Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's diamonds scandal

During the Vietnam War, North Vietnamese VietCong guerrillas built a vast network of tunnels in the south of the country as part of the insurgency against the South Vietnamese government and their American allies. The tunnel network was a key base and shelter for the North Vietna ...  Show more

In November 2015, the 'holy grail' of shipwrecks, laden with treasure worth an estimated $18 billion, was found off the coast of Colombia.The San José, a Spanish galleon, sank in 1708, when a British warship intercepted it. Rachel Naylor speaks to former Colombian President Juan ...  Show more

Max Pearson presents a collection of this week’s Witness History stories from the BBC World Service. Journalist Claude Angeli discovered French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing received diamonds from a depraved African emperor, which contributed to him losing the presidential e ...  Show more

FT analysis points to huge fraud in the first change of power since Joseph Kabila took over the presidency of the mineral-rich central African nation almost 18 years ago. Gideon Rachman discusses how the Democratic Republic of Congo's election authorities and regional powers will ...  Show more

In August 1785 a shocking affair came to light which would prove so detrimental to the reputation and standing of the French King Louis XVI, and more especially his already unpopular wife, Queen Marie Antoinette, that it would become a decisive moment in the rising tide of the Fr ...  Show more

Queen Marie Antoinette's reputation was already tarnished by gossip in 1784, but was completely ruined by the implication that she defrauded the crown jewelers, conning them out of a dazzling, expensive diamond necklace. That's the short summary -- but the story itself is a start ...  Show more