15th August 1955
This programme is part of the series Remembering the Second World War in the Netherlands: Historical Sound of the 1950's In 1945, the Second World War continued in the Pacific and Southeast …
8th July 1957
On July 8, 1957, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru paid an official visit to the Netherlands. Dutch Foreign Minister Joseph Luns greeted him at Schiphol Airport and Radio Nederland was there …
8th July 1980
To mark the 60th birthday of India’s most famous composer and musician, Ravi Shankar, Radio Netherlands devoted a special edition of its weekly Asia magazine programme “Mainstream …
9th December 1980
This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsMother Teresa (1910-1997), a canonised saint in the Roman Catholic Church, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, in recognition for her …
1st October 1982
During the 1980’s, Pete Myers and his team hosted the weekly magazine Mainstream Asia. In this edition, the programme looks at the plight of the Vietnamese refugee community in the Netherlands. …
2nd November 1982
Gerard Rakers talks to South African heart transplant pioneer Dr. Christaan Barnard about his book: “The Body Machine”. Producer: Gerard Rakers Broadcast: 1982…
18th April 1983
David Attenborough’s epic film biography of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) presents a sweeping, masterful image of the life of India’s great pioneer of independence and 20th-century …
14th October 1983
In this programme, the renowned and controversial writer Salman Rushdie discusses his third novel “Shame”, published in 1983. The story is set in postcolonial Pakistan and explores the …
22nd October 1984
This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsIn this Mainstream Asia special, Pete Myers meets Indian writer Anita Desai to discuss her life, her preferred writing language – …
2nd November 1984
To coincide with the second World Population Conference in Mexico City City, Pete Myers presents in-depth interviews with two experts on India’s family planning programme. It was a prelude to a …
11th December 1984
This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsPete Myers discusses the acclaimed autobiographical novel “Empire of the Sun”, whose main character is based on the …
8th March 1985
This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviews“A passage to India” Producer: Pete Myers Broadcast: March 8, 1985…
1st November 1985
Pete Myers reports on how radical theology works in the Philippines, the only predominantly Catholic country in Asia. The programme includes a contribution from correspondent Keith Dalton, an …
14th February 1986
In 1986, Queen Beatrix and her husband Prince Claus paid a royal visit to India. Mainstream Asia and Pete Myers accompanied them. …
7th November 1989
This is an unedited 40-minute interview with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists and one of the world’s most revered advocates of non-violence and altruism. …
1st February 1991
This special edition of Asiascan focuses on silk, from its discovery, to the production process, to the final product. Maya Scheepers and Mieke Kooistra go on a silk thread route through Thailand. …
4th April 1993
Pete Myers takes a look at the voices behind the gorgeous and glamorous actors who could not sing—the ghost singers who sang for stars like Rita Hayworth and Susan Hayward in the golden age of …
10th October 1993
Every day across the globe, 5.000 people are infected by the virus that causes AIDS. More than 14 million people are believed to have been infected so far, mostly in Africa. A new battlefield is now …
8th February 1994
By the mid-1990’s when this programme was made, a number of Indian writers like Vikram Seth and Salman Rushdie had made a huge impact on the international literary scene. In this programme, we …
9th February 1994
No one knows how many children around the globe are forced to work, but a large percentage of the world’s child labor force is located in the Indian subcontinent. In India alone, the government …
16th February 1994
Working children are everywhere to be found in all of India’s major cities. They work mostly on the streets, peddling one thing or another, shining shoes or doing other menial tasks. In rural …
20th February 1994
In this award-winning edition of “East of Edam”, Dheera Sujan and Maggie Ayre pay tribute to some of the powerful and influential women who are changing India and are doing so in spite of …
2nd March 1994
It’s hard to imagine a country where women have a more difficult life than in Pakistan. Literacy rates among women are abysmally poor. Female infanticide is widely practiced, and women generally get …
1st April 1994
India relaxed its laws on foreign investments in 1991 and opened its doors to market liberalisation. By the time this programme was made a few years later, India was being referred to as the …
12th August 1994
In the mid-1980s, a non-governmental organisation near the southern Indian city of Bangalore began an experiment to help people in nearly 150 villages to create a better life for themselves. Praxis, …
24th September 1994
During the period from 1641 to 1859, Nagasaki was the only Japanese city that allowed to trade with the outside world. The city developed close ties with Dutch traders. To commemorate this …
3rd November 1994
India is fighting a losing battle to achieve literacy for all. The country’s population is growing so quickly that the educational system simply cannot keep up. Every year, India needs 175,000 …
9th November 1994
Eric Beauchemin visits Bombay, which at the time had a population of 10 to 15 million people. The city is comparable to the many sprawling urban areas emerging through the developing world and which …
12th November 1994
As the British raj left the Indian subcontinent in 1947, the rulers of the princely states were given the right to join India or Pakistan. One maharaja, wanting full independence for his state, …
14th November 1994
For decades, the Japanese young person’s recipe for success later in life has gone something like this: study hard, pass exams, get into the best university, get a job for life and then work 12 …
31st July 1995
