HARDtalk — Season 2016

BBC News (Europe) Running

71 Episodes · Premiered January 3, 2016 · Ended November 6, 2016

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Episodes

No synopsis available.

Zeinab is joined by Elias Bou Saab.

In-depth interviews with news makers and personalities from around the globe.

Stephen Sackur speaks with Fahd al Rasheed, CEO of King Abdullah Economic City in Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah Economic City is a vast construction project on the Red Sea. It is supposed to become one of the world's biggest ports with a population of 2 million - a new global city for Saudi Arabia. But could the kingdom's economic problems see this dream turn to dust?

Stephen Sackur talks to one of Europe's top film directors, Susanne Bier, who already has an Oscar to her name and a reputation which brings in offers from the major US studios as well as her native Denmark. How hard has it been to challenge Hollywood stereotypes?

The suicide bomb attacks in Brussels are unlikely to be the final operation mounted by the so-called Islamic State on European soil. France's President Hollande says Europe is now at war, so what are the most effective weapons at Europe's disposal? Dominic Grieve was the Attorney General in David Cameron's first term as British prime minister. He is now Chairman of the UK parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee. Can Europe be both secure and free?

Can architecture inspire people to think and behave differently? David Adjaye is one of the most sought after architects in the world today. Among his many buildings are the Nobel Peace Centre in Oslo, a business school in Moscow, shopping centres in Beirut and Lagos, a children's hospital in Rwanda, a housing project in New York's Harlem and about to open - his biggest project yet - the National Museum of African American History and Culture sitting right on the National Mall in Washington. Has he got it right? What is the test of a good building?

From his Oscar winning score for The Lion King, through 12 Years A Slave to a series of superhero blockbusters, including the latest - Batman vs Superman - Hans Zimmer is, as one director put it, "quite simply the contemporary composer to work with". German born, British educated, he never received formal musical training and he's a champion of technology. Hardtalk's Shaun Ley asks Hans Zimmer whether the technology he so loves is killing the music makers?

Stephen Sackur talks to one of the most powerful voices in Europe's radical left: Yanis Varoufakis. The motor-bike riding former Greek Finance minister confronted the powers that be during the darkest days of Greece's debt crisis and lost. Or did he?

Vladimnir Putin's projection of Russian power, from Ukraine to Syria, has sowed seeds of alarm across Europe and America. The United States is beefing up its military presence in Europe in response to what the Americans call Russian aggression. Stephen Sackur asks Russia's Ambassador to the European Union, Vladimir Chizhov, can the Kremlin sustain a longterm confrontation with the West?

We tend to pigeonhole creative types: writer, musician, actor - they get a label. Stephen Sackur talks to a guest who defies simple description - punk is perhaps the only word that captures the spirit of Henry Rollins. He first found success in the punk band Black Flag back in the early eighties. Since then he's variously made a name as a non-conforming writer, broadcaster, actor and intrepid traveller. How hard is it to swim against the cultural tide in the United States?

When US President Barack Obama visited Kenya last year he spoke out against the continued practice of female genital mutilation in countries across Africa and beyond. He said that FGM has "no place in the 21st century". But are there cultural arguments for the practice to continue? Stephen Sackur talks to Fuambai Ahmadu and Nimco Ali.

American politics currently has more unlikely story lines than anything you might see in New York's Broadway theatre district. The rise of Donald Trump is one illustration of the depth of public frustration with politics as usual. Stephen Sackur talks to Anthony Weiner who was a rising star of the Democratic Party in New York. His career was destroyed by not one but two bizarre sex scandals. Why did he push the self-destruct button?

The stories we tell ourselves say much about the times, places and cultures we live in. So what should we make of the fiction coming out of Africa in the two generations since the continent emerged from colonial rule? How free are Africa's storytellers to explore the richness and diversity of their continent? Stephen Sackur talks to internationally acclaimed novelist and poet Ben Okri, whose life has straddled Nigeria and the UK.

On the same day that a war crimes tribunal jailed the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic for 40 years, it also detained a journalist. Florence Hartmann used to work at the tribunal, but her decision to reveal confidential court decisions led to a brief spell in custody. She says the world had a right to know that Serbia had been allowed to keep secret documents which could have helped victims of war crimes win compensation. Critics say Hartmann's actions made it harder for the tribunal to get cooperation in the future. How did her own experience of the horrors of the Bosnian War influence her decision? Did Florence Hartmann put journalistic ambition before justice?

From Washington, HARDtalk's Stephen Sackur talks to Congresswoman Donna Edwards. She's a radical voice in the Democratic Party and is now running for a seat in the senate. But is America ready for genuinely left-wing politics?

HARDtalk's Stephen Sackur is in Washington DC to talk to a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, Haley Barbour. With every passing week the race for the Republican Party's presidential nomination becomes more bizarre and more bitter. According to one Republican senator the fact that Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are the two leading candidates is proof that the party has gone crazy. We ask - what on earth has happened to the Republicans?

In front of an audience in Washington DC, HARDtalk's Stephen Sackur talks to Christine Lagarde, head of the IMF. Could 2016 produce economic shocks big enough to plunge the world economy back into crisis?

No synopsis available.