. We have this incredible earth anyway.

VOICE 2: I'm just taking it all in. It's just unreal.

MK: That was billionaire Richard Branson, returned to Earth after a quick flight to outer space -- the first in a private spacecraft and while the view from up there must have been beautiful... it might also have been marred by space junk. It turns out that since humans starting going into space, we've been leaving a lot of random stuff up there. It's a threat to anyone and anything in orbit, and there is no plan to clean it up. Moriba Jah is an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin's aerospace engineering and engineering mechanics department. He has been mapping the human-made garbage that's orbiting the earth and tracking the damage it is doing. He spoke with Matt Galloway this winter.

MATT GALLOWAY: Moriba Jah, good morning.

MORIBA JAH: Good morning. How are you?

MATT GALLOWAY: I'm well, thank you. How would you... I mean, I said space junk. How would you define what space junk actually is?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah. So I would say that space junk pretty much is anything that's anthropogenic, so... so human-made, human-derived that is in orbit, that is not serving any useful purpose. So satellites that stop working, the rocket bodies that deliver these things to orbit, you know, nuts, bolts, astronaut gloves floating around, that sort of stuff, all that could be categorized as space junk.

MATT GALLOWAY: How much is up there?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, so there's the trackable population of these anthropogenic space objects ranging in size from about a cell phone all the way up to the space station. And that trackable set is about, I don't know, 26,000-plus objects, of which probably about 3,500, 3,000 are things that work. And everything else is garbage.

MATT GALLOWAY: You did a visualization of this. And, I mean, people can see it online. Describe what that looks like. I mean, it just looks like everything is kind of happening all [laughing] at the same time around the Earth.

MORIBA JAH: Yeah. So, you know, this is like a multi-source, crowdsourced database of stuff in space. And, you know, we have things coming from the US Department of Defense, from Russia, from satellite owner-operators, people that have radars like LeoLabs that are tracking these things. And so it's an amalgamation of all these opinions about stuff in space. And so, yeah, it definitely looks busy. I think one of the... one of the unfortunate aspects of it is that, you know, the dots are not to size or when people see all these dots and the size of the dots, it makes, you know, space look really, really cluttered. But the dots are just to show like location of stuff. And yeah, I mean, there is a lot of traffic there, and it's just increasing.

MATT GALLOWAY: If there's a lot of traffic, why don't we see it in photos? I mean, you see photos of space, you see videos of space. Why don't I see this stuff that's flying around?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah. So these things are too dim for the human eye to mostly see. So the human eye can really see dimness of about six visual magnitude. And, you know, the space station for sure is at least that bright. But, you know, the smaller things, the human eye can't see it, but you know who sees all this stuff all the time? Astronomers, [chuckling] they're pretty upset with all this stuff in Earth orbit, reflecting sunlight towards their, you know, large pieces of glass, trying to look at very dim things.

MATT GALLOWAY: And so you say that it can be as small as a cell phone, as large as a space station, and just everywhere in between?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, and so... and so that's the trackable set. But, you know, actually, there's a hypothesized, I don't know, half-a-million of these objects if we go all the way down to about one millimetre in diameter. So like a, you know, a flick of paint. But the thing is, we can't track things that small. So there's differing numbers between the European Space Agency and NASA as to how many of those things there are because we can't we can't track them.

MATT GALLOWAY: This sounds like an obvious question, but what is wrong with having all of that garbage up there?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, so as it turns out, you know, the garbage is going at very high speeds. And so imagine that we have these highways in space, call them orbital highways. And those orbital highways are populated by things that work but mostly by stuff that doesn't. And things don't really slow down when they stop working. They still go at the same speeds. And so there's potential for, you know, near head-on collisions and stuff like that. And so the things that work are basically, you know, at the mercy of this garbage that's just, you know, orbiting around. And we could lose services and capabilities that we depend upon on a daily basis.

MATT GALLOWAY: Tell me more about that. When you say they're at the mercy, I mean, on the, you know, the orbital highways, is everything kind of moving at the same speed? And you just hope that it just kind of flows along together, or are things are moving at different speeds? How is that unfolding?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, so... so in a given orbital highway, things are moving pretty much at common speeds, you know, that's what, you know, the curvature of space-time tells us. But the thing is, these highways crisscross each other, and that's the thing, there are no stoplights or any of that stuff. And so basically, it's like, I don't know, it's almost like imagine two interstates that actually, like, go through each other. And you just hope that when you're at that juncture that you don't get slammed by something.

