Celia Hatton

The protest led to Shell suspending its operations in Oguniland by 1993. But 30 years on, the community continues to live with the impact of the oil pollution. Pipelines still run through Oguniland and risk leaking oil.

In 2008 there was a massive oil spill that devastated this community. It lasted for four months. The fishermen couldn't fish, the mangrove was destroyed and the birds and crabs went away. The Ogonis have for decades been fighting for a holistic clean-up to happen. But things like this from Bodo and communities around shows that much more needs to be done. And although clean-up is currently ongoing, the community says it is slow, inadequate and not a picture of what justice should look like.

Shell has always maintained that the extent of the pollution is caused by the scourge of oil theft and illegal refining. We met local farmer, Ledisi Nomkia. As we talk, she points at the pale sickly leaves at a cassava farm, showing the impact the oil spill has had on their farmlands.

A 2011 United Nations Environment Program report concluded that the restoration of Oguni land may take 25 to 30 years. So that's at least a decade from now. And it's feared that without prioritizing the cleanup, new oil drilling would not be welcomed here. Helen Oyibo in Rivers State, Nigeria.

In the world of robotics, the human hand is often viewed as the pinnacle of dexterity. Well, now scientists say they've developed a detachable robot hand that could eventually outperform its human counterpart. Researchers in Switzerland say they've created a robotic hand that can crawl using its fingers and pick up more than one object at the same time. Kun Peng Yang is one of the scientists working on the project.

Pete Ross. Now you may have seen on some of the news websites video of a 13-year-old Swiss brown cow called Veronica scratching herself with a broomstick, holding it in her mouth. In fact, she's pretty sophisticated, using different ends of the broom for different parts of her body.

Veronica's case has been written up in the journal Current Biology, which declares this as the first documented case of flexible tool use in cattle, which has led to a reassessment of cognitive capacities in livestock species. Well, put simply, are cows smarter and more capable than we might have thought? My colleague Evan Davis spoke to Rosamund Young, farmer and author of The Secret Life of Cows, to ask for her reaction to Veronica's scratching.

I'm very, very surprised. I'm perfectly sure none of my cows would ever do this, but I can't be certain now, can I? Up until today I would have been sure they wouldn't have done. She looks like a very happy cow from the pictures I've seen on the internet. And she's obviously a pet, as the owner said. It looks to me as if she might live alone, which I think might be a factor. Because my cows, if they want some inaccessible part of their body scratched or licked, they can ask...

One of their friends or even one of their enemies. But if this cow lives on her own, she's only got her owner, it looks as if he doesn't say that he's taught her to use a brush. I could just about imagine teaching a cow to if you were patient. But if she's done it of her own volition, then it's rather nice. But your book, Rosamund, The Secret Life of Cows, you find them intelligent, I think. What's the smartest thing you've seen cows do?

I just want to emphasize that I think all cows are individuals, and I think everything is an individual. All spiders, all octopuses, everything is just people who are not very observant. My cows aren't particularly clever, and some of them are stupid, just like with people. Some are very clever, some are slightly clever, some are very stupid. There's just that much variation. But I don't think you'll ever get a cow using a tool if she was living under stress.

But when they have freedom to move around, they have sunshine on their backs and they've got no fear, then it looks very conducive to doing all sorts of things. Do cows play? Because play shows some degree of cognitive ability, doesn't it? Do cows, do they have playful activity?

Oh absolutely. I've seen, I mean calves play when they're outside. They always run races and do amazing things and sometimes the cows join in and it just looks very joyful. I've seen the whole herd race around the field with no fear, with nothing making them do it, just with seemingly full of the joys of spring. I can only watch and hope that that is the reason.

Rosamund Young puhuu Evan Davisin.

And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag Global News Pod. This edition was mixed by Jack Wilhelm. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Celia Hatton. Until next time, goodbye.

This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.

I'm Celia Hatton, and at 16 hours GMT on Thursday, the 15th of January, these are our main stories.

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