Witness History: Archive 2010

BBC World Service
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The story of our times told by the people who were there.

  1. 10/05/2013

    Albert Luthuli Receives the Nobel Peace Prize

    When Chief Albert Luthuli won the Nobel Peace Prize he was living under a banning order in rural South Africa. His daughter Albertina talks to Witness. Also listen to archive recordings of his acceptance speech. He won the prize for advocating peaceful opposition to the Apartheid regime in South Africa. Picture: Albert Luthuli receives the Nobel Peace Prize in 1960, Credit: Keystone/Hulton Archive

    9 min

  2. 10/01/2013

    Jamaica Slave Rebellion

    *** Contains descriptions that some listeners may find upsetting *** Enslaved Africans are forced to work in sugar cane fields - the hours are long and there are frequent, brutal punishments. They have endured these conditions for 200 years. By 1831 the anti-slavery movement is gathering pace and the slaves decide to take action - by going on strike. Samuel Sharpe became a Jamaican national hero as he led the island's slaves in a rebellion against the overseers and sugar plantation owners. The rebellion was brutally crushed, but over time, the rebellion had a significant impact - and two years later in 1833 the Slavery Abolition Act is passed. Picture: Making sugar in Jamaica, Credit: HultonArchive/Illustrated London News/Getty Images

    9 min

  3. 12/31/2010

    Chiapas Uprising

    People in the Chiapas region, led by the charismatic, ski-mask wearing, sub-commandante Marcos, rose up against the Mexican state. They called themselves, Zapatistas.

    9 min

  4. 12/30/2010

    Hamlet

    The play Hamlet can tell us a great deal about the time in which it was written. At the turn of the 16th century England was faced with many of the problems which plague its hero.

    9 min

  5. 12/29/2010

    Assad and Syria

    Hafez al Assad was the Syrian Defence Minister in the winter of 1970 when his struggle for power came to a head. His former friend, the hardline Baathist, Salah Jadid, was jailed for life.

    9 min

  6. 12/28/2010

    The Great Escape

    The film, The Great Escape, has become an all-time favourite. It is about a mass breakout from a German prison camp during World War 2. Flight Lieutenant Ken Rees, who died in August 2014, took part in the real-life escape effort, and talked to us about the escape.

    9 min

  7. 12/24/2010

    Christmas Truce

    For several days over Christmas in 1914 the fighting stopped on the battlefields of the First World War. British and German soldiers left their trenches to sing carols, exchange gifts and even play football. With archive recordings from the BBC and testimony from the Imperial War Museum. Image: British and German troops make a Christmas and New Year truce at the Western Front, Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images

    9 min

  8. 12/23/2010

    Andrei Sakharov

    The nuclear physicist and human rights activist Andrei Sakharov had spent seven years in internal exile in the Soviet city of Gorky. His return marked a change in attitude towards dissidents under the rule of Mikhail Gorbachev.

    9 min
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