The weekly survey of arts and culture, “Mirror Images”, spotlights Japan, with an animated film version of the Diary of Anne Frank, the popular all girl rock group Shonen Knife and the …
31st July 1995
In 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, killing 75,000 people instantly. Tens of thousands more died in the following years as a result of the effects of radiation. A few days …
1st August 1995
In August 1945, Indonesians proclaimed independence from the Netherlands. After hundreds of years of Dutch colonial rule, the East Indies was one of the world’s largest, richest and most …
2nd August 1995
On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan. 75,000 people died instantly. 75,000 more were injured. Thousands were killed in the fires that ravaged Hiroshima in the following …
15th August 1995
The most famous Dutch novel of the 19th century is “Max Havelaar” by Multatuli (pen name of Eduard Douwes Dekker (1820-1887). It not only became a classic of European literature but also …
16th October 1995
Women Living Under Muslim Laws is an organisation or network set up in 1986 by Muslim feminists to take action against Islamic legislation which discriminates against women. Hélène Michaud talks to …
11th November 1996
In his time, Judge Dee, a historical figure of the Tang Dynasty, earned fame as a magistrate, detective and statesman. Though never forgotten in his own country, it was only in the 20th century that …
14th November 1996
In the beautiful northeastern hills of India lies Darjeeling. And it is there that the true aristocrat of teas is grown. It is there that tea lover and world traveller Dheera Sujan indulged herself …
15th November 1996
The United States of America has been a country built on the blood, sweat and tears of generations of immigrants: the poor, the hungry and the tired who came to the New World to begin a new life. The …
15th December 1996
Homosexuality was quite common among the samurai, the military class in feudal Japan, and there are many literary works, dating back several centuries, which deal with love between men. But, as Eric …
14th March 1997
It’s a truism to say that language is fundamental to culture. In Hong Kong, political change is laying a path for cultural change, and language is an important aspect of that shift. When the …
23rd March 1997
Before the Cultural Revolution, which started in the mid-1960’s, Nien Chen (1915-2009) held a high position at Shell in Shanghai, was privileged and had servants. But almost overnight, she was …
29th May 1997
In this edition of the programme, Dheera Sujan has two guests, both Westernised Indians who talk about the way their culture influences their art. Rohinton Mistry is a writer who has lived in Canada …
1st July 1997
Marijke van der Meer examines the future of Hong Kong on the eve of its return into the Chinese fold on July 1, 1997. She meets the locals: a legislator, a businessman, an asylum seeker, a dissident …
3rd August 1997
A month ago, the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh was rocked by tank and gunfire. The leader of the coup, Hun Sen, ousted his government coalition partner Prince Norodom Ranariddh and took power. But …
15th August 1997
This programme was broadcast to mark the 50th anniversary of the partition of the subcontinent, when India and Pakistan gained independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Floris van Straaten …
22nd August 1997
When British India was granted independence in 1947, the subcontinent was divided into two countries: a predominantly Hindu India and to its east, and to its west a predominantly Muslim Pakistan. The …
21st September 1997
Dheera Sujan focuses on the phenomenal success and popularity of Indian films. Guest speakers include critic Derek Malcolm, the director of the Indian International Film Festival, Malti Sahai, …
5th October 1997
The French oil company Total has defied the U.S. government and signed a 2 billion dollar deal with Iran to develop offshore gas fields. In response, Washington has threatened to impose sanctions on …
12th October 1997
Dheera Sujan visits Bhutan, an ancient, pristine land with none of the problems (overpopulation, environmental degradation, crime, etc.) that beset most of the world. But for how long will it be so …
9th November 1997
Dheera Sujan visits Bhutan’s National Institute of Traditional Medicine. She finds out how to use tiger bones to cure epilepsy and how turning a prayer wheel could affect your health. Producer: …
14th November 1997
Bombay is India’s most cosmopolitan city. Its sheer scope, hustle and bustle, its mass of human can overwhelm. On a taxi ride to the city, chances are, you will be greeted by the sight of a row …
14th November 1997
Marijke van der Meer explores one of the sad legacies of the war in Vietnam. Over 20 years after the fall of Saigon, thousands of the nearly one million Vietnamese boat people who once sought asylum …
2nd January 1998
In the 19th century, 100,000 tigers stalked the Asian forests. But big game hunting, illegal poaching and the destruction of their habitat has shrunk that number to less than 6,000, the majority of …
18th January 1998
Dheera Sujan meets two Indian conservationists who are worried about the plight of the Asian elephant. There are around 25,000 of them in India, but ivory poachers and a shrinking habitat are a real …
23rd January 1998
It is difficult to adequately assess the political and spiritual importance of the life of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948). He was assassinated in Delhi on January 30, 1948, but his legacy as an ethical …
22nd February 1998
Siren Song meets Lulu Wang, the Chinese author of the Lilly Theatre (and later of other books), a fictionalised account of her experiences in China’s cultural revolution. It was an instant …
24th February 1998
The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly two hundred years, from the time it was established in …
24th February 1998
The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly two hundred years, from the time it was established in …
11th March 1998
The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly 200 years, from the time it was established in 1602 to …
7th August 1998
Every day, 2000 Filipinos leave their country to take up jobs abroad. The Philippines is the world’s biggest exporter of labour. Hélène Michaud takes us to Malanday, a densely populated area …