MATT GALLOWAY: How fast are things moving up there?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah. So the the things that are really jeopardizing, you know, the stuff that works, the relative speeds are like 15 kilometres per second, so like 15 times the speed of a bullet.

MATT GALLOWAY: And so what happens if something that doesn't work hits, as you say, the stuff that works? And you could talk about something large first? Like, I mean, if you know something the size of a cell phone goes crashing into, you know, a space station or satellite, what happens?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, so, so something the size of a cell phone hitting the space station at these high speeds will totally, like, obliterate a whole section of the space station. Like, we're talking likelihood of of loss of human life as a consequence. If something the size of a cell phone hits one of these working satellites, that's probably game over, you know, for that satellite working. Now, if we go down to millimetre size, speck of paint --

MATT GALLOWAY: Yeah.

MORIBA JAH: That's probably not mission-ending, but it is mission degrading. And so... so it can... it can degrade or cause disruption or at least some partial loss of capability.

MATT GALLOWAY: And when we say the stuff that works, I mean, what sort of satellites are at risk of being hit by some of this junk up there? What would happen here on Earth if that were to unfold?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, so right now, if we look at like different orbital neighbourhoods, one of them is is called low-earth orbit. That goes, you know, up to about 1,200 kilometres in altitude. And that's where most of the stuff is living. You know, Elon Musk's Starlink satellites and all these things are there, Planet Labs. And so we're talking things that provide Earth monitoring, like, you know, things looking down, taking pictures of the Earth all the time, everything from climate change to disaster relief. Certainly, the businesses of Internet from space, those would be potentially impacted. But if you go higher to, like, mid-Earth orbit, then we're talking position navigation and timing services like GPS, GLONASS for Russia, that sort of stuff. That would be a big.... that would be a huge loss because, at this point, a lot of what we do is automated based on these position navigation and timing services. Like, even financial transactions are timestamped with these space-based services and that sort of thing. [49.7s] So losing that would be a really bad day. And if you go a bit higher to geosynchronous orbit, where we have communication satellites and things like, you know, DirecTV and that sort of stuff, then... then losing those is also a bad day.

MATT GALLOWAY: A bad day is putting it bluntly, I think.

MORIBA JAH: Yes.

MATT GALLOWAY: How often are there collisions in those... on the space highways between the stuff? It seems like you don't hear that often that much about that. But does it happen regularly?

MORIBA JAH: So, you know, the... the... the honest answer is we just don't know how... how often these things are happening. We can say this: given evidence of, you know, at least, you know, astronauts doing their spacewalks and going outside of the space station, this stuff is pitted, man. Like, I have some good friends of mine are former astronauts like Susan Helms. You know, she was saying that the portion of the station that... that is, let's call it, mostly up-wind, the forward direction, she said that she would hear things, you know, like, dinging the side of the hull frequently. And, you know, and that was a bit nerve-racking. And so we know that the smaller things are interacting with these large, trackable things very frequently. But like I said, those aren't necessarily mission-ending. It all depends. But the larger stuff, there aren't so many known collisions of those things happening. I think probably the most, you know, famous or infamous, as it were, is between a working satellite, Iridium, and a dead satellite from Russia, Cosmos. They... they met each other, you know, in about 2009, and that... that meeting resulted in thousands and thousands of pieces of debris. So when two things collide, they become many, many, many pieces that are smaller. And that's part of the problem. But we have had quite a few explosions of dead rocket bodies and stuff. This is what I call a super spreader events in space because one of these rocket bodies is like a ticking time bomb with, like, maybe extra fuel and that sort of stuff. And when it goes boom, then that one object can... can can easily become tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of smaller pieces.

MATT GALLOWAY: I'd read about some of the, you know, wild ideas, maybe practical or not, that people had to try and get some of this junk out of space, where you have, you know, harpoons and you would reel it in or, you would --

MORIBA JAH: I know, fishing, man!

MATT GALLOWAY: [chuckling] Vacuum thing that you'd suck. Does any of that work?

MORIBA JAH: Yes, so the answer is yes, some of that works, but it all... but it all depends on there's no "Lord of the Rings" like one mechanism to rule them all. It all depends on the type of object. So certain technologies and techniques are most optimized for certain sizes and classes. So you need kind of an all hands on deck, kind of all of the above approach. But the really sad thing, man, about this is that, people need to accept that space will never be clean.

