Max Pearson presents a compilation of this week's Witness History programmes from the BBC World Service.
You'll hear the story of how a protest led by the punk band Pussy Riot in one of Moscow's main cathedrals led to a trial which made the news inside Russia and around the world.
Then, historian Robert Service talks about other examples of rebellion, from ... Show More
Nov 2023
95. The History of Putin's War
Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on 24th February 2022, but how did we get to this point? After the brutality of the Second World War, Ukraine was completely under the control of Moscow. Then in the 1980s, with Chernobyl as the catalyst, the Ukrainian nationalist movement regained ... Show More
53m 37s
May 2024
Ukraine defends against Russian attack on border, Putin's spy mansion & how Moscow is 'replaying' the Second World War
Day 800.Today, Russia launches an assault on Ukrainian border towns in Kharkiv, we discuss Russian spycraft in the UK and the links between the Second World War and Russian atrocities today, and we interview Anna Zakletska – the Ukrainian TV presenter, singer, and activist, who's ... Show More
1h 6m
Jun 2023
Wagner vs Putin: A History of Russian Coups
On the 24th of June, 2023, Yevgeny Prigozhin and his paramilitary group Wagner carried out what appeared to be an attempted coup in Russia. In a seismic turn of events, his mercenaries marched across the Russian border without resistance and seized key military installations in t ... Show More
24m 40s
Mar 2022
161. Yeltsin, Economic Chaos and President Putin
[Episode 3 of 4]
'You certainly won't understand what ordinary Russians see in Vladimir Putin if you don't understand what happened in the 1990s. A time of utter, utter collapse.'
In part three of our Soviet Union, Russia and Putin series, Tom and Dominic drill down into the det ... Show More
39m 33s
Jul 2022
Putin, Power and Personality
Vladimir Putin has the power to reduce the United States and Europe to ashes in a nuclear firestorm. He invades his neighbours, most recently Ukraine, meddles in western elections and orders assassinations inside and outside Russia. But who is the man behind the headlines?
For ye ... Show More
31m 20s
Jul 2022
The man who came back from the dead
The incredibly story of Ivan Skyba, the sole survivor of one of the worst atrocities of the war in Ukraine. In March 2022, Russian troops shot dead eight unarmed men in a mass execution in the town of Bucha, outside Kiev. But incredibly, one man who the Russians thought they’d ki ... Show More
26m 27s