14th August 1998
On June 12, the Philippines celebrated the 100th anniversary of its declaration of independence from Spain. The irony is that it was, in fact, handed over to the United States for 20 million dollars. …
1st January 1999
This programme is part of the series Stories of Our CenturyIn 1999, Radio Netherlands broadcast a series of 12 programmes telling the story of the 20th century through famous books. In each …
12th February 1999
Bangladesh lies on a delta created by three of the world’s greatest rivers. To them, it is life in the form of food and transport. It is also death as the annual floods drown this most densely …
30th March 1999
The Black Death or Great Plague was one of the most devastating waves of disease and death in human history. Modern historians of the Middle Ages estimate that up to 200 million people succumbed to …
23rd April 1999
In this two part series, Jane Murphy looks at the impact of the biggest hydro-electric project on Earth: the massive Three Gorges Dam being constructed on China’s longest river, the Yangtze. …
30th April 1999
In this two-part series, Jane Murphy visits China to look at the impact of the biggest hydro-electric project in the world: the Three Gorges Dam, being built on the Yangtze River. Part two examines …
24th August 1999
Dheera Sujan looks at 50 years of Indian independence and partition through the experiences of one family. For although the people of India had won the right to rule themselves, the partition of …
25th October 1999
In this programme, producer Martha Hawley goes in search of her great uncle, Edwin Hawley, known in her family as Uncle Ned. Born in 1881, he left for China as a young man, a staunch Presbyterian …
19th November 1999
Crampons and spikes feature heavily in this heady documentary from James McDonald looking at the history of the challenge to climb the world’s highest mountain. Producer: James McDonald …
3rd December 1999
Hélène Michaud takes us to Malaysia. This country in southeast Asia has been in political turmoil since the sacking last year of Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who is now being tried on charges …
2nd January 2000
Khaled and Shukria Manupal are both physicians. They had a prosperous life and a nice home with their children in Afghanistan, until the Soviet invasion in 1979 forced them to leave their country in …
5th January 2000
The Bosphorous is the only link to the outside world for the nations of the Black Sea. It runs through the heart of Istanbul with shipping (oil, chemicals, etc.) posing a potential threat to the …
8th October 2000
By the turn of the century, Afghanistan had been at war for nearly two decades. The Afghans first took up arms to oust the Soviet occupiers and then the conflict descended into civil war. Pakistani …
18th October 2000
This is the first of two programmes about the Silk Road Project, initiated by acclaimed cellist Yo Yo Ma, which brings together music and musicians from around the world. In fact, the project follows …
19th October 2000
Dheera Sujan talks to Indian writer Arundhati Roy, whose first novel “A God of Small Things” became a world-wide bestseller. She studied architecture, flirted with acting, lived in a …
1st November 2000
Eric Beauchemin visits the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan in Central Asia. It has been independent since 1991, but a civil war has devastated most of the new country’s infrastructure. On …
8th November 2000
To mark the 400th anniversary of Japanese-Dutch relations, Liesbeth de Bakker focuses on scientist Philipp Franz von Siebold (1796-1866) who left behind beautiful collections of thousands of Japanese …
8th November 2000
Liesbeth de Bakker visits the Primate Research Institute at Kyoto University in Japan, and she meets Chimpanzee Ai, the chimp who counts, and her research partner, Tetsuro Matsuzawa. Find out what …
16th November 2000
On April 19, 1600, the Dutch merchant ship “de Liefde” arrived in Japan, and the sailors set up a trading post. When half a century later, Japan decided to close itself off from the rest …
28th November 2000
Afghanistan is one of the countries with the world’s highest percentages of disabled people. It’s estimated that over 800,000 people have some kind of disability, that’s over 1 in 20 Afghans. Many …
17th January 2001
For people in the developed world, human rights mean things like a free press, the right to vote or freedom from torture. But in many parts of the developing world, people are concerned with more …
14th March 2001
Jonathan Groubert visits Bombay, the movie capital of the world, where more than 1000 flicks are produced each year. The international appeal of these Hindi films is growing. What is their appeal, …
20th June 2001
In Pakistan, there are over three million heroin addicts, and this figure is still rising. Eric Beauchemin meets some of them, sees how and where they live and talks to local groups who are fighting …
1st July 2001
In Pakistan, child sexual abuse is rampant, but it remains shrouded in secrecy. Both girls and boys are the victims of abuse, and few of the perpetrators are ever convicted. Guilt and shame are …
16th October 2001
Much has been said and written about the situation of women today in Afghanistan. Since the ruling Taliban movement took over power in 1996, women have been subjected to what many in the West regard …
10th November 2001
Hindi cinema or Bollywood films are a major source of entertainment for many Indians. But these movies are also a major influence on the millions of South Asians who have settled all over the world. …
23rd December 2001
In the autumn of 2001, Radio Netherlands organised a Dutch music week in Japan. The crème de la crème of Dutch jazz musicians gave several concerts in Tokyo and Nagasaki. Jonathan Marks and Hans …
1st January 2002
The Kamasutra has been used and misused over the centuries. Its name has become synonymous with exotic sex. But in fact, it is a treatise on pleasure. It’s latest translator from Sanskrit, …
1st January 2002
This is the second of two programmes about the Silk Road Project, initiated by acclaimed cellist Yo Yo Ma, which brings together music and musicians from around the world in an enriching exchange of …