MATT GALLOWAY: Yeah.

MORIBA JAH: And so.. and so, at best, we have to learn to live in our current state of orbital filth, as it were.

MATT GALLOWAY: It's interesting that you were worried about super spreader events. I mean, that's language that's used around a pandemic right now. Do you see, like, a parallel between all of this?

MORIBA JAH: Well, that's exactly why I use it. And so the biggest... so the biggest contributor to the growth of space junk is actually lack of compliance with what scientists have said. Hey, here... here are these guidelines. If you follow these things, we can mitigate the growth of the debris, the spread of the debris. We can flatten the curve, as it were if you follow these things. And it turns out most people just don't comply with that stuff. So the question is, how do we incentivize people to, you know, just like we have here with the pandemic, with the masking, the social distancing, and stuff like that, how do we incentivize people to actually believe that this stuff is really a problem and just follow those guidelines? So that's the biggest thing. And then the cleaning of the stuff that's like icing on the cake. I mean, we should clean some of it. And certainly, these super spreader events, rocket bodies, not a matter of if when those should be removed.

MATT GALLOWAY: How do you convince people that this is important? I mean, we, you know, he played the little clip there at the beginning of Elon Musk's giant rocket taking 60 more satellites up into space. You go to a national park, and the belief is you take your garbage in, you take your garbage out. How do you convince people that that's important if they're putting things up in space, that they need to be responsible for the waste that they leave behind?

MORIBA JAH: To be honest, I really think that the best way to do that is to enroll humanity in the vision. And what I mean by that is this: space people tend to be elitist, man. You know, it's like, oh, we're space people, we're smart, we get it. Space people like having, like, groupies and stuff, you know, people swarming around, people like Elon or astronauts and this sort of stuff. So what I think we need to do, and certainly this is my... my mantra, I'm on this evangelism to normalize and democratize space, make it accessible to everybody, let people know that space is connected to Earth, oceans, atmosphere and climate. We need to be saying near-earth space is a finite resource because, hey, outer space may be infinite, but these orbital highways are very specific where we have the stuff. This is a heritage of humanity. We need to go back to the days where we accepted that we were custodians of life instead of like owners of it. And everyday humans have a right to understand what's going on up there. I want to make that very visible, push that out there, make it difficult for people to not be aware of it. Then people can go and start exerting pressure on, you know, elected officials in that sort of stuff. It's not going to happen by me talking to companies and saying pretty please with sugar on top. Will you do blank? That's just that's just not going to... look at meat, man. You know what I'm saying? For 30 years, people have been talking about, oh, you know, you should probably decrease your use of meat. I mean, it's not the healthiest thing for you, but there's a huge environmental impact with the way we're doing it. People don't pay attention to that. Well, now that you have something that actually tastes like it and looks like and blah, blah, blah, people are, you know, switching because it's more accessible, you know? So I want to make space accessible to humanity. And I think that's the way to do it.

MATT GALLOWAY: The other part of this is that people would say these satellites are providing some sort of valuable service. I mean, that idea that that you could democratize Internet access, that especially in a pandemic where people are stuck at home, that there's a huge digital divide still, and that if you can figure out a way to close that digital divide, that's something worth wrapping your arms around. What do you make of that?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, I... look, I think that providing global Internet that needs to happen. Most people don't realize that, you know, 50 per cent of humanity doesn't have Internet access. And I think that that makes huge disparities and... and provides significant disadvantages to those that don't have that easy access to information, you know, knowledge, that sort of stuff. So I'm all about evening the playing field when it comes to, you know, being able to have access to that. The... the... the however, comma, that I want to add is it doesn't have to be done in the absence of inclusivity. For all these people that you'd like to provide that and democratize this, that or the other, have a candid conversation. Just let them know, look, this is what I want to do. This is what this technology can do. I want to make some money while at it. There's nothing wrong with that. I can do great things and make a profit by being helpful and providing a service to humanity. But also, here are the consequences of me doing this. It means that when you look up at the sky, you're going to see more stuff moving. It means this, that or the other. It's like, let's have an inclusive dialogue. And my guess is there's a way forward. What I don't like is when people just say, well, the legal framework doesn't say that I have to have the inclusive dialogue, so I'm just going to do what's legal.

MATT GALLOWAY: You said that we should think of space in some ways, you know, is we talk about earth and air and water, that space needs to be part of that larger environmental conversation. We've already done enormous damage to the environment. Are you optimistic that people could be inspired to stop polluting space, to stop leaving their garbage there?

