Iran hosted a meeting to save the world's wetlands in 1971. The Ramsar Convention - named after the village on the Caspian Sea where it was originally signed - is seen as the first of the modem global intergovernmental treaties on the sustainable use of natural resources. Claire Bowes has been speaking to the Belgian representative, Eckhart Kuijken, about the battle by conservationists to interest people and governments in the value of wetlands. He describes how his home country had no planning laws protecting natural landscapes until 1962 - so that many were lost to industry and agriculture.Photo: Hawizeh Marsh in Iran. Credit: courtesy of the Convention on Wetlands
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Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there.
For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more.
Recent episodes explore everything from the death of Adolf Hitler, the first spacewalk and the making of the movie Jaws, to celebrity tortoise Lonesome George, the Kobe earthquake and the invention of superglue.
We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: Eva Peron – Argentina’s Evita; President Ronald Reagan and his famous ‘tear down this wall’ speech; Thomas Keneally on why he wrote Schindler’s List; and Jacques Derrida, France’s ‘rock star’ philosopher.
You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the civil rights swimming protest, the disastrous D-Day rehearsal, and the death of one of the world’s oldest languages.