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Witness History

Witness History is a short BBC World Service podcast about history that takes you inside big moments from the past through first-hand testimony and archive. Each weekday, in around nine minutes, we revisit one moment that helped shape the world and hear it through the voice of someone who was there. Scientists, artists, campaigners, soldiers, leaders and everyday people tell their true stories.

When you subscribe to Witness History, you’ll be taken inside turning points in world affairs, from West Africa’s fight back against Boko Haram in 2015, to the behind-closed-doors talks that led to the US-Cuba “thaw” and the surprise announcement of restored relations.

You’ll discover what it was like to experience disasters and how people recovered from them, including the Tabasco floods in Mexico, Portugal’s worst train disaster, and the huge clean-up after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

You’ll explore culture and ideas too: Sweden’s Expedition Robinson, often credited as the first modern reality TV game show; the friendship between The Beatles’ George Harrison and Indian sitarist Ravi Shankar; and the night a tiger attack brought Las Vegas superstars Siegfried and Roy’s show to a sudden end.

And if you’re curious about inventions, we’ll tell you how air fryers, BlackBerry, YouTube, Alexa, GPS, superglue, the shopping cart (shopping trolley) and bubble tea were created.

If you’re new to Witness History, the appeal is simple: real voices, one strong true story, and a fresh way to understand today through events from history – all in the time it takes to enjoy a cup of tea or a walk around the block. Join millions of BBC World Service podcast listeners around the globe and enjoy the insight, context and detail Witness History will bring you.

Copyright: © (C) BBC 2024

Latest Episodes:

Fighting forced marriage in war May 21, 2021

Show notes

In 2009 a war crimes trial in Sierra Leone ruled that forced marriage was a crime against humanity. It was the first time a court had recognised that charge. The ruling came in a trial of three rebel leaders for crimes committed during Sierra Leone's civil war. The legal turning point came largely as a result of the testimonies of the women who had been victims. The prosecution argued that forced marriage should be considered a crime against humanity distinct from other forms of sexual violence. Farhana Haider has been speaking to the former chief prosecutor Stephen Rapp about the trials.

Photo: Sierra Leone, repatriated refugees reaching Freetown January 2001 Credit: Ullstein Bild/Getty Images

Saving the world's wetlands May 20, 2021

Show notes

Iran hosted a meeting to save the world's wetlands in 1971. The Ramsar Convention - named after the village on the Caspian Sea where it was originally signed - is seen as the first of the modem global intergovernmental treaties on the sustainable use of natural resources. Claire Bowes has been speaking to the Belgian representative, Eckhart Kuijken, about the battle by conservationists to interest people and governments in the value of wetlands. He describes how his home country had no planning laws protecting natural landscapes until 1962 - so that many were lost to industry and agriculture.

Photo: Hawizeh Marsh in Iran. Credit: courtesy of the Convention on Wetlands

Striking in South Korea in 1980 May 18, 2021

Show notes

There were strikes and student protests across South Korea in May 1980. The military government responded with a brutal crackdown in the city of Gwangju and elsewhere striking workers faced arrest and even torture. Heongjun Park has been hearing from one of those strikers, Bae Ok Byoung, who worked in a factory making wigs in Seoul. She, and the other female employees had gone on strike demanding better working conditions, but after the industrial action ended she was jailed, tortured and then blacklisted for decades. This is a 2 Degrees West production.

Photo: Labour activist Bae Ok Byoung talking to some of the workers at the wig factory in Seoul where she worked in 1980.

When Ariel Sharon visited the Al-Aqsa compound May 17, 2021

Show notes

The controversial Israeli opposition leader visited the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jersualem's old city in 2000. His appearance was followed by an upsurge in violence between Palestinians and Israelis. Mike Lanchin spoke to an Israeli, and a Palestinian who were there that day.

This programme is a rebroadcast.

(Photo: Ariel Sharon at the compound. Credit: AFP/Getty Images.)

China's Democracy Wall May 14, 2021

Show notes

How a brick wall in Beijing became a beacon for those calling for change. But when Wei Jingsheng posted an essay demanding democracy in 1978, he was arrested and imprisoned for 18 years. He's been telling Rebecca Kesby why he thinks it was worth it.

(PHOTO: BEIJING, CHINA: China's prominent dissident Wei Jingsheng (R) laughs as he talks to reporters at his Beijing apartment 20 September 1993. Wei was arrested again shortly after this and eventually released from prison on medical grounds in 1997. He currently lives in the USA. (credit MANUEL CENETA/AFP via Getty Images)

The trial of South Africa’s 'Dr Death' May 13, 2021

Show notes

The trial of a South African doctor accused of multiple murders under the Apartheid regime. Wouter Basson, nicknamed 'Dr Death' by the country’s media, was alleged to have run a secret chemical and biological weapons project in the 1980s to eliminate perceived enemies of the government. But after the country’s longest and most expensive trial and despite evidence from 150 witnesses, in 2002 a judge found him not guilty on all 46 charges. Bob Howard talks to Dr Marjorie Jobson, the national director of Khulumani, a group which campaigns for justice on behalf of the victims of apartheid.

The Jewish exodus from Iraq May 12, 2021

Show notes

In the summer of 1971 around 2,000 Iraqi Jews were forced to flee the country following persistent threats and persecution. The Jewish community in Iraq dated back to the Babylonian times, but by the mid 1950s numbered less than eight thousand. Mike Lanchin has been speaking to Edwin Shuker, who was just 16 years old when he and his family were smuggled over the mountains to safety in neighbouring Iran by members of Iraq’s Kurdish minority. Edwin and his family eventually settled in the UK.

Photo: Edwin Shuker and his parents and grandmother at home in Baghdad before they left in 1971 (courtesy of Edwin Shuker)

Legalising contraception in Ireland May 11, 2021

Show notes

Contraception wasn't easily accessible in Ireland until 1985. Activists spent years fighting for the right to control their fertility but faced opposition from the Roman Catholic church which traditionally played a central role in Irish society. Paul Moss has been hearing from Betty Purcell who was a teenager when she first started campaigning.

Photo: a woman holding up a condom and some contraceptive pills. Credit: Getty Images.

Why a British MP was filmed taking mescaline May 10, 2021

Show notes

# Warning: This programme contains scenes of drug use #

In 1955, a British member of parliament, Christopher Mayhew, took the hallucinogenic drug mescaline and had his experience filmed by the BBC. The drug was legal at the time and the experiment was supervised by the pyschiatrist Dr Humphry Osmond. The film was part of a wider public debate about psychedelic drugs following the publication of The Doors of Perception by the writer Aldous Huxley. But the film of the experiment was never broadcast and years later mescaline was put on the banned list of drugs in the UK because of fears of its potential impact on mental health.. Photo: Christopher Mayhew (right) preparing to start the experiment, watched by Dr Humphry Osmond (left), December 1955. (BBC)

The Great Wine Fraud May 06, 2021

Show notes

In the early 2000s, Rudy Kurniawan was a newcomer to the hedonistic world of wine auctions in the US.

He quickly became well-known for his warm and friendly manner and his profligate spending on wines. But where was all his money coming from?

Josephine Casserly tells the story of one of the most high profile cases of wine fraud and speaks to Laurent Ponsot, French winemaker, turned Sherlock Holmes.

(Photo: Corks, foil capsules and wine labels used as evidence in the trial. Credit: Stan Honda/Getty Images)

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