MORIBA JAH: Yeah, I am, I am. I... I believe in it with all of my being. And I think the thing that gives me some evidence that that belief, you know, is... is based on something foundational and of substance, is that especially the younger generation, even my students, they care about this stuff. Like, I'm getting people saying, look, and I have to also say I think we're... we're... we're walking into a next scientific revolution. I'm calling it a Renaissance encore. I think we're there. And the thing is, this is brought about by wicked problems. So problems that have huge societal consequences and cultural consequences. And, you know, space is a complex system by every stretch of the imagination, I... I think these wicked problems only get solved through trans-disciplinarity, where... where all of these different disciplines need to come together and contribute, and I'm finding more and more people caring about that stuff. And it's like nine out of... nine out of 10 times, if you tell people, look, here's... here's how you can do this, but here's how you can do it and be sustainable while you do it and be compassionate in doing this. Nine out of 10 times, I find that people will choose that path, you know, so... so I'm very hopeful.

MATT GALLOWAY: I hope you're right because it's terrifying to think of all this stuff [chuckling] swirling around up above us. Moriba Jah, it's great to talk to you about this. Thank you very much.

MORIBA JAH: No worries, Brother! Any time. Thank you.

MK: Matt Galloway spoke with Moriba Jah in February. He is an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin's aerospace engineering and engineering mechanics department. The mysteries of outer space are not just the domain of scientists and billionaires. There are hundreds of songs written about the cosmos. Here's one of our favourites. From 1972 this is Supersonic Rocket Ship by British rockers The Kinks.

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[Song]

MK: Coming up after your regional update.

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It is a message that is going forth to Africans, Caribbeans, Asians, ethnically diverse communities, to say that the sport of elite swimming is not inclusive for all.

MK: A decision to ban swim caps made for natural Black hair is making waves just ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. And we'll continue the CBC podcast A Death in Cryptoland. I'm Mark Kelley and you're listening to The Current.

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Swim cap for natural Black hair banned from Olympics; and Episode 2 of A Death in Cryptoland

Guest: Chantique Carey-Payne

MK: I'm Mark Kelly, and you're listening to The Current,

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My mom used to relax my hair and then braid it to make sure it would fit into the cap and just make our lives easier. And that is only one of the older that I've been able to find ways to manage it. And it's not to form. I don't want little black girls or black boys to look at elite swimming and think it's not open to them because it is completely the wrong idea.

MK: Alice Dearing is the only black swimmer representing Britain at the Olympics. She's also a brand ambassador for a swim cap called Soul Cap. The cap is designed to be worn with natural black hair and was recently banned by the International Swimming Federation. That decision is now under review, but it's already sparked conversation around racism in the sport. Chantique Carey-Payne is the head coach of the University of Guelph swim team. She joins me now. Hi, Chantique.

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: Hello. How are you doing?

MK: I'm doing well, but help me figure this one out if you can. I went online to, you know, see a picture of this cap. It looks like a regular swim cap, but a little bigger, obviously, to accommodate more hair. What's the problem with that? Why would that design get it banned?

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: Yeah. So what the International Federation has said is that the swim cap does not fit the natural form of the head. And that's basically because it is so much bigger to be useful for natural black hair because our hair grows up and out as opposed to straight white hair that just kind of falls down your head. So they've made it bigger so that it can actually fit things like dreadlocks and braids and the type of hair that we have. And for that reason, they said it doesn't fit the natural form of the head, which is completely subjective and has left a lot of people very unhappy.

MK: Yeah, that also you get that terminology, natural form of the head, kind of perpetuate perpetuates a real sort of racist view of people, doesn't it?

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, when you really think about it, whoever is making these rules, when they think of the natural form of their head, they're likely thinking of their natural form of the head, is most likely middle aged white men who are making these rules. And that definitely does not apply worldwide, never mind just in the sport of swimming. So the thought that they didn't really take into consideration that there are different ethnicities and different shapes to the head, which has to include the hair, is what's causing a lot of issue with people.

MK: But it's not just the Olympics to this ban that goes applies to to all levels of swimming. What impact will this have on competition and especially when you're trying to make a sport more inclusive?

