Racist raids, protests and a political assass...

Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service. We hear how a speech by Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme, in 1972, caused a break down in relations with the USA. Our guest is an expert in the historic relations between Swede ...  Show more

We begin with the trial of the former President of Liberia, Charles Taylor. It was claimed that he traded in arms and ammunition in return for so-called blood diamonds.Our guest, gemmologist James Evans discusses the creation of synthetic diamonds.Next we head to Syria where a gr ...  Show more

On June 22nd 1922, the British Field Marshall, Henry Wilson was shot dead in London. The assassination sparked a major political crisis in Ireland. The British government blamed the killing on a faction of the IRA opposed to the recent Anglo-Irish Treaty. When they demanded ac ...

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the most destructive riots in London's history, which reached their peak on 7th June 1780 as troops fired on the crowd outside the Bank of England. The leader was Lord George Gordon, head of the Protestant Association, who objected to the relaxing ...  Show more

In the 1920s and 30s Irish emigrants in Britain faced widespread racism and discrimination. Labelled drunks, subversives, and a threat to society, right wing politicians whipped up fear and hatred against the community.This podcast tells the forgotten stories of these emigrant ...

In June 1982 a young Chinese-American engineer was murdered with a baseball bat by two white men in the US city of Detroit. The lenient sentences the perpetrators received sparked an Asian-American civil rights movement with protests across the US. At the time, America was going ...  Show more