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Misha Glenny's final programme on Russia - what it is and where it came from - looks at the country's attitude to war. What has been the long lasting effect of the great patriotic wars against Adolf Hitler and Napoleon Bonaparte? Plus the Poles, the Mongols, and the British in Crimea.
With contributions from Antony Beevor, author of Stalingrad, Robert Service, author of the Last Tsar, Kateryna Khinkulova of BBC World Service, former ambassador to Moscow Rhodric Braithwaite, and Dominic Lieven, author of Napoleon against Russia.
Producer: Miles Warde
(Photo: World War Two, Russian front. Street fight in Stalingrad, October 1942. Credit: Roger Viollet/Getty Images)
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It was Peter the Great who created a new capital on the Baltic, and Catherine the Great who extended Russian influence south and west. Sweden, Poland, and the Ottomans all felt the Russian expansion in a century of geopolitical drama. This, says presenter Misha Glenny, is all part of the build up to today's war in Ukraine.
With contributions from Virginia Rounding, biographer of Catherine the Great; Prof Simon Dixon of University College London; Prof Robert Service, author of The Last Tsar; Prof Janet Hartley, author books on the Volga and Siberia; and Dr Sarah Young of the UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies.
Producer: Miles Warde
(Photo: Portrait of Empress Catherine II (1729-1796), 1780s. Artist : Rokotov, Fyodor Stepanovich 1735-1808. Credit: Getty Images)
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Russia's massive empire was not like that of Britain or France. It expanded across the land, making it more like the United States of America. And from very small beginnings, it became the biggest contiguous landmass in the world.
Presenter Misha Glenny speaks to James Hill of the New York Times about travelling to the edges, and also to Janet Hartley, author of Siberia: A History of the People. Plus further contributions from Ukrainian academic Olesya Khromeychuk, Anna Reid, the author of Borderland and Leningrad, and the Tblisi-based journalist, Natalia Antelava, editor-in-chief at Coda Story.
Producer: Miles Warde
(Photo: The imperial procession coming out of the Winter Palace to go to the Cathedral, celebrations for the 3rd centenary of the Romanov dynasty, St Petersburg, Russia, photograph by Bulla-Trampus, from L'Illustrazione Italiana, Year XL, No 12, March 23, 1913. Credit: Getty Images)
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Countries look so cohesive on the map - sturdy borders, familiar shapes. Don't be misled. They didn't always look like this. This is the story of Russia, biggest contiguous country on the planet, told from the time when it was still very small.
With contributions across the series from Janet Hartley, author of a history of the Volga; Rhodric Braithwaite, former ambassador to Moscow; historian and sociologist, Mischa Gabowitsch; Anthony Beevor; Natalia Antelava; Kateryna Khinkulova; Dominic Lieven; Olesya Khromeychuk; and James Hill of the New York Times.
Producer: Miles Warde
(Photo: View of the Moskva River and the Moscow Kremlin. Credit: Vlad Karkov/Getty Images)
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Tel Aviv is a bustling place and for a blind person it can be a little daunting, as BBC journalist, Peter White, discovers. The narrow streets in the older parts of town are full of open air cafes, buskers and people visiting the markets and local shops. It is a lively place and Peter's first challenge comes when he tries to navigate the local busses, only to find that without being able to see them approaching, it is virtually impossible to get them to stop!
Today signs of expansion are evident in the building works going on everywhere and Peter hears from young people concerned about political, social and environmental pressures.
The city is home to some exciting activities, including tandem bike riding, with a local club attracting 70 plus blind and partially sighted members. As he walks around he becomes aware of some of the steps being taken to make things more accessible, including the addition of sound systems on public crossings that at least offer protection from the constant and sometimes fast flowing traffic.
In the local parks Peter hears from people about other fun activities offered locally, from outdoor gyms through to long meals taken with friends and family. Younger people he meets share their hopes and dreams and explain what it has been like growing up with a disability in Tel Aviv.
(Photo: Peter White and his guide walk along the streets of Tel Aviv)
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In a new series of Sounds of the City Peter White, who has been blind since birth, uses the sounds to guide him as he explores new parts of the globe.
In Los Angeles the sea quickly beckons and although it's a struggle, Peter dons a wetsuit and prepares for his first surfing lesson! He also explores the huge metropolis by metro, comes across tales of political intrigue and meets up with a blind friend, who explains how she uses smell as well as sound to guide her on her travels.
One thing that’s clear from the moment he arrives, is how many homeless people Peter encounters as he moves around LA. He meets some of those living rough and joins them at an impromptu meal prepared by volunteers from a local church. When he leaves, he threads his way across several blocks to find a charity warehouse where the clothes are stacked high in huge bins. People rummage all day in the hope of finding bargains and gleefully share tips of their greatest finds.
