Christiane Amanpour

questions aimed at revealing the other player's true nature. It's just the scientific method, really. In asking different people the same set of questions, you can make observations about which truths appeared to be universal. I love this discipline, and it made me wonder, what if these questions were just the jumping off point, what greater depths would be revealed if I ask these questions as conversations daters with thought leaders,

and trailblazers across all these different disciplines. So I adapted prus questionnaire and I wrote my own seven questions that I personally think a pertinent to a person's story. They are when and where were you happiest? What is the quality you like least about yourself? What relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you? What question would you most like answered, What person, place, or experience has shaped you the most?

What would be your last meal? And can you tell me something in your life that's grown out of a personal disaster? And I've gathered a group of really remarkable people, ones that I am honored and humbled to have had the chance to engage with. You may not hear their answers to all seven of these questions. We've whittled it down to which questions felt closest to their experience, or the most surprising, or created the most fertile ground to connect.

My guest today on many questions is journalist Christiane AmAm Poor. I try not to be intimidated by the ideas I might have about the extraordinary people I interview on the show, but knowing I was going to be speaking to one of the great interviewers of the twenty one century definitely gave me pause. I mean, Yessa Arafat hung up on her and Bill Clinton, well, he snapped like a corner teenager.

Christianne has won every major television journalism award interviewed every single geopolitical player of the last twenty five years, and her journalism made such an impact during the war in the former Yugoslavia that she was made an honorary citizen of Sara Jevo. It's really important to say that this conversation was recorded before Russia started a war by invading Ukraine. The world looks very different today than it did three weeks ago. But I think the observations Christiane makes about

conflict are eerily poignant. I really hope you enjoy this one. My first question is can you tell me where and when you were happiest? So I've thought about it a lot, and I don't think there's ever for anybody one particular

place or space or time. I remember it in three steps, really I had, I would say indisputably one of the happiest childhoods that I can even imagine, and that you know, I've spoken to a lot of friends and asked them and just you know, the osmosis and conversation as you're going, you know, you understand how people have lived their lives and what has made a difference and has shaped them. And I don't think I've ever heard anybody say what I feel, which is that I am the luckiest person

in the world. You know, I grew up in Iran of an English father and adversion father. My mom Catholic, my father Muslim. You know, it was a patriarchal and a non democratic. It was a monarchy when I grew up there. So it had all those things that could have made it very stressful and difficult and hard and et cetera. And instead of it was just for such I don't even mean freedom to roam and to range and to do all sorts of just freedom in my mind,

in my heart, in my friendships. And with that freedom came this most incredible amount of happiness. And of course when you're young, you don't really realize that that's what it is. You know, afterwards you get asked these questions. But when you're young, and when you're a kid, I just remember everything being fun. Whether it was playing with my friends, you know, in their houses or our house is, whether it was playing sardines. You know what that is,

hide and seek sardines everybody crams into one. That was really fun, whether it was you know, in somebody's garden and running around playing hide and seek, and especially riding horses. That was my sport. I was five years old when my mom and my dad literally put me on the back of a very large horse, not a pony, not a kid's game, and me and my best friend and my sister, that's what we did. That was our sport,

not hockey or lacrosse or whatever. And that was really a source of happiness because you were sharing that finness with each other. Your mother's were sitting in the corner chit chatting and not being helicopter parents, but he knew that they were there, so that was nice. The writing instructor was this phenomenal Iranian guy who had been in the Iranian military, in the cavalry. So he was a brilliant old military man from the cavalry, and he was

really compassionate and fantastic. He loved us kids, and we were girls, by the way, I remember, this is a really girl's being taught how to be happy, how to be brave, and he just you know, didn't let us wimp out if we fell, if we had an accident or whatever, you know, make sure he dusted us off.

But almost by the scruff of your neck, you'd be picked up and put back on the horse, and that developed a bond of love, a bond of courage, a bond of connection with another living thing from a very early age, and an understanding of how you have to, you know, react and treat other living things, whether they're animals or whether it's nature, whether it's people. And it was just happiness. It was just a phenomenally happy childhood. First of all, I'm so glad that you had a

wonderful childhood. Do you think that that wonderful beginning good to you or gave you something that you were going to be able to use in all of the places of conflict that you would wind up that all of the bloodshed and all of the disparity that you would live in for so many years of your life. Do you think that it gave you a base to be able to do that. I really do think so. I never really thought about it or dissected it, but I do believe in retrospect that that is actually what happened.

That I grew up with phenomenal parents who gave me unconditional love and support, never overly demanding in terms of I want you to be a doctor or a banker, or this or that we had to be moral, we had to tell the truth, we had to be kind, we had to have all those values. But we were good enough as we were. So that was very very important.

And that and the lessons I took from my writing instructor and from that period of my childhood, yes, gave me that backbone and that structure to carry on without really being conscious of it in the rest of my life, which has been you know, I mean, it's an extreme job that I've done, going to war zones, going to famines, going to natural disasters, you know, doing all that kind of stuff. Most people think you should run away, what

we journalists like to say, we run towards. But it takes a really important lessons and gifts from your childhood, because I can tell you that so many of the colleagues that I've come across have not been able to stand it. The extreme nature, the horror, having to put yourself out there all the time, has really crippled a lot of people emotionally and has sent them somewhat off

the deep end. And I was just very fortunate that I was able to come back to my family after these terrible things, into a happy environment, into a connected environment into an environment where I was able to talk, I was able to think of something other than being on the road and being in the field. I could swap that darkness for the light of being away in this very happy and I keep using that word because we're talking about happiness, happy personal environment, and that was

very important for me. The other thing that was really important was growing up as the product of different ethnic groups, different nationalities, different religions. Given that my parents came from two different parts of the world, allowed me to accept everybody and everything. Everything was normal, nothing was other. So I went to all these different places and I just felt that they were just like me. You know, I never felt that I was in any way different or

superior or inferior or anything like that. And that really really helped me throughout my career because you know, with this we live now in the extreme version of partisanship and divisiveness, and you know, the other is such a not just a scary concept because it isn't, but it's used to scare people and to drum up fear and hatred and loathing. And I had the opposite. I grew up with the opposite lessons, and that really did see me through my career because I obviously covered all these

ethnic conflicts and religious conflicts and battles. Yeah, the opposite of happiness. Yeah, I mean really the apotheosis of happiness. And so I was really happy doing my job. And I give you a little anecdote. I was so happy being a foreign correspondent. I really thought I'd died and gone to heaven when I was made a foreign correspondent. And one day one of the key anchors at the time, presenters, who was at CNN in