Review 2017 HARDtalk

have the right to make

such a decision.

It is time for HARDtalk.

Welcome to my look back at the best

of HARDtalk, 2017. So many

personalities, so much passion. And

more than a little anger.

There is a

lot of pain in America, and Donald

Trump addressed that. He said I will

be a different type of Republican. I

hear your pain. The only trouble is

he lied. Blue eye at the work inside

the White House, and I will tell

you, there is no crisis, we are

creating the results expected of us

and which got the president elected

supreme he can build as many walls

as he wants. What he will never ever

achieved, is Mexico paying for the

wall.

We do not want to have Islam

claiming power in our country.

Preaching against our values, our

culture!

The worst thing that could happen

with North Korea was the escalation

leading to sleep-walking interwar.

It is the entitlement of too many

men, and it is epidemic. When they

are famous, it gets talked about.

There is only one place to start in

the look back at 2017, the United

States. Donald Trump's election

victory reflected a divided America.

In his first year in office, those

divisions were deepened.

Bernie

Sanders, welcome to HARDtalk. It is

great to be with you.

To you in any

way regret what you did with Hillary

Clinton? She could be in the White

House.

I do not accept that. I

accept the fact our campaign brought

millions and millions of people into

the political process. Donald Trump

did not need me to understand

Hillary Clinton gave speeches before

Wall Street. She did not need me to

understand her record. There is a

lot of pain in America. And Donald

Trump addressed that an. He said I

will be a different type of

Republican. I hear your pain. I will

take on the establishment, the

politics, economic establishment.

The only problem is Donald Trump

lied.

Senator Lindsey Graham, John

McCain, your good friend, says it is

time for Republicans on Capitol Hill

to stand up to Donald Trump. We are

not his subordinates, John McCain

says. So, are you now prepared to

stand up to Donald Trump?

Absolutely. We came out strongly

against the first travel ban because

I thought it was basically a ban on

a person's religion.

Sebastian Gorka

in Washington, what is the

atmosphere in the White House today?

Fabulous. I literally just left The

Oval Office where we swore in

general Kelly as the new Chief of

Staff or the president. It was like

a family gathering. A great mood.

Lots of breast. We are very excited

about recent developments.

Anthony Scaramucci, with his words

to the New Yorker, he has surely

thrown a bomb into the building

behind you, the White House.

Not at

all. I know that is what colleagues

on the hill on the left and in the

chattering classes of the leftist

media would want people to believe.

But it is not at all like that. We

are excited, the agenda to make

America great again is working. We

have strengthened the team. We have

people who can communicate to the

base that elected him as president.

Sebastian Gorka left the White House

just a month later. One of the most

extraordinary features of the first

months of the Donald Trump

presidency has been the deepening

sense of a war between the White

House and the so-called mainstream

media. On top of the enemy list of

the president, the New York Times,

the grand old lady of American

newspapers, which Donald Trump

portrays as a purveyor of lies.

This

is a president, umm, who does not

like the press. No president ever

like the pressie gets. He likes it

less. This is a man who made his

name in the industry by manipulating

the tabloids. He becomes president

and I think he was expecting the

same thing. Fox News gave it to him.

But we will not.

You, I think it is

fair to say, for a long time, as a

paper, did not appear to take Donald

Trump that seriously. Would you at

least accept that?

I guess the way I

would slip it, it is not that we did

not take him seriously, we did not

take the Donald Trump phenomenon

seriously.

Out of touch would be the

phrase.

I will accept that. There

was anger in the country. Anger at

elites. We were seen as elites. I do

not think we had our finger on the

pulse of the anger. We wrote about

the anger in the country, but we did

not understand the scope of it and

how much people want to change.

None

of the usual diplomatic rules

applied to the Donald Trump

presidency. Some harsh words came

from south of the border.

Excuse me,

it starts with the wall. He can

build as many walls as he wants. He

can enclose that leading nation

behind more walls because of fear

and because of his crazy ideas, but

what he will never ever change is

Mexico paying for the wall. That is

a different thing. That has to do

with sovereignty, that has to do

with dignity, that has to do with

pride. We are not paying for that

stupid wall that he wants to build.

Build that if you want with US

taxpayers' money.

Latin America had

its own big headache this year.

Venezuela plunged into an economic

crisis which saw shops run out of

food and medicine. Nicolas Maduro

faced a wave of protesting. For the

last few years you have been a

diplomat at the UN representing

Venezuela and the Venezuela

government. A month ago you decided

to jump ship. Why is that?

It is

impossible to defend what cannot be

defended. You can clearly see the

violation of human rights and the

crimes against humanity that have

been committed in the past four

months. It is impossible to defend

quote unquote socialist utopia, it

is a dystopia.

A journey to

Venezuela undercover. Journalists

were barred as the opposition to do

the streets. The mother of the

country's most famous political

prisoner took me to hear the voice

of resistance.