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: Yeah, it's very disheartening because it seems like it should have been a very simple decision to allow the cops, but at least in Canada, I know that most of our competition follow FINA regulations. So if the International Swimming Federation banned something, those rules are followed. Our national meets and our provincial meets, regional meets, invitational meets and can affect swimmers of all ages. So it's not just talking about the super elite swimmers who are at the Olympics, but it's talking about kids who are getting into the sport and might be enjoying the sport for the first time. And that's going to be super discouraging for them. If the International Swimming Federation is saying, no, you can't wear that swim cap that actually fits the hair that you were born with. So I don't think it was the right decision and it's just so disheartening as an opportunity. And they missed it.

MK: As I mentioned off the top, you're coaching at Guelph University. Has this been a problem for you to actually attract black swimmers to your team?

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: I think the biggest issue really has been just finding black athletes. One of the barriers to black athletes swimming is the hair issue, but also just the lack of representation in the sport. And it all kind of goes hand in hand. I started as an athlete at the University of Guelph back in 2007, and since then we've had four black athletes on the team. So in 14 years, that's not very many.

MK: Not at all. And why is I?

CHANTIQUE CAREY-PAYNE: I honestly believe that it's representation matters so much in sport. So when you're growing up as a black kid, most people honestly assume that you're just going to play basketball or track and field and they don't really consider swimming as an option. And you're not seeing a lot of swimmers on the international stage or on TV or anything like that representing you in the sport. So it's hard to convince people to do something where they can't already see themselves there. And I know my sister and I were kind of the two black kids on our swim team and that kind of continued all through elementary school, high school, university. And it's just- yeah, representation in general is the biggest thing, and I think that stops people and having a barrier like this and having to deal with your hair just kind of proves to the black community that it's OK, we don't really need you or want you to be part of this sport.

MK: Well, as I mentioned off the top, this list, this band is under review. So we'll follow the story to see if there will be a reversal shortly. Great to talk to you today. Thanks for your time. Thanks so much, Chantique Carey-Payne is the head coach of the University of Guelph swim team. I'm Mark Kelley and this is The Current. We're continuing A Death in Cryptoland. This is an original CBC podcast series about a crypto tycoon, his secret past, his sudden demise, and an online sleuths obsession to unravel the truth. Yesterday in chapter one, we heard about the circumstances of the reported death of Gerald Cotton in India. He was a 30 year old CEO of Canada's biggest cryptocurrency exchange, Quadriga CX. Without him, 76000 clients had no access to their millions of dollars in funds. Here's host Takara Small to pick up the story.

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TAKARA SMALL: On January 14th, 2019, Quadriga SCIEX finally told the public that its CEO, Gerald Cotton, was dead. Even before that, customers were already jittery for almost a year. The company has been struggling to pay out their clients. The value of bitcoin has plummeted, and there's been a mad rush to get money off the exchange

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE: when they start having withdrawal delays. That's when you start worrying and that's when you get your money.

NEHA POONIA: They couldn't get cash. They couldn't get crypto off the exchange. It was all falling apart.

TAKARA SMALL: And for a whole month, the company appeared to operate as though its CEO weren't gone.

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE: Because like when the news came out, the exchange was still running and they made a statement that, like, everything's fine, we're not on fire.

VOICE 1: But waited a very long time, obviously, to announce his passing. So I think that's the first kind of shock to the system, is that inconsistency between what they had been saying and what had clearly happened? I mean, why wait that long? That's extraordinary.

TAKARA SMALL: If that was extraordinary, the next revelation was shocking. About two weeks later, it's revealed in court that the company can't access customers money. Gerry was the only person with the passcode to more than one quarter of a billion dollars.

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE: You know, I was holding out hope probably until then, like a lot more. And then it was just like, oh, yeah, I was not good. It was not good for anyone that day.

VOICE 1: You know, I wasn't really buying the headline Crypto CEO dies with keys to the wallet. The exchanges just operate that way or shouldn't operate that way.

TAKARA SMALL: Here's the thing. A cryptocurrency exchange typically has two types of digital storage. One is called hot wallets. The other cold wallets. Hot means the crypto is stored online while cold, entirely offline for security and you need passwords to get at it or keys, so to learn. Gerald Cotten was the only person holding those keys and now he's dead. Well it all defied logic really.

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE: Are you sure. Guys just seems off you know.

TAKARA SMALL: Here's a guy named Alvis from Alberta in an interview with the CBC, he had thousands of dollars on the exchange.