23rd March 2002
This programme is part of the series Global PerspectiveA group of international broadcasters exchanges documentaries with a common theme. This five-part series examines the way in which global forces …
2nd April 2002
In the second half of the 19th century, the Meiji Restoration in Japan was moving the country from a medieval agricultural economy to an industrialised one. It was a time of tremendous change and …
15th April 2002
Johannis de Rijke (1842-1913) was the son of a humble dyke worker from Zeeland. Yet by the time he died, he had reached the highest position ever reached by a foreigner in Japan, and was a regular …
1st May 2002
Indian literature produced the single longest poem in history, the great epic Mahabharata. Today the ancient story-telling and poetry recital traditions of India live on in “Bollywood”, …
2nd June 2002
To mark the 400th anniversary of the Dutch East India Company, plus the fact that exactly 400 years ago the first Dutchman set foot in Sri Lanka, Liesbeth de Bakker sailed forth to find out how Sri …
12th June 2002
Liesbeth de Bakker visits Galle in Sri Lanka where, in the bay, a wrecked VOC ship, De Avondster, is being recovered to put on display in a special museum. Experts from the Netherlands, Sri Lanka and …
9th July 2002
Dheera Sujan revisits Jagriti, a small school in a New Delhi slum where she taught as a volunteer some years ago. When the Indian government decided to relocate the slum dwellers and bulldoze the …
19th July 2002
Over 400 years ago, in 1602, the Dutch East India Company was set up with trading posts all over the world, and it grew into the first and biggest multinational commercial enterprise of its time. The …
1st November 2002
This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
31st January 2003
This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
21st March 2003
In 1913, the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941). It was the first time the prize was given to an Asian writer. But Tagore was more than a poet. He …
16th May 2003
This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
13th August 2003
“Traces of War” is a book created by photographer Jan Banning about 24 men who survived slave labour on the construction of the notorious Burmese and Pakanbaroe railroads. The railway …
26th October 2003
Destiny brought together two men from different worlds: one a Padaung tribal from the Hill Tracts of Burma, the other an ivory tower Cambridge don. The meeting would change both their lives forever. …
18th February 2004
Helen Keller said that blindness separates a person from objects and deafness separates that person from people. Without support, encouragement and education the world of a deafblind person can be an …
30th May 2004
This is part of a series called “War and Forgiveness” about the victims and perpetrators of wartime atrocities, produced by Radio Netherlands together with WNYC and Sound Print. In this …
21st February 2005
Marijke van der Meer was travelling in the hill country of Sri Lanka in December 2004 when news came of the tsunami. She joined a Dutch nurse and an American doctor preparing and escorting medical …
10th May 2005
There are 140,000 Burmese refugees living in camps along the Thai-Burma border. Some have been there for more than two decades. They live a life that is neither temporary nor permanent, in harsh …
1st August 2005
On a sunny August morning in 1945, Keijiro Matsushima sat in his math class in Hiroshima. He looked out the window, saw two American bombers in the clear blue sky and suddenly his world was torn …
13th October 2005
In October 2004, the Sebangau area of Kalimantan, in the Indonesian part of Borneo was declared a national park. The region is a very dense, almost impenetrable swamp forest, and it is also the only …
5th December 2005
In 2002, the Netherlands sent a peace-keeping contingent to Afghanistan as part of ISAF, the International Security Assistance Force. In this programme, we speak with some of the officers and …
13th February 2006
From the 16th century onwards, the guardians of the great vocal music of northern India were the “courtesans”, the tawaif baiji, high-class women schooled in dancing, song and poetry who …
13th April 2006
Rajani Thiranagama was gunned down by the Tamil Tigers in 1989. She was a doctor, poet and scientist. Her crime had been to speak out against human rights abuses being perpetrated on her people. For …
21st April 2006
Throughout Southeast Asia, tens of thousands of children are being trafficked. Most go to neighbouring countries, but they can be sent as far away as South Korea or Australia. Because human …
25th April 2006
This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people abroad doing remarkable things. Dutchman Billy Barnaart is a physiotherapist, …
10th May 2006
Throughout the late 1960’s and 1970’s, Cambodia was a failed state, with governments that were unable to control the country’s territory or meet the people’s basic needs. By the time the …
7th June 2006
This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. Over 20 years ago, Lea …
13th June 2006
A quarter of a century after HIV/AIDS first emerged, the disease continues to wreak havoc in many parts of the world. Initially, one of the hardest hit countries was Thailand. In the mid- and late …
14th June 2006
This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. When Father John Visser met Silesian …
28th June 2006
This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. Annelie Hendriks has always been a …
16th August 2006
The ancient Indian practice of “sati” or “suttee” — widow-burning — was banned under British colonial rule in 1829. But in modern-day India, the plight of a woman who loses …
23rd August 2006
In this award-winning programme, we look at the changes and shifts in family life in China in the early 20th century. Maoist China’s family policy had already done away with certain feudal …
24th October 2006
Shabnam Ramaswamy runs an informal court of law in a small village in India. For the illiterate and the poor, India’s unwieldly, corrupt and slow justice system is inaccessible. So she started …
15th November 2006