(Photo: Peter White surfing.Credit: Peter White)
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When one of journalist Rajkumar Keswani's friends dies at the Union Carbide plant after exposure to toxic gas, he decides to investigate. Local government officials dismiss him, but safety reports smuggled to him open his eyes to the potential for disaster. Rajkumar Keswani wrote his first article 40 years ago, warning of the dangers posed by safety lapses and poor maintenance at the chemical plant. During a dogged investigation pitting him against political power, corporate money and the indifference of the media and public opinion, he never gave up.
This cinematic documentary - narrated by Narinder Samra and featuring key witnesses - tells Keswani's courageous story for the first time.
Producer: Neil McCarthy (Death in Ice Valley podcast)
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Giles Edwards looks inside the private clubs of former world leaders to see how they are still trying to influence global politics.
(Photo: Helen Clark speaks at a 2022 meeting of the Global Leadership Foundation)
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Giles Edwards investigates the many opportunities offered by globalisation, and speaks to some of the former presidents and prime ministers who have run, or worked for, international organisations from civil society to the United Nations.
(Photo: Anders Fogh Rasmussen at the Copenhagen Democracy Summit, June 2022. Credit: Ritzau Scanpix/Philip Davali/Reuters)
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What happens to presidents and prime ministers when they stop running their countries, and leave politics behind? Giles Edwards has spent 10 years finding out what they do next. He shares some of his conversations with former world leaders, takes us inside their organisations and helps us understand their thinking.
Giles begins at the Clinton Global Initiative in New York City, where he speaks to presidents and prime ministers about how they use their influence, and what they contribute when they speak out.
(Photo: Bill Clinton speaks at a Clinton Global Initiative meeting in Manhattan in September 2022. Credit: David Delgado/Reuters)
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The town of El Triunfo in Tabasco state is not far from the Mexican border with Guatemala. Translated from Spanish, ‘El Triunfo’ means ‘The Triumph’ and being miles from the nearest city, with just over 5000 inhabitants, it does not usually attract much attention. However, that changed in 2018 when Tren Maya was announced and China Communications Construction Company (CCCC) arrived to help build part of the brand new train line, connecting the ancient Mayan ruins across the Yucatán Peninsula.
Seen as the pet project of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Tren Maya is one of the biggest news stories in Mexico, and has had its fair share of opposition from archaeological and environmental groups. The government hopes it will boost tourism, trade and access throughout the regions it traverses, and it has been declared as a project of national importance.
Katy Watson, the BBC’s South America correspondent, visits El Triunfo to discover how a town has been transformed, asking if Mexico can ever follow other countries in the region and sign up to China’s Belt and Road initiative?
Presenter: Katy WatsonProducer: Peter ShevlinA C60Media production for the BBC World Service
(Photo: Construction workers prepare the ground forTren Maya. Credit: Peter Shevlin)
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From highways to hospitals, Chinese construction firms continue to work on a number of high-profile projects across Jamaica. In the face of soaring debts they have not proceeded without controversy, with particular criticism of the use of Chinese labour for jobs that Jamaicans might do, and concerns of so-called ‘debt-trap diplomacy’.
‘Highway 2000’ is a 66 kilometre motorway connecting Kingston and Montego Bay funded by a loan of over 700 million dollars, and built by a Chinese contractor. It is just one of a series of Chinese mega-projects in Jamaica, who have received more loans from the Chinese government than any other Caribbean island nation, officially joining China’s Belt and Road initiative in 2019.
Meanwhile, the Covid pandemic has led to Jamaica’s deepest economic contraction in decades, due in part to the drop in tourism earnings, which account for more than 30% of GDP and over a third of all jobs. Yet through the ‘Medical Silk Road’, China has helped Jamaica during one of the most turbulent times in its history.
The BBC’s South America correspondent Katy Watson explores what impact Chinese aid and infrastructure is having on Jamaica.
(Photo: Construction in progress for foundations of hotel development in Jamaica. Credit: Getty Images)
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The Panama Canal is a great feat of engineering and a place of huge global significance for trade and shipping. An artificial waterway that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, literally dividing North and South America, whilst saving thousands of miles of shipping time round Cape Horn at the very southern tip of South America.
The Americans built the canal and operated it for decades, but today there’s a new global superpower hoping to make their mark. In 2017, Panama became the first country in the region to sign up to China’s Belt and Road initiative, shortly after they had cut diplomatic ties with Taiwan in favour of Beijing.
Five years after signing up, what impact has the new Silk Road had on this small Central American nation with strong historical ties to the US? Travelling from one coast to the other, BBC South America correspondent Katy Watson aims to find out.
