Documentaries

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• Average duration:
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Recent episodes (10)

• StoryCorps - Part Two

  Fri, 4 Dec 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  Did I turn out to be the son you wanted? What was the saddest moment of your life? Questions like these have arisen out of StoryCorps - an American oral history project described as "a story-foraging mission of epic proportions".

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• Assignment - Bhopal

  Thu, 3 Dec 09

  Duration:
  23 mins

  Twenty-five years ago, a gas leak at a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal killed 8000 people. Allan Little returns to the scene of the disaster to find out why people are still suffering.

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• Can China Go Green? Part One

  Wed, 2 Dec 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  Jonathon Porritt reports from China, where, amidst the toxic power stations and burgeoning numbers of cars, he finds some extraordinary and pioneering green solutions. In two provocative and counter-intuitive programmes, Jonathon Porritt flies in the face of international protest and fear at what China is 'doing' to the world's environment in order to properly explore what's actually happening across the vast country. Although the Chinese are avid to grow their economy at all costs, Porritt is convinced that they are effectively leap-frogging the older industrial societies of Europe and America and bringing on real long term environmental solutions, sustainable power and eco design.

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• The Crescent and the Cross - Part Four

  Mon, 30 Nov 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  In the final part of this series, Owen Bennett-Jones examines the Islamic leader who confronted the might of the British Empire. The Mahdi was a devout man, who developed a huge following. This programme examines his rise to power and his clash with the British General, Charles Gordon.

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• StoryCorps - Part One

  Fri, 27 Nov 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  How would you like to leave a record of your life for your great-great-great-grandchildren? That's the future for participants of StoryCorps, an American oral history project. What do people choose to talk about?

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• Assignment Malvinas War Crimes

  Thu, 26 Nov 09

  Duration:
  23 mins

  Twenty seven years after Britain and Argentina went to war over the Falklands, or the Malvinas islands, Argentine army officers are facing prosecution. Not for the way they treated the enemy, but for crimes allegedly committed against their own troops.

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• Assignment - The Congo Connection

  Thu, 26 Nov 09

  Duration:
  23 mins

  In Assignment Peter Greste investigates whether Rwandans in France and Germany are controlling a deadly African militia in the Democratic Republic of Congo. For the last 15 years, the rebels of the FDLR have enforced their control through a series of brutal atrocities. Now Assignment has secret intelligence suggesting that they were taking orders from political leaders living openly in Europe.

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• Short Changing the Planet

  Wed, 25 Nov 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  The BBC World Service has been investigating the controversial issue of whether poor countries have ever seen all of the money promised by industrialised countries in 2001. According to some less than 10 percent of it has been paid: others disagree.

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• The Crescent and The Cross: Part Three

  Mon, 23 Nov 09

  Duration:
  27 mins

  In the third instalment of The Crescent and the Cross, Owen Bennett Jones examines one of the most important Muslim empires in history - the Ottoman Empire. In particular, it focuses on the time of Suleiman The Magnificent, a towering figure in the rivalry between Christianity and Islam, and a crucial battle - the 1565 Seige of Malta.

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• John Simpson Returns to 1989 - Part Two

  Thu, 19 Nov 09

  Duration:
  24 mins

  The BBC's World Affairs Editor John Simpson tells the story of 20 years of post-communist life. Through personal stories, he traces the different roads that East Germany, the Czech Republic and Romania have taken since 1989. In part two John returns to Prague to speak to those who lived through the Velvet Revolution.

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