ALVIS: So the cold storage keys or the password, for whatever reason, was not left behind with the executor estate, his wife, which to a lot of people is strange because two weeks before his death, he had left a will, leaving a plane at two houses and 100000 dollars for the care for his two Chihuahua's

NEHA POONIA: four to two hours. He left. How much?

MK: 100,000 dollars.

TAKARA SMALL: The other thing people found alarming was the timing of that will it was drawn up just days before his trip to India, then a week after this news that no one can open the cold wallets, Quadriga, his website goes down. A week after that, the company files for creditor protection, now people are really freaking out.

VOICE 1: I smell a rat. I mean, you know, I think many, many people did.

[Music]

TAKARA SMALL: I'm Takara Small, and this is A Death in Cryptoland. Chapter two. Hunting ghosts.

[Music]

MICHAEL PERKLIN: I felt all the blood rush out of my face, out of my body, and because I mean, this is Gerry I knew Gerry.

TAKARA SMALL: This is Michael Perklin not to be confused with. Quadriga is co-founder Michael Patrón. Not only did he have money on the exchange, he knew Jerry personally. They used to play board games together.

MICHAEL PERKLIN: Board games like Ticket to Ride, which was one of his favourite board games about trains.

TAKARA SMALL: They'd gotten to know each other in Toronto in the months after Quadriga had formed.

MICHAEL PERKLIN: We'd go out frequently for lunches where Gerry would order his bundlers hamburgers and oftentimes we'd go out for a pint after work.

TAKARA SMALL: Gerry would have cider, though, on account of his Crohn's disease. He told people about his condition that he'd been diagnosed in the year before starting Quadriga. The two shared an interest in crypto currencies. Michael works for an exchange out of Denver now, and that's where he was when he learnt about Gerry.

MICHAEL PERKLIN: We were waiting for the conference room to free up, and while I was outside of the conference room, I was scrolling through my phone looking at news, and that's where I found out. So I reached out to other people that I knew in the cryptocurrency space in Toronto saying, hey, did you hear about this? Yes, I just heard about this a day ago. I'm crushed and. It was a sombre day, and I remember it, it threw me off for that meeting because I couldn't believe that Gerry was dead.

TAKARA SMALL: But at the same time, something didn't quite sit right.

MICHAEL PERKLIN: Gerry was a very careful speaker, but he was also just a careful person in general, the way that he would talk about things, the way that he would think about things, he was always thinking about the risks and I was planning for the future. It seemed very inconsistent to me to learn that the only copy of his entire organisation's funds were left on a single, solitary, encrypted laptop.

TAKARA SMALL: We asked Andrew Wagner about his reaction. He's the ideologue, the guy with the Bitcoin tattoo. He spent time with both Jerry and his business partner when they launched the company in Vancouver. He didn't hesitate.

ANDREW WAGNER: Betrayal who dies with the keys or is your dead man switch, you're supposed to have a dead man switch if you know the term.

TAKARA SMALL: In a nutshell, it's a backup plan if someone dies, there's an automated response, in other words, people were expecting the passwords or keys to be shared with someone in the company, but it soon became painfully evident that wasn't going to happen. And you figured it meant one of two things.

ANDREW WAGNER: It's either stupidity or greed.

TAKARA SMALL: Andrew didn't lose money, just his faith. His mother is down about 5000 bucks. But there are some who are out massive amounts, thousands, hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars. Alex Sockeld sums up what was happening on the online forum, Reddit.

ALEX SOCKELD: As a chaotic right, because everyone wants answers and they're just not getting them because they don't exist.

VOICE 2: I want to be that guy. But is there an obituary or something to verify Gerald Cotten's death? The way you guys have been operating this past year has brought us to this new blow to question whether someone is past or not.

NEHA POONIA: There's something grimly amusing about accepting fake Internet money, but demanding real physical bodies in case of death.

VOICE 2: Hello. Well, give me the death certificate.

TAKARA SMALL: There are accusations, demands for evidence, people fighting over what to believe. At one point, someone claiming to be a relative dresses down the crowd, calling the posts disgusting and referring to one guy as an insensitive jerk. The family is living a nightmare, they say. Others seemed confused, not knowing what to make of it all.

ALEX SOCKELD: This is either a totally soulless, borderline sociopathic reaction to a man's death and a family's grief, or a completely rational reaction to an industry riven with fraud and corruption. I don't know for sure which one.

TAKARA SMALL: A few creditors were sympathetic.