In the 13th century, the Mongol ruler Genghis Khan (1162-1227) and his armies advanced across Asia and created the largest contiguous land empire in history. They reached eastern Europe in the …
4th January 2007
Mongolia – a country the size of Germany and France and Britain combined with only 2.5 million people – is celebrating its 800th anniversary as a state. In the 21st century, the country …
3rd September 2007
The daring design of the new headquarters of China Central Television, the state media of the People’s Republic, is controversial for both architectural as well as political reasons. The …
29th March 2008
One of the lesser noticed side-effects of war and violence is the immeasurable loss to humanity and to a nation’s sense of identity when its art treasures and cultural traditions are destroyed. In …
15th August 1955This programme is part of the series Remembering the Second World War in the Netherlands: Historical Sound of the 1950's In 1945, the Second World War continued in the Pacific and Southeast …
8th July 1957On July 8, 1957, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru paid an official visit to the Netherlands. Dutch Foreign Minister Joseph Luns greeted him at Schiphol Airport and Radio Nederland was there …
8th July 1980To mark the 60th birthday of India’s most famous composer and musician, Ravi Shankar, Radio Netherlands devoted a special edition of its weekly Asia magazine programme “Mainstream …
9th December 1980This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsMother Teresa (1910-1997), a canonised saint in the Roman Catholic Church, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, in recognition for her …
1st October 1982During the 1980’s, Pete Myers and his team hosted the weekly magazine Mainstream Asia. In this edition, the programme looks at the plight of the Vietnamese refugee community in the Netherlands. …
2nd November 1982Gerard Rakers talks to South African heart transplant pioneer Dr. Christaan Barnard about his book: “The Body Machine”. Producer: Gerard Rakers Broadcast: 1982…
18th April 1983David Attenborough’s epic film biography of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) presents a sweeping, masterful image of the life of India’s great pioneer of independence and 20th-century …
14th October 1983In this programme, the renowned and controversial writer Salman Rushdie discusses his third novel “Shame”, published in 1983. The story is set in postcolonial Pakistan and explores the …
22nd October 1984This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsIn this Mainstream Asia special, Pete Myers meets Indian writer Anita Desai to discuss her life, her preferred writing language – …
2nd November 1984To coincide with the second World Population Conference in Mexico City City, Pete Myers presents in-depth interviews with two experts on India’s family planning programme. It was a prelude to a …
11th December 1984This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviewsPete Myers discusses the acclaimed autobiographical novel “Empire of the Sun”, whose main character is based on the …
8th March 1985This programme is part of the series Pete Myers' interviews“A passage to India” Producer: Pete Myers Broadcast: March 8, 1985…
1st November 1985Pete Myers reports on how radical theology works in the Philippines, the only predominantly Catholic country in Asia. The programme includes a contribution from correspondent Keith Dalton, an …
14th February 1986In 1986, Queen Beatrix and her husband Prince Claus paid a royal visit to India. Mainstream Asia and Pete Myers accompanied them. …
7th November 1989This is an unedited 40-minute interview with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists and one of the world’s most revered advocates of non-violence and altruism. …
1st February 1991This special edition of Asiascan focuses on silk, from its discovery, to the production process, to the final product. Maya Scheepers and Mieke Kooistra go on a silk thread route through Thailand. …
4th April 1993Pete Myers takes a look at the voices behind the gorgeous and glamorous actors who could not sing—the ghost singers who sang for stars like Rita Hayworth and Susan Hayward in the golden age of …
10th October 1993Every day across the globe, 5.000 people are infected by the virus that causes AIDS. More than 14 million people are believed to have been infected so far, mostly in Africa. A new battlefield is now …
8th February 1994By the mid-1990’s when this programme was made, a number of Indian writers like Vikram Seth and Salman Rushdie had made a huge impact on the international literary scene. In this programme, we …
9th February 1994No one knows how many children around the globe are forced to work, but a large percentage of the world’s child labor force is located in the Indian subcontinent. In India alone, the government …
16th February 1994Working children are everywhere to be found in all of India’s major cities. They work mostly on the streets, peddling one thing or another, shining shoes or doing other menial tasks. In rural …
20th February 1994In this award-winning edition of “East of Edam”, Dheera Sujan and Maggie Ayre pay tribute to some of the powerful and influential women who are changing India and are doing so in spite of …
2nd March 1994It’s hard to imagine a country where women have a more difficult life than in Pakistan. Literacy rates among women are abysmally poor. Female infanticide is widely practiced, and women generally get …
1st April 1994India relaxed its laws on foreign investments in 1991 and opened its doors to market liberalisation. By the time this programme was made a few years later, India was being referred to as the …
12th August 1994In the mid-1980s, a non-governmental organisation near the southern Indian city of Bangalore began an experiment to help people in nearly 150 villages to create a better life for themselves. Praxis, …
24th September 1994During the period from 1641 to 1859, Nagasaki was the only Japanese city that allowed to trade with the outside world. The city developed close ties with Dutch traders. To commemorate this …
3rd November 1994India is fighting a losing battle to achieve literacy for all. The country’s population is growing so quickly that the educational system simply cannot keep up. Every year, India needs 175,000 …
