31/12/2016 Witness


31/12/2016

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Hallo, and welcome to Witness with me, Tanya Beckett. I am here at the

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British Library in London for the last time this year to bring if I

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want our favourite stories from 2016. We will meet a former member

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of Chairman Mao's intimates red guards, a woman astronaut who

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trained with the Challenger space or crude an art restorer who brought a

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Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece back to life. But first, Witness has

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travelled to the Bamyan Valley in Afghanistan. For over 1,000 years to

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huge statues of border towered over the valley at in 2001 they were

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destroyed by the Taliban. Mr Hussein was one of the local people forced

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to lay dynamite around the statues. This year is the 50th anniversary of

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the start of the cultural revolution in China. At the forefront were red

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kites, fanatical students trying to help eliminate vestiges of

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capitalism. Our next Witness Saul Yeung was one of them. In 1966I was

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in middle school when the cultural revolution started. The biggest

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nation on earth, China, is in turmoil. Is China's ageing leader

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losing control? Has Mao gone mad, driven by the megalomania of the

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teenage Red Guards? Mao had decided to drive the young

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people in a vast campaign to purify the Communist Party. There was to be

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a new revolution, a cultural revolution, a revolution in people's

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thinking. Inspired by Mao, the Red Guards went

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wild in their enthusiasm to keep the revolution alive. They worshipped

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Mao as their leader and follow his instructions without question. They

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consider longhair and Western-style clothes I'm Communist. --

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un-Communist. After reports of riotings, beatings

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up and even murder, the Red Guard seem to have gone too far. Their

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leaders have told them to cool off and go and help with the harvest.

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Saul Young, talking to Witness in San Francisco. In January 1986

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tragedy struck the US space agency NASA when the space shuttle

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Challenger exploded shortly after launch. Six astronauts and a school

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teacher were killed. Barbara Morgan was another teacher who trained

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alongside the Challenger team. My husband that I, we were sitting on

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the sofa, watching venues and president Reagan came on and made

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this announcement, it was quite remarkable. Today I am directing

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Nasser to begin a search and to choose as the first citizen

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passenger in the history of our space programme one of America's

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finest, a teacher. I'll always remember my husband, who was a

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writer, jumped up immediately and said, why a teacher, why not a

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writer? And I laughed and said I thought a teacher would the perfect

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choice. Christa was chosen as our teacher in space. I was very, very

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lucky to be chosen as her backup. Christa was very much like the girl

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next door. She had an effervescent smile. She was very intelligent and

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just soaking it all in. Christa spent six months with me training

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with the Challenger crew. Some of the favourite training was with the

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simulators, to learn what it was like to be weightless. We did not

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stop laughing that entire flight. Launch date was January 20 eight. We

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had been at the Kennedy space centre for a few days and the crew had been

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spending time in crew quarters going through all the last-minute work and

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preparation for the flight. And that morning it was a very, very cold

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morning. We of course have school children all over the country

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watching. There were, you know, 100 kids from Christa's son's school

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there. And all of the families and friends. I remember I was so

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excited, I so wanted to be with them. I was waving and I am sure I

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was jumping up and down. Really cheering them on, really really

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happy for them and wanting to be with them. S we have main engine

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start, four, three, two, one and left. Lift off of the 25th station

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at all -- space shuttle mission and we have liftoff. Very soon into the

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launch, things didn't look right. There wasn't one contrail going up

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and that look very different from the launch of that Christa and I had

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watched a few months earlier. And then at some point you realised that

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something has gone terribly wrong. Flight controllers, you are looking

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very carefully at the situation. Obviously a major malfunction. We

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all went to crew quarters where we were waiting word and helping her

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families. It was, you know, a really tough situation. In September, I

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went back to the classroom, and I taught for many, many more years. In

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1998, many, many years later, NASA asked me to apply for the astronaut

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office, the astronaut programme. At that point I had left teaching and

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went and served as an astronaut for ten years. One of the wonderful

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legacies of the Challenger is the educational programme that the

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families of the Challenger crew members got together and created,

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where young people for themselves experience the joy and wonder of

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spaceflight and space exploration. It is called the Challenger centre

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for space science education. That is why the Challenger crew were going

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into space. They were going to explore and discover an experience

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for all of us and to keep that future wide open for all of us.