NEHA POONIA: I can only imagine it would be a terribly painful way to go.

VOICE 2: My condolences to the family. Rest in peace.

TAKARA SMALL: There is also at least one tribute, it read, We lost a true Bitcoin hero today, and the person praised the company saying Quadriga has always paid out through thick and thin. And they ended the post by calling Jerry a rare, honest type who had died fighting for Bitcoin. But then the horror stories start to emerge.

TOM ZOW: Some of you may have heard on the news or read an article, something about me,

TAKARA SMALL: this guy Tom Zow lost half a million Canadian dollars in one transaction. He spilt a story on YouTube.

TOM ZOW: Yeah, I pretty much ended up losing my life savings because of it. And it's really kind of a crazy story how it happened.

TAKARA SMALL: Tongon made a bunch of money off the sale of his apartment in San Francisco and was trying to move it back to Canada where he's from. He thought he could avoid losing money to the bank on currency conversion and fees. He figures about 10 grand. The plan was to convert the cash to Krypto and back again, easy or disastrous, while Tom had used other exchanges. He says this was the first time he had ever used Quadriga's. His timing was awful. It was weeks before Jeri's fateful trip to India. And that's just one story, about 76000 people lost more than two hundred and fifty million dollars. Freelance journalist Amy Kastor became, in her words, obsessed with the story,

AMY CASTOR: well, obsessed means that you can't sleep unless you find the answer to one more thing. You know, it just means you just kind of go on and on and on to the point of exhaustion. And I think when I put together the Quadriga timeline, that's sort of what I did, is I just kept I literally thought, well, I'll just whip this out in a day. But it just went on for like days and days and a week to the point where, you know, I just would be in my pyjamas all day and all night. And that's all that I did. And it really kind of made me sick, frankly. There was one point where I was like walking my dogs out at night and I looked down and I still had my pyjamas on. I'm like, what am I doing?

TAKARA SMALL: And the coming months, as the company hurtles its way towards bankruptcy, a number of irate customers start to hunt for clues. They're trying to figure out what really happened that Quadriga CX.

AMY CASTOR: So some people start doing their own investigations because you have to understand that that the cryptocurrency world doesn't trust, doesn't trust, you know, the governments to begin with. Right. And the exchange is shuttered. And a lot of people lost a lot of funds and they feel screwed, you know, and rightly so. They're angry. They're really angry.

TAKARA SMALL: They're also searching the block chain for answers. That's the public ledger that shows the movement of funds in and out of the exchange. Industry analysts couldn't find the cold wallets, the offline storage.

VOICE 1: That suggests that it didn't have the resources, the currency reserves that it should have. The exchange is trading while insolvent or it's operating as a fractional reserve. It only has a fraction of the funds that it claims to have.

TAKARA SMALL: Customers who lost money begin to organise gathering on the encrypted messaging service telegram, swapping theories, articles and documents. They're wondering if this is the tragic blunder of a young CEO or an elaborate con by a fraud artist. The head of a big exchange based in San Francisco offered up a 100,000 dollar reward for the best lead that would solve the mystery of the missing money. They all want to know where's the money, Gerry? It's a question that one online sleuth in particular would become determined to answer. A man motivated by the loss of his money a some north of six figures.

QCX-IND: I lay down on the floor and just kind of stared at the ceiling for about an hour, just trying to come to grips with the fact that, yes, I think this money is gone. It was the first kick in the guts of many.

TAKARA SMALL: He goes by the handle. QCX-Ind, it stands for Quadriga Intelligence.

QCX-IND: You know, I was shocked to hear that he was actually dead. That's pretty rare for someone his age, you know, a relatively young guy to suddenly kind of drop dead. So the inconsistency between what they were saying and what you could observe on the block chain. So I think I started looking at a few other people started looking.

TAKARA SMALL: We've agreed to keep his identity hidden. It's taken months to persuade him to tell us his story. He's nervous of what could happen if people knew who he was. There could be repercussions. After all, he's been chasing phantoms online and back in time. And there are people who won't like what he's been up to or what he's uncovered.

AMY CASTOR: QCX-Ind. I can't really tell you too much about him other than what's online, but what this individual did was he was available on social media and, for example, put together. So over the years, Cotten and Michael Petron were online for a long time and they leave this trail of breadcrumbs online, you know, different websites. They've set up different email addresses. They've used different investigations that have taken place. We can take that and we can link it to other places on the Web. So he he did that and he put together, for example, this huge document and he put it up on Reddit and basically saying if anybody else has any clues, you know, contact me.

