Witness History

In 2014, Egypt’s outgoing president, Adly Mansour, issued a decree which categorised sexual harassment as a crime punishable by a minimum six-month jail term and a fine of 3,000 Egyptian pounds which…

In 1979, Egypt’s former first lady Jehan Sadat helped lead a campaign to grant women new rights to divorce their husbands and retain custody of their children.

Married to President Anwar Sadat, she w…

In June 2012, Mohamed Morsi, representing the Muslim Brotherhood, became Egypt's first democratically elected president.

In 2022, Ben Henderson spoke to Rabab El-Mahdi, chief strategist to one of Mors…

On 15 September 1935, following the introduction of the Nuremberg Laws in Nazi Germany, seven-year-old Lotte Hershfield and her family left their home in Breslau, which was part of Germany and is now…

On 11 September, 2001, a small Canadian town called Gander became a haven for thousands of airline passengers and crew stranded after the 9/11 terror attacks.

The attacks on the World Trade Center had…

In 1969, a satirical book, The Peter Principle, suggested promotion led to incompetence.

It was written by a Canadian Professor of Education, Dr Laurence J Peter and playwright Raymond Hull.

The book …

On 23 March 1933, the Enabling Act was passed in Germany, handing Adolf Hitler unchecked power. It became the legal foundation of his dictatorship.

But in that moment, one voice spoke in defiance.

Otto…

In 1977, Nigeria hosted the largest festival of African arts and culture there had ever been. About half a million visitors attended, as well as 16,000 delegates including Stevie Wonder and Miriam Ma…

In 2008, Lithuanian student Milda Mitkutė realised she had too many clothes when she was moving out.

She told her friend Justas Janauskas and together they came up with a website to sell them.

It late…

In September 2014, the world's first baby was born to a mother with a transplanted womb, making headlines around the globe.

Malin Stenberg had the pioneering surgery over a year earlier when she recei…

During World War Two, an unconventional special force was formed. Known as the Chindits, they fought behind enemy lines in Burma, now Myanmar during 1943 and 1944 in the war against Japan.

Their leade…

On 3 November 1961, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) was founded, bringing all existing aid work under one single agency. A key proponent of it was Barbara Ward, a pi…

In September 1985, the wreck of the Titanic was discovered around 400 nautical miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada, during a joint American-French expedition.

It had remained undisturbed, 13,0…

In 1972, after leaving The Beatles, John Lennon and Yoko Ono performed in the United States at the One to One benefit concerts at Madison Square Garden, New York.

They were helping to raise money for…

In 1948, filming began on a post-war thriller that would become one of the greatest British movies of all time.

Directed by Sir Carol Reed, the film captured the atmosphere of a divided, ruined Vienna…

In May 1991, a female police officer shot and wounded a young immigrant from El Salvador in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood in Washington DC in the United States.

It sparked several days of disturba…

In 2000, as the internet expanded, websites faced a growing challenge to stop spam bots from flooding their systems.

To separate humans from machines, researchers at the United States’ Carnegie Mellon…

In 1998, at a conference organised by the United Nations, a blueprint was devised for what would be the world's first permanent International Criminal Court.

Judge Phillipe Kirsch chaired the Rome con…

In 1859, Swiss businessman Henry Dunant witnessed the Battle of Solferino, in Italy.

He couldn’t believe the lack of aid for the wounded soldiers and came up with two ideas – a voluntary aid organisa…

In the early 2000s, BlackBerry was the phone that ruled the world. But within a decade, it collapsed, overtaken by the touch screen revolution.

Sam Gruet speaks to former co-CEO Jim Balsillie about Bl…