9th November 1994Eric Beauchemin visits Bombay, which at the time had a population of 10 to 15 million people. The city is comparable to the many sprawling urban areas emerging through the developing world and which …
12th November 1994As the British raj left the Indian subcontinent in 1947, the rulers of the princely states were given the right to join India or Pakistan. One maharaja, wanting full independence for his state, …
14th November 1994For decades, the Japanese young person’s recipe for success later in life has gone something like this: study hard, pass exams, get into the best university, get a job for life and then work 12 …
31st July 1995The weekly survey of arts and culture, “Mirror Images”, spotlights Japan, with an animated film version of the Diary of Anne Frank, the popular all girl rock group Shonen Knife and the …
31st July 1995In 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, killing 75,000 people instantly. Tens of thousands more died in the following years as a result of the effects of radiation. A few days …
1st August 1995In August 1945, Indonesians proclaimed independence from the Netherlands. After hundreds of years of Dutch colonial rule, the East Indies was one of the world’s largest, richest and most …
2nd August 1995On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan. 75,000 people died instantly. 75,000 more were injured. Thousands were killed in the fires that ravaged Hiroshima in the following …
15th August 1995The most famous Dutch novel of the 19th century is “Max Havelaar” by Multatuli (pen name of Eduard Douwes Dekker (1820-1887). It not only became a classic of European literature but also …
16th October 1995Women Living Under Muslim Laws is an organisation or network set up in 1986 by Muslim feminists to take action against Islamic legislation which discriminates against women. Hélène Michaud talks to …
11th November 1996In his time, Judge Dee, a historical figure of the Tang Dynasty, earned fame as a magistrate, detective and statesman. Though never forgotten in his own country, it was only in the 20th century that …
14th November 1996In the beautiful northeastern hills of India lies Darjeeling. And it is there that the true aristocrat of teas is grown. It is there that tea lover and world traveller Dheera Sujan indulged herself …
15th November 1996The United States of America has been a country built on the blood, sweat and tears of generations of immigrants: the poor, the hungry and the tired who came to the New World to begin a new life. The …
15th December 1996Homosexuality was quite common among the samurai, the military class in feudal Japan, and there are many literary works, dating back several centuries, which deal with love between men. But, as Eric …
14th March 1997It’s a truism to say that language is fundamental to culture. In Hong Kong, political change is laying a path for cultural change, and language is an important aspect of that shift. When the …
23rd March 1997Before the Cultural Revolution, which started in the mid-1960’s, Nien Chen (1915-2009) held a high position at Shell in Shanghai, was privileged and had servants. But almost overnight, she was …
29th May 1997In this edition of the programme, Dheera Sujan has two guests, both Westernised Indians who talk about the way their culture influences their art. Rohinton Mistry is a writer who has lived in Canada …
1st July 1997Marijke van der Meer examines the future of Hong Kong on the eve of its return into the Chinese fold on July 1, 1997. She meets the locals: a legislator, a businessman, an asylum seeker, a dissident …
15th August 1997This programme was broadcast to mark the 50th anniversary of the partition of the subcontinent, when India and Pakistan gained independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Floris van Straaten …
22nd August 1997When British India was granted independence in 1947, the subcontinent was divided into two countries: a predominantly Hindu India and to its east, and to its west a predominantly Muslim Pakistan. The …
21st September 1997Dheera Sujan focuses on the phenomenal success and popularity of Indian films. Guest speakers include critic Derek Malcolm, the director of the Indian International Film Festival, Malti Sahai, …
5th October 1997The French oil company Total has defied the U.S. government and signed a 2 billion dollar deal with Iran to develop offshore gas fields. In response, Washington has threatened to impose sanctions on …
12th October 1997Dheera Sujan visits Bhutan, an ancient, pristine land with none of the problems (overpopulation, environmental degradation, crime, etc.) that beset most of the world. But for how long will it be so …
9th November 1997Dheera Sujan visits Bhutan’s National Institute of Traditional Medicine. She finds out how to use tiger bones to cure epilepsy and how turning a prayer wheel could affect your health. Producer: …
14th November 1997Bombay is India’s most cosmopolitan city. Its sheer scope, hustle and bustle, its mass of human can overwhelm. On a taxi ride to the city, chances are, you will be greeted by the sight of a row …
14th November 1997Marijke van der Meer explores one of the sad legacies of the war in Vietnam. Over 20 years after the fall of Saigon, thousands of the nearly one million Vietnamese boat people who once sought asylum …
2nd January 1998In the 19th century, 100,000 tigers stalked the Asian forests. But big game hunting, illegal poaching and the destruction of their habitat has shrunk that number to less than 6,000, the majority of …
18th January 1998Dheera Sujan meets two Indian conservationists who are worried about the plight of the Asian elephant. There are around 25,000 of them in India, but ivory poachers and a shrinking habitat are a real …
23rd January 1998It is difficult to adequately assess the political and spiritual importance of the life of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948). He was assassinated in Delhi on January 30, 1948, but his legacy as an ethical …
22nd February 1998Siren Song meets Lulu Wang, the Chinese author of the Lilly Theatre (and later of other books), a fictionalised account of her experiences in China’s cultural revolution. It was an instant …