TAKARA SMALL: You see, if it weren't for CUCs end, this story may have been quite different without him. A web of hidden pass in shady ventures might have stayed buried. Instead, he has built a massive dossier sharing it with law enforcement and journalists like us and Amy Castor, amazed by what he'd found. She also began looking more deeply into Gerry Cotten's past.

[You tube commentary]

TAKARA SMALL: I'm watching videos on YouTube on a channel called Jerry Rules with a Z, they're mostly from 2011 to 2012, a year or so before he launched Quadriga.

QCX-IND: You know, there's a whole bunch of videos of Jerry in there. And they were quite remarkable, I think until you see him on video, you know, in in kind of his private life, you don't really realise just how childlike he was. And kind of goofy and immature

TAKARA SMALL: on a video call accent is dressed casually in a black baseball cap in a dark vest. He began his hunt for answers in early twenty nineteen, trying to learn who exactly Gerry Cotten was and what Quadriga had all been about. It began simply.

QCX-IND: Yeah, Gerry had a YouTube account that no one had found.

GERRY COTTEN: Welcome to the first annual pokey battle at Jerry Stadium.

QCX-IND: This video, as it came, kind of burning Pokemon cards and kind of laughing maniacally and, you know, chasing the remote controlled helicopters around an oval and playing some very kind of goofy, nerdy jokes and things like this.

GERRY COTTEN: This Bottle of Hormuz claims that it's flammable, but I'm a bit of a sceptic. So today I'm going to try and see if I can light the hair mousse on fire.

TAKARA SMALL: It doesn't catch setting fire to stuff. Seems to be a running theme. There's a video where he lights up a Winnie the Pooh keychain, a stuffed duck, even a walnut.

GERRY COTTEN: This video confirms that a walnut can indeed be lit on fire.

QCX-IND: The one that struck me, that was him burning money in a microwave. I think that's my favourite. And, you know, that was certainly an omen of things to come in.

GERRY COTTEN: Another test of Canada's new plastic money. I'm going to see what happens when I put it in the microwave.

TAKARA SMALL: It's a crisp new twenty dollar bill,

GERRY COTTEN: put it in there for a minute.

TAKARA SMALL: You can see, Jerry, in the reflection of the class filming as the bill rotates inside.

GERRY COTTEN: It looks like it's melting.

TAKARA SMALL: He pulls it out for closer inspection.

GERRY COTTEN: I have to take it out a bit early. Uh oh. All of the Hollywood grams actually melted, incredibly hot.

QCX-IND: Look, we've all kind of probably played around with matches when we were kids and, you know, lit something on fire and just watch what happens when something burns. But for a grown man to be doing that and reacting in such a way is is a bit disturbing in itself. There's definitely some pathology going on there, some psychological issues. And it made me extremely uneasy, just the thought that this guy had been in charge of several hundred million dollars and that. Myself and other Quadriga customers or creditors had trusted him. With our funds and to be honest, the thought may be sick.

TAKARA SMALL: it also made him more determined to find the truth.

QCX-IND: I thrive on data. I thrive on data. I mean I mean the tax base. That's part of my world, part of my job.

TAKARA SMALL: He's been chasing Gerry's ghost through a murky online labyrinth, hunting for paths through a tangle of websites, hidden identities and a trail of emails.

QCX-IND: But look, when I did start digging, I just uncovered this trial of of data points, starting with things like the domain. That's really simple. What kind of intelligence can be gleaned from just the domain names that were used for Quadriga and Quadriga Financial Services, for example, which is the holding group in each of those, will yield up a name and address, an email, a phone number, and those can be revealing. And so you can successfully build up essentially like a map. Easiest way to think of it is like a map of interconnected points linking all these domain names to a single entity or entities. I was absolutely committed to doing a comprehensive report in a form that could be provided to law enforcement and investigators. It was based on evidence, not hearsay, not conspiracy theories, but it was based on evidence.

MK: We'll hear about that evidence tomorrow when we continue with Chapter three of the CBC podcast, A Death in Crypto Land. That's our programme for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q Tom Powers will be speaking with Gary Camp, who's well, he's the founding member of the 90 1980s group Spandau Ballet. You remember them their release. He's releasing his first solo album in 25 years. I'm Mark Kelly in this week for Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current.

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Wednesday 14 July, 2021

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