Look at that.

A Jeep has come out of

the present. They want to talk to

us. This was the moment our filming

in Venezuela came to an abrupt end.

As the military police approached us

from the prison, we attempted to

leave. We managed to conceal the

camera in our car but our cover was

blown. European politics in 2017

featured concern about immigration,

the rise of antiestablishment

populist politics, and efforts by

mainstream politicians to

reinvigorate the centre ground. And,

of course, there was Brexit as well.

One of the most memorable interviews

of my year came from Nicholas Frank,

whose father was Hitler's lawyer,

and the Nazi's top official in

Parliament.

It hurts to admit we

killed the lives of innocent people

in a system which was really a tough

system. And to be against the system

was to have a very brave character

to do it. But this hurts. You can

endure it, and I still love Germany,

I love being a world champion in

football, for instance. Really, I am

a nationalist, yes? As you can see,

especially refugees, everything

changed because it was as if we were

Jews again. The swamp is coming.

You

feel that? You feel so insecure

about your Germany today?

Yes. Don't

trust us.

We do not want to have

Islam claiming political power in

our country. We are very much in

favour of religious freedom, I said

that already. And a mosque is where

Muslim people are practising their

beliefs. That is OK. What we know

from our Secret Services is we

basically, in every mosque have

problems, because they are preaching

very often in a language which we do

not understand, erratic. They are

preaching against our values, our

Constitution, our culture. --

Arabic.

Let me explain, we have

radical and political Islam in

Europe, jihadists. Secondly, we have

a trap by Putin, an autocrat in the

Kremlin who tries to divide Europe.

And now we have an American

president who is seeing the European

unity as a pillar for foreign

policy. He is saying openly he hopes

the EU disintegrates. I think we

are, for the moment, in an

existential moment for the EU.

There

is a clear idea for Brexit. Theresa

May will say that in her speech and

her Florence speech. There are bits

I am not enthusiastic about, but it

is a clear manifesto. She has been

generous in the office she has made

to the EU. The government she leads

is stronger than many, not all,

Continental governments.

You can

take a decision one day and change

your mind another day. It happens.

It is OK to open doors and say

perhaps, if you are interested, one

day, we would be happy to have you

back.

Throughout 2017, Europe cast

uneasy glances to the east. Vladimir

Putin continues to flex Russia's

muscle in the international arena

while maintaining an iron grip at

home.

Vladimir Putin just tries to

distract the Russian people from

real problems like inequality and

poverty. We have 23 million Russian

citizens living below the line of

poverty, and he is distracting them

from this problem with is imperial

delusions about making Russia great

again and all that stuff.

You know,

unfortunately, we have a very weak

position in our country. ? Could

that be because they are not allowed

access to state television, for

example? It is not about that. You

have modern media. Television is

diminishing day by day.

In Russia

today, if you switch on the TV and

you want to find opposition voices,

you...

The American president is

winning elections using Twitter! In

order to be a successful opposition,

you have to be sustainable you have

to have a problem of development of

the country.

You also have to be

allowed a semblance of freedom. You

have to be a person not at risk of

being assassinated as Boris Nemtsov

was 100 metres from the Kremlin. You

have to be like election of any

whose brother was caught up in

trumped up charges. -- Alexi

Navalny. You need space to make a

movement in Russia.

Why do you think they are not fair

charges?

Because the European human

court of rights has said they were

illegitimate.

We don't agree with

that.

You don't agree with the

European Court of Human Rights?

I

would rather trust are in court.

Welcome to the HARDtalk Studios.

Great to see you. We are going to

put you in that seat over their...

One Russian intent on challenging

Putin and the election next March

came into the HARDtalk studio,

boasting views, not experience.

I

hope he will be wise enough if I

will be registered to support me

because unfortunately, this

situation is very unfair, he won't

be registered by unlawful lawsuits

that are made against him, so if we

are fighting for the same goal, and

I think we are, with Alexei Navalny,

I offered him this option, to be

united a person who just opens the

door. I am the one who will be

registered and I hope together with

him we can fight for the best future

of Russia.

In Africa, 2017 will be remembered

as the year Robert Mugabe's rule

finally came to an end in Zimbabwe

is, tempting perhaps what is seen as

a wider determination to push for

more political accountability. The

former president, welcome to

HARDtalk The mindful of what the

National Assembly said in November

of last year when you lectured them

about corruption...

What did they

say?

The person who introduced

corruption to this National Assembly

is the previous president. He had

corrupt practices from day one...

Listen to me, when I took over the

National Assembly said to me... The

national security adviser said

whenever I said in a bill to them I

shall send it with money and I said

no. If they don't pass it I will...

The National Assembly says have you

forgotten the sacks of money that

were displayed on the floor of the

House of Representatives? Where did

it come from? Being used for bribes.