24th February 1998The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly two hundred years, from the time it was established in …
24th February 1998The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly two hundred years, from the time it was established in …
11th March 1998The VOC (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie) or Dutch East India Company was the world’s first multinational commercial empire. For nearly 200 years, from the time it was established in 1602 to …
7th August 1998Every day, 2000 Filipinos leave their country to take up jobs abroad. The Philippines is the world’s biggest exporter of labour. Hélène Michaud takes us to Malanday, a densely populated area …
14th August 1998On June 12, the Philippines celebrated the 100th anniversary of its declaration of independence from Spain. The irony is that it was, in fact, handed over to the United States for 20 million dollars. …
1st January 1999This programme is part of the series Stories of Our CenturyIn 1999, Radio Netherlands broadcast a series of 12 programmes telling the story of the 20th century through famous books. In each …
12th February 1999Bangladesh lies on a delta created by three of the world’s greatest rivers. To them, it is life in the form of food and transport. It is also death as the annual floods drown this most densely …
30th March 1999The Black Death or Great Plague was one of the most devastating waves of disease and death in human history. Modern historians of the Middle Ages estimate that up to 200 million people succumbed to …
23rd April 1999In this two part series, Jane Murphy looks at the impact of the biggest hydro-electric project on Earth: the massive Three Gorges Dam being constructed on China’s longest river, the Yangtze. …
24th August 1999Dheera Sujan looks at 50 years of Indian independence and partition through the experiences of one family. For although the people of India had won the right to rule themselves, the partition of …
25th October 1999In this programme, producer Martha Hawley goes in search of her great uncle, Edwin Hawley, known in her family as Uncle Ned. Born in 1881, he left for China as a young man, a staunch Presbyterian …
19th November 1999Crampons and spikes feature heavily in this heady documentary from James McDonald looking at the history of the challenge to climb the world’s highest mountain. Producer: James McDonald …
3rd December 1999Hélène Michaud takes us to Malaysia. This country in southeast Asia has been in political turmoil since the sacking last year of Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who is now being tried on charges …
2nd January 2000Khaled and Shukria Manupal are both physicians. They had a prosperous life and a nice home with their children in Afghanistan, until the Soviet invasion in 1979 forced them to leave their country in …
5th January 2000The Bosphorous is the only link to the outside world for the nations of the Black Sea. It runs through the heart of Istanbul with shipping (oil, chemicals, etc.) posing a potential threat to the …
8th October 2000By the turn of the century, Afghanistan had been at war for nearly two decades. The Afghans first took up arms to oust the Soviet occupiers and then the conflict descended into civil war. Pakistani …
18th October 2000This is the first of two programmes about the Silk Road Project, initiated by acclaimed cellist Yo Yo Ma, which brings together music and musicians from around the world. In fact, the project follows …
19th October 2000Dheera Sujan talks to Indian writer Arundhati Roy, whose first novel “A God of Small Things” became a world-wide bestseller. She studied architecture, flirted with acting, lived in a …
1st November 2000Eric Beauchemin visits the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan in Central Asia. It has been independent since 1991, but a civil war has devastated most of the new country’s infrastructure. On …
8th November 2000To mark the 400th anniversary of Japanese-Dutch relations, Liesbeth de Bakker focuses on scientist Philipp Franz von Siebold (1796-1866) who left behind beautiful collections of thousands of Japanese …
8th November 2000Liesbeth de Bakker visits the Primate Research Institute at Kyoto University in Japan, and she meets Chimpanzee Ai, the chimp who counts, and her research partner, Tetsuro Matsuzawa. Find out what …
16th November 2000On April 19, 1600, the Dutch merchant ship “de Liefde” arrived in Japan, and the sailors set up a trading post. When half a century later, Japan decided to close itself off from the rest …
28th November 2000Afghanistan is one of the countries with the world’s highest percentages of disabled people. It’s estimated that over 800,000 people have some kind of disability, that’s over 1 in 20 Afghans. Many …
17th January 2001For people in the developed world, human rights mean things like a free press, the right to vote or freedom from torture. But in many parts of the developing world, people are concerned with more …
14th March 2001Jonathan Groubert visits Bombay, the movie capital of the world, where more than 1000 flicks are produced each year. The international appeal of these Hindi films is growing. What is their appeal, …
20th June 2001In Pakistan, there are over three million heroin addicts, and this figure is still rising. Eric Beauchemin meets some of them, sees how and where they live and talks to local groups who are fighting …
1st July 2001In Pakistan, child sexual abuse is rampant, but it remains shrouded in secrecy. Both girls and boys are the victims of abuse, and few of the perpetrators are ever convicted. Guilt and shame are …
16th October 2001Much has been said and written about the situation of women today in Afghanistan. Since the ruling Taliban movement took over power in 1996, women have been subjected to what many in the West regard …
23rd December 2001In the autumn of 2001, Radio Netherlands organised a Dutch music week in Japan. The crème de la crème of Dutch jazz musicians gave several concerts in Tokyo and Nagasaki. Jonathan Marks and Hans …
1st January 2002The Kamasutra has been used and misused over the centuries. Its name has become synonymous with exotic sex. But in fact, it is a treatise on pleasure. It’s latest translator from Sanskrit, …
