The Interview

Tania Bruguera's pieces and immersive performances have attracted international acclaim but prolonged harassment from the Cuban authorities. Is she artist, activist or both?

Tania Bruguera's pieces and immersive performances have attracted international acclaim but prolonged harassment from the Cuban authorities. Is she an artist, activist or both?

(Photo: Cuban artist Tania Bruguera poses in the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern. Credit: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP)

HARDtalk’s Zeinab Badawi speaks to the world’s oldest head of government, Malaysia's Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad. He came back to office in May after election victory against his own former ruling coalition. The country has been mired in allegations of corruption swirling around the previous government, which have dented confidence at home and abroad. First time round, he was Prime Minister for more than 20 consecutive years until 2003. Can Mahathir Mohamad leave his own chequered past behind and lead Malaysia to a brighter future?

Image: Mahathir Mohamad (Credit: Reuters)

Is the left losing the political argument in Europe? Stephen Sackur speaks to Yanis Varoufakis, Greece’s radical leftist finance minister at the height of the economic crisis, and an advocate of a new global progressive politics. The old certainties in European politics are crumbling. Voters seem fed up with the long established supremacy of the parties of centre right and centre left. The politics of identity and raw emotion have fuelled populist insurgencies from Italy to Sweden to eastern Europe. Mostly it’s the right, not the left in the ascendant.

(Photo: Yanis Varoufakis. Credit: AFP/Getty)

Is Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit strategy in deep trouble? Stephen Sackur speaks to Lord Howard, former Conservative leader. Britain's Conservative party is about to hold its annual conference; it promises to be a fascination spectacle, with the party riven by deep divisions over Brexit; divisions which threaten to derail Theresa May's Brexit strategy and perhaps her premiership as well. At stake is not just the future of a venerable political party, but the future of Britain.

(Photo: Lord Howard in the Hardtalk studio)

What is journalism for? To inform and bear witness, uncover inconvenient truths and hold power to account? Those are surely values most of us share, but have we collectively lost faith and trust in the news and those who report it? Stephen Sackur speaks to Alan Rusbridger- who edited the UK’s Guardian newspaper for 20 years in the midst of a digital revolution, which transformed the news business forever. If the established media is no longer trusted, who is to blame?

(Photo: Alan Rusbridger in the Hardtalk studio)

Will post Brexit Britain be left behind in the race to reach new scientific frontiers? Stephen Sackur speaks to Graham Turnock, Chief Executive of the UK space agency. Britain’s exit from the European Union has generated intense scrutiny of borders, tariffs and trade. But the shock waves will spread much further. A complex web of scientific collaboration and partnership is in jeopardy – most obviously in the field of space and satellite technology. The UK stands to be frozen out of the Galileo project which will deliver a European rival to the American GPS system.

Deploying troops overseas, whether to fight or protect, is a costly business. It is one of the reasons why throughout history, wars and long term military commitments have often been contracted out to private operators – mercenaries – whose methods, personnel and costs can be very different. HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to Erik Prince, the founder of the Blackwater security contractor used by the US Government in Iraq until things went badly wrong. A decade on, he is pitching to replace the US military in Afghanistan – is it an idea President Trump might just buy?

'Sense the party's thought, obey the party's words, follow the party's lead' are the words printed in red on a building at an internment camp in Xinjiang, China. It is one of the country's wealthiest provinces, and also one of its most restive. It has one and a half per cent of China's population, yet over 20 per cent of its arrests. Meanwhile, there are reports of over a million people currently in detention. The Government says the camps are needed to "re-educate" the people. Nury Turkel, chairman of the Uyghur Human Rights Project, disagrees. Uyghurs, an ethnic group who practice Islam, say Xinjiang has become a giant prison. Yet armed groups have killed hundreds in recent years, and the US and UK among others have placed the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, based in the region, among those they call terrorists. Is he being duped, or is China duping the rest of the world?

HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur is in Italy to speak to Matteo Salvini, the country’s Deputy Prime Minister and arguably the most important populist politician in Europe today. He has risen to power with strident denunciations of immigration and the European Union. What does his success mean for Italy and Europe?

Image: Matteo Salvini (Credit: Reuters)