You tell me! He says you and I'm

quoting him directly. The

grandfather of corruption in

Nigeria.

I never gave anybody dying.

Never.

Welcome to HARDtalk You made

a decision to call for Jacob Zuma to

go.

Yes.

Not just as party chief but

as president of his country.

Yes. My

belief was that if you are in a

leadership position you have the

responsibility of guiding others.

And whenever they get off the rails

you have the ability to put them

back and that same conscience should

help you as well. You don't think

Zuma has a conscience? Today it is

failing.

It has failed?

I say the

entire leadership is crooked, with a

few exceptions.

How could you just a

few months ago describe Robert

Mugabe as a father figure when you

seem to think that the people close

to him are responsible for the

murder of your husband?

He appeared

to be a father figure to me. It was

during this trouble that these

people were giving leadership to

everybody in trouble. According to

custom, it is out of respect we give

to our citizens.

It calls into

question your judgement.

About

Mugabe?

About everything we have

discussed. It is hard to understand

how your political career makes any

sense at all if you have morals,

ethics and principles.

The issue is

you have never been to Zimbabwe. The

issue is you have never seen what

personally I have done for the

country of Zimbabwe. The issue is

you have never come to the interview

for yourself those people to say,

how do you take Joice as a person?

Actually I have been to Zimbabwe, I

have reported from Zimbabwe, so I

have a little bit of an idea of how

the politics of the bubbly works.

You have been there but you have not

asked about me. -- politics of

Zimbabwe.

The map of the Middle East changed

in 2017. The self-styled caliphate

established by the Islamists of

Islamic State was erased in Iraq and

much of Syria, so was this the end

of the jihadists search?

I don't

think we are going to see the end of

Isis at all. That will be with us

for a long time, not in Iraq but it

is spreading. Already it's reached

Thailand and the Philippines.

Definitely it has reached Europe.

But in Iraq you are suggesting they

will change tactics? They won't hold

territories so much as conduct an

underground insurgency?

Holding

territories is finished for them,

but they will do insurgencies. And

they will embark on insurgencies.

They will resort back to terrorist

activities of explosions and

killings and assassinations. That's

why I say we need to end the war.

Thank you! I was on the first

commercial flight to land in

Benghazi, Libya.

IS fighters had terrorised the city

for a couple of years, before being

vanquished by a new Libyan military

force, led by this martial. A

one-time Kadhafi loyalist with his

own ambitions to rule the world.

Troubling evidence emerged of abuses

committed by him, including summary

executions. You would have read the

latest UN report suggesting that as

the forces moved back to Benghazi

there were as abuses of human

rights. That's something that

worries the international community.

That worries us as well. These

reports came out and he voiced his

concern and he said that he would

address them by investigating these

people who had been committing these

outlawed acts.

Have you seen those

videos and pictures, minister, of

people being shot in the back of the

head, bound, feet, executed?

Unfortunately I have seen them.

These acts should stop and I'm sure

that the Army staff will look into

that seriously because of the

wrongdoing that we have witnessed.

Aside from the conflicts and

geopolitics, 2017 will be remembered

for the power of women's voices,

speaking out about misogyny, sexual

abuse and gender inequality. Some of

my most memorable interviews from

this year reflected deeply personal

experiences.

It is the entitlement

of too many men and it is epidemic

and when they are famous and

powerful like Harvey then it gets

talked about, so it's really

important that those women who have

been brave enough to come out...

Indeed, the logjam has broken. But

there was silence when it's clear

that people knew of these behaviours

but did not talk in public about

them for year upon year.

Wire? The

women he preyed on and praise on,

young women, most of them were in

their 20s when it happened.

Vulnerable. Afraid that if they said

anything or did anything it would

ruin their career.

Wiley you felt

you couldn't speak out year ago when

you heard a lot of this stuff? --

macro -- why.

I was afraid. If it

had happened to me I would now. It

has happened to me, but long ago,

and it's very hard to come forward

when you've been a victim of sexual

abuse, because you get dragged over

the coals, you have to prove. We

have to stop believing these women

and stop protecting them.

Ian

McKellen, I wonder if you feel,

looking back now, whether you have

been a better, Fuller actor,

younger, if you had been more public

about your identity?

I think

probably. It is a certain truth of

me and practically every person I

know who has declared their

sexuality that life becomes better

in every possible way once you are

honest. That clearly affects your

work and my work, which is dealing

with honesty and truth about human

nature, it was likely to be more

convincing. And that's what friends

and colleagues said, that overnight

my acting took on a depth which it

hadn't had before, because I'm no

longer disguising, I now revealing.

Personal, political, powerful. We

celebrated 20 years of HARDtalk this

year. He's looking forward to more

memorable encounters in 2018. Until

then, have a very happy New Year.