1st January 2002This is the second of two programmes about the Silk Road Project, initiated by acclaimed cellist Yo Yo Ma, which brings together music and musicians from around the world in an enriching exchange of …
23rd March 2002This programme is part of the series Global PerspectiveA group of international broadcasters exchanges documentaries with a common theme. This five-part series examines the way in which global forces …
2nd April 2002In the second half of the 19th century, the Meiji Restoration in Japan was moving the country from a medieval agricultural economy to an industrialised one. It was a time of tremendous change and …
15th April 2002Johannis de Rijke (1842-1913) was the son of a humble dyke worker from Zeeland. Yet by the time he died, he had reached the highest position ever reached by a foreigner in Japan, and was a regular …
1st May 2002Indian literature produced the single longest poem in history, the great epic Mahabharata. Today the ancient story-telling and poetry recital traditions of India live on in “Bollywood”, …
12th June 2002Liesbeth de Bakker visits Galle in Sri Lanka where, in the bay, a wrecked VOC ship, De Avondster, is being recovered to put on display in a special museum. Experts from the Netherlands, Sri Lanka and …
9th July 2002Dheera Sujan revisits Jagriti, a small school in a New Delhi slum where she taught as a volunteer some years ago. When the Indian government decided to relocate the slum dwellers and bulldoze the …
19th July 2002Over 400 years ago, in 1602, the Dutch East India Company was set up with trading posts all over the world, and it grew into the first and biggest multinational commercial enterprise of its time. The …
1st November 2002This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
31st January 2003This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
21st March 2003In 1913, the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941). It was the first time the prize was given to an Asian writer. But Tagore was more than a poet. He …
16th May 2003This programme is part of the series Rivers of the WorldRivers are the cradle of the world’s earliest civilisations. Mythology and religion were born on their banks. They provide us with life-giving …
13th August 2003“Traces of War” is a book created by photographer Jan Banning about 24 men who survived slave labour on the construction of the notorious Burmese and Pakanbaroe railroads. The railway …
18th February 2004Helen Keller said that blindness separates a person from objects and deafness separates that person from people. Without support, encouragement and education the world of a deafblind person can be an …
30th May 2004This is part of a series called “War and Forgiveness” about the victims and perpetrators of wartime atrocities, produced by Radio Netherlands together with WNYC and Sound Print. In this …
21st February 2005Marijke van der Meer was travelling in the hill country of Sri Lanka in December 2004 when news came of the tsunami. She joined a Dutch nurse and an American doctor preparing and escorting medical …
10th May 2005There are 140,000 Burmese refugees living in camps along the Thai-Burma border. Some have been there for more than two decades. They live a life that is neither temporary nor permanent, in harsh …
1st August 2005On a sunny August morning in 1945, Keijiro Matsushima sat in his math class in Hiroshima. He looked out the window, saw two American bombers in the clear blue sky and suddenly his world was torn …
13th October 2005In October 2004, the Sebangau area of Kalimantan, in the Indonesian part of Borneo was declared a national park. The region is a very dense, almost impenetrable swamp forest, and it is also the only …
5th December 2005In 2002, the Netherlands sent a peace-keeping contingent to Afghanistan as part of ISAF, the International Security Assistance Force. In this programme, we speak with some of the officers and …
13th February 2006From the 16th century onwards, the guardians of the great vocal music of northern India were the “courtesans”, the tawaif baiji, high-class women schooled in dancing, song and poetry who …
21st April 2006Throughout Southeast Asia, tens of thousands of children are being trafficked. Most go to neighbouring countries, but they can be sent as far away as South Korea or Australia. Because human …
25th April 2006This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people abroad doing remarkable things. Dutchman Billy Barnaart is a physiotherapist, …
10th May 2006Throughout the late 1960’s and 1970’s, Cambodia was a failed state, with governments that were unable to control the country’s territory or meet the people’s basic needs. By the time the …
7th June 2006This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. Over 20 years ago, Lea …
13th June 2006A quarter of a century after HIV/AIDS first emerged, the disease continues to wreak havoc in many parts of the world. Initially, one of the hardest hit countries was Thailand. In the mid- and late …
14th June 2006This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. When Father John Visser met Silesian …
28th June 2006This programme is part of the series Under Foreign Skies“Under Foreign Skies” is a series of portraits of Dutch people doing remarkable work abroad. Annelie Hendriks has always been a …
16th August 2006The ancient Indian practice of “sati” or “suttee” — widow-burning — was banned under British colonial rule in 1829. But in modern-day India, the plight of a woman who loses …
23rd August 2006In this award-winning programme, we look at the changes and shifts in family life in China in the early 20th century. Maoist China’s family policy had already done away with certain feudal …
15th November 2006In the 13th century, the Mongol ruler Genghis Khan (1162-1227) and his armies advanced across Asia and created the largest contiguous land empire in history. They reached eastern Europe in the …
4th January 2007Mongolia – a country the size of Germany and France and Britain combined with only 2.5 million people – is celebrating its 800th anniversary as a state. In the 21st century, the country …
3rd September 2007The daring design of the new headquarters of China Central Television, the state media of the People’s Republic, is controversial for both architectural as well as political reasons. The …