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Former astronaut Barbara Morgan talking to us at her home in Idaho.

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Remember, you can watch Witness every month on the BBC News channel,

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or you can catch up on all of our films along with more than 1000

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radio programmes in our online archive.

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Now, a story of Cold War intrigue and the BBC. In 1978, a Bulgarian

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dissident was working in London for BBC World Service. On his way into

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the office he was stabbed with, of all things, poisoned umbrella

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witness has tracked down Doctor Bernard Reilly, who tried to save

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Georgi Markov's life. I remember walking into the cubicle and Georgi

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Markov was on the trolley, setting up. He was hot, toxic, he had rapid

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pulse rate and his temper Bridge was up. The first thing he said that, I

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was warned three months ago that they are out to get me. And I have

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been poisoned by the KGB and I am going to die and there is nothing

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you can do about it. Georgi Markov was driving to work at the BBC. He

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parked as usual below Waterloo Bridge. Georgi Markov came up the

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steps of the bridge, towards the bus stop on the road above. As he

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reached the bus stop, suddenly something happened to Georgi Markov.

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He suddenly felt a sharp stabbing at the back of his right thigh, and he

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looked around expecting the person behind him to apologise for prodding

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him with an umbrella. Instead of which the man hailed a taxi. Mr

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Georgi Markov finished his shift and it wasn't until late that night at

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his home in Clapham that he developed a high fever. When I

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examined him systematically, the only thing that I could find was on

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the back of his thigh he had, perhaps, sort of a centimetre

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diameter swollen area, with then around one or two McNamee the

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central puncture mark. I thought, well, at best phoned Scotland Yard

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special branch because they are the sort of people who deal with

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defectors. His own room at the BBC Bulgarian service was used by

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anti-terrorist squad detectives investigating the murder. I thought

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it can't be cyanide, that would kill you to quickly. It can't be thallium

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or arsenic, that is too slow. It had to be a toxin. And if there was a

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toxin it might be an antidote. So I then went home, and my wife said you

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should read more Agatha Christie. And she had just read a book called

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the House of the Lurk lurking Death, rice and in the face. I don't think

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this was an intruder diagnosis, it was because of the book she had read

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at the time but the whole thing was that she was proven right, it was

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right in. His heart had started giving out, and I just saw the hype

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machine die away, and shortly after that he died -- ricin. I had to go

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to the postmortem. I remember the pathologist taking a segment of

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thigh tissue where this area was. As this was being handled, very small

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metallic object was dislodged. As a sort of role under the table, and

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they then looked at it under a microscope and realised that it was

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actually a very round, circular, tiny little ball about, sort of,

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just under two millimetres in diameter, and that it had holes in

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it. And obviously something could have been contained in those holes.

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They decided almost straightaway that this was going to be ricin. It

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is a poison which is incredibly toxic. It is strange that as you

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encounter one patient so early on in 1's career that actually changes

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your entire life. All I wanted to be was a forensics pathologist. I

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wanted to be someone who looked at dead bodies, looked at laboratory

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findings, and decided white people died. And this was the first patient

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I am trying desperately to keep alive, and failing. And realising

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that actually I didn't want to find out why people died, I wanted to try

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and keep them alive. Doctor Bernard Reilly with that extraordinary

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story. Finally this month, Caty cap witness has travelled to Milan to

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meet the woman charged with restoring one of the world's great

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masterpieces, Leonardo Da Vinci's Last Supper. She finished her

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painstaking work in 1999 after spending 20 years on the project.

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Last Supper was painted here 500 years ago for the refectory of Santa

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Maria. But due to his experimental fresco technique, it started to

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flake away almost as soon as Leonardo Da Vinci had finished it.

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Now, a mouth on restoration has attempted to save one of the world's

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masterpieces from disappearing completely.

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By stripping away centuries of botched restoration attempts, lines

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which were crude and inexpressive are now delicate and refined. The

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mural isn't by no means perfect and some critics feel too much paint has

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been removed. -- is by no means perfect.

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Pinin Brambilla, speaking at her studio in Malang. That's all for

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Witness for this month and this year. We will be back in 2017 with

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more stories from history told by the people who were there. From me

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and the rest of the Witnessed him, good light -- Milan. -- goodbye.

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Some contrasting weather conditions to close out our final few

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It was cold and foggy in the south-east pretty much

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