HARDtalk BBC

The designer catwalk and the glossy magazine cover are powerful cultural signifiers. Top models who occupy those spaces are deemed to have a look that attracts and sells. But how diverse is that look? How inclusive? Stephen Sackur interviews Halima Aden, a supermodel who challenged a host of stereotypes. She is a refugee from Somalia’s civil war; she’s Muslim and follows a modest dress code. Hers has been an extraordinary journey to international fame and fortune - how has it changed her?

There are international laws and norms designed to prohibit states from bumping off their enemies, internal or external. But look around the world, and its clear those laws are being violated, often with impunity. Stephen Sackur interviews Agnes Callamard, a renowned human rights investigator who serves as the UN Special Rapporteur on extra judicial killing. Given the scale of the problem, have her investigations become an exercise in futility?

Remember the time when political discourse was founded on those quaint concepts - facts, evidence, and expertise? Now it seems partisanship infects every corner of the realm of ideas, according to Paul Krugman. Stephen Sackur interviews the Nobel Prize-winning economist and New York Times columnist, whose latest book suggests America’s political and economic future is threatened by zombie ideas peddled largely by America’s conservative movement. Has he become addicted to the partisan warfare he professes to despise?

Like many of Europe’s long-established parties of the left, the UK Labour Party is in big trouble. In last December’s election, Labour wasn’t just beaten, it was humiliated, losing its grip on working-class heartlands in the midlands and the North. Stephen Sackur interviews Len McCluskey, who will have a big say in the choice of the party’s next leader. He leads the Unite Union, which is Labour’s biggest financial backer. Who can save Labour from a slow death?

For a generation of black South African artists who came of age in the apartheid era, art and activism were intertwined; the liberation struggle was their life force. Now, a quarter of a century after Mandela became president, things are more complicated. Stephen Sackur speaks to John Kani, a giant of South African theatre. His career spans five decades of acting and writing. He’s been in Hollywood blockbusters, and is currently starring in his own West End play. What drives his artistic vision?

Ian Blackford is the Scottish Nationalist MP for a vast tract of north-west Scotland, and the leader of the SNP’s 48-strong band of Westminster MPs. He is a prominent champion of the cause of Scottish independence, a cause which represents one of the biggest challenges facing prime minister Boris Johnson over the next five years. Back in 2014, Scotland voted by 55% to 45% to remain in the UK. At the time, it was billed as a ‘once in a lifetime’ decision. But since then, Britain has left the EU – against the wishes of a clear majority in Scotland – and the SNP now argues that this material change in circumstances gives Scots the right to another vote on independence. The SNP's grip on power in Scotland is currently unassailable, so a protracted political stand off between Edinburgh and London seems inevitable. The nationalists have plenty of passion, but do they have a winning strategy?

(Photo: SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford during Prime Ministers Questions 2019. Credit: PA)