Presenter: Katy WatsonProducer: Peter ShevlinA C60Media production for the BBC World Service
(Photo: Panama port. Credit: Peter Shevlin)
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The Cordillera del Condor mountain range in the east of Ecuador is where the mountains meets the jungles and the Andes meets the Amazon. In this region a Chinese run copper mine, Mirador, has grabbed the headlines over recent years, leading to controversy, resistance and talk of impending disaster. It has become a huge challenge for a government trying their utmost to support mining projects that might help boost a fragile economy.
On the other side of the country, shrimp farms line mile upon mile of Pacific coastline, helping a nation of 17 million people to become the largest exporter of that popular crustacean in the world. Ecuador now provides over half of all the shrimp consumed in China, and as the price of shrimp increases, so does its appeal to modern-day pirates who regularly raid shrimp farms and their workers in the Gulf of Guayaquil, hoping to plunder their precious catch.
In the first of a new, four-part series, Katy Watson, the BBC’s South America correspondent explores how China’s ambitious New Silk Road is impacting the lives of people in Latin America and the Caribbean. Beginning in Ecuador, Katy looks at how mining and shrimp farming are helping to drive President Xi Jinping’s ‘Belt and Road’ initiative in one of the most environmentally diverse countries in the world, where the ‘rights of nature’ are protected in the constitution.
Presenter: Katy WatsonProducer: Peter ShevlinA C60Media production for the BBC World Service
(Photo: Ecuador mine. Credit: Peter Shevlin)
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Tim Marshall on Narva where The EU, Europe and Nato meet the Russian Federation. It's a city in Estonia where 95% of the population are ethnically Russian. Identity crises are nothing new in Narva which has found itself on the edge of empires, kingdoms and duchies during its long history. Today residents cannot trace family here back further than the second Word War. That is when Stalin deported the locals and replaced them with Russians. Somehow however the collective memory in Narva, a border town forever on someone else's periphery, has re-asserted itself among the city's population. As a place founded on trading they remain open to everyone but look to themselves.
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Tim Marshall delves into the strange story of Kinshasa and Brazzaville the only capitals straddling a border. Their peoples share a common culture but were split by Empires and now kept apart by a river border which has no bridge.
Presenter: Tim MarshallProducer: Kevin Mousley
(Photo: Sapeurs from a group belonging to Papa Griffe, a Sapeur leader, walks on Avenue De La Democratie, in Kinshasa, DRC. Credit: Per-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images)
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Tim Marshall considers Niagara Falls, the busiest crossing point on the world’s longest border. The fortunes of the two cities either side of the famous Falls have varied over the years as the advantages of being one side of the line, or the other, have played out. Today it is the Canadian side in ascendance but as Tim finds out, the border continues to shape the communities in different ways as it becomes a less informal, so-called ‘friendly’ border and a more of sophisticated digital one.
(Photo: A general view of Niagara Falls State Park in Niagara Falls, Credit: Kevin Mousley)
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Tim Marshall profiles Maastricht, the city where 30 years ago the European Union was born. Have these economic measures dented relations between the communities that sit on one of Europe’s linguistic and cultural fault lines?
(Photo: Aerial view of the city of Maastricht. Credit: N. Bellegarde/Getty Images)
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Writer and environmentalist Isabelle Legeron is in France to see how cultivating a healthy soil, teeming with fungi and microbes, can enhance the flavour profile of food and drink - from cheese to coffee to wine. She explores the fundamental role soil plays in the notion of “terroir’ - the conviction that the natural environment in which plants are grown, can be experienced in the taste and texture of the food and drink made from them. Isabelle speaks to a cast of soil microbiologists, land managers and taste experts - Lydia and Claude Bourguignon (France), Anne Biklé (USA), the Le Puy vineyard in Bordeaux, Barry Smith (UK), Darek Trowbridge (USA) and Hans-Peter Schmidt (Switzerland).
Presenter: Isabelle LegeronProducer: Sasha Edye-LindnerA Cast Iron Production for BBC World Service
(Photo: A vineyard)
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Isabelle Legeron travels to Giessen in Germany, to the original laboratory of Justus Von Liebig the brilliant 19th century chemist whose work made way for the 20th century Haber and Bosch process. Liebig joined the spirit of the Industrial Revolution, where technical solutions were set to end starvation; he set out to make the soil more productive, echoed through the 20th century with the Green Revolution. But at what cost to the soil?
With Environmentalist, Tony Juniper and Soil Scientists: Margaret Glendining, Aislinn Pearson, Hans-Peter Schmidt, Wogmar Wolters, Gerd Hamscher, Jan Siemens, Christophe Muller and Richard Bardgett.
Presenter: Isabelle LegeronProducer: Kate Bland and Anja KriegerA Cast Iron Production for BBC World Service
(Photo: Dried, cracked soil in a maize field near Hajduszovat, Hungary. Credit: Zsolt Czegledi/EPA)
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