The Interview

Special Counsel Robert Mueller found no evidence that the President colluded with the Russians during the 2016 presidential election. Even though Mueller left open the question of obstruction of justice the President is claiming exoneration. George Papadopoulos was the first Trump campaign member to be convicted as a result of the Mueller probe. Are we any closer to the truth?

(Photo: George Papadopoulos. Credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

MPs are currently trying to find a Brexit consensus in defiance of the wishes of Prime Minister May. How close to breaking point is Britain’s political system?

Image: Kenneth Clarke (Credit: UK Parliament)

HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is 70 years old this year, but despite its achievements and longevity, celebrations are muted. That’s because NATO's cohesion and long-term viability are being questioned as never before. Is the Secretary General simply papering over the organisation’s widening cracks?

Image: Jens Stoltenberg (Credit: European Photopress Agency)

Is the World Bank braced for turbulence ahead? HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to the bank's interim President Kristalina Georgieva. For more than seven decades, the World Bank has been a pillar of international consensus forged in Washington – where ‘rich world’ money has been funnelled into poorer nations prepared to play by its rules. But maybe the consensus is breaking down. The World Bank is about to get a new Trump-nominated president who has been sharply critical of its past activities.

(Photo: Kristalina Georgieva. Credit: Stephanie Lecocq/European Photopress Agency)

Is UK policing fit for purpose? Stephen Sackur speaks to Michael Fuller, former chief constable of Kent police, and the only black Briton to have run one of the country’s regional forces. There has been an alarming rise in knife crime in the UK and this prompted a bout of soul searching about the causes and responses. Many of the questions focus on the police. Are they doing an effective job? How well do they handle the challenges of policing in disadvantaged and minority communities?

(Photo: Michael Fuller, former chief constable of Kent police

Is there a way out of Venezuela’s protracted agony? Stephen Sackur speaks to Juan Andres Mejia, Deputy of Venezuela’s Voluntad Popular party. For millions of Venezuelans every day is a struggle for survival. This is an oil rich country where the shops are empty, the power is out and healthcare is collapsing. And politics offers little hope of salvation. The Maduro Government is clinging to the trappings of power while the country’s other self-proclaimed president Juan Guaido leads mass protests against him. Juan Andres Mejia is one of Guaido’s key allies in the Venezuelan parliament. Is there a way out of Venezuela’s protracted agony?

(Photo: Juan Andres Mejia. Credit: Federico Parra/AFP/Getty Images)

Stephen Sackur speaks to Ayelet Gundar-Goshen, a prize-winning Israeli novelist who brings a trained psychologist’s eye to compelling stories set in her home country. Hers is a world of moral ambiguity where truth, memory, right and wrong aren't necessarily what they seem. Does her work tell us something important about the Israeli psyche?

Mental health is not easy to talk about, least of all for young men, so often brought up to regard emotional vulnerability as weakness. In a special edition of HARDtalk filmed in the BBC’s Radio Theatre, Stephen Sackur speaks to Stephen Manderson who is better known as the British rapper Professor Green. He has been very honest about his own struggles with mental health issues and is determined to break the taboos around the subject. Can we all learn from Professor Green?

(Photo: British rapper Professor Green)

Theresa May’s European parliamentary elections could be a defining moment in the struggle for the EU's future; a continent wide clash between the forces of liberalism and populism exists - perhaps best personified by French President Emmanuel Macron up against Hungary's Viktor Orban. HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to Italy’s former centre-left Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni. Politically he’s with Macron, but his country is led by populists sympathetic to Viktor Orban. Whose message is resonating with European voters?

Image: Paolo Gentiloni (Credit: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images)

As the political debate over Brexit grows ever more polarised in the UK exposing deep fractures within the political parties, questions are also being asked about the how the machinery of government is working. Lord Ricketts, a former top diplomat, and national security adviser has very publicly condemned the current government’s handling of Brexit negotiations describing them as a fiasco and expressing the fear that Brexit will leave Britain permanently and significantly weakened. This public airing of views has created the impression that the supposedly apolitical civil service, particularly the foreign office, is institutionally and temperamentally opposed to Brexit – a policy which was of course approved by a national referendum in 2016. Does this represent a real problem in Britain’s democracy and in the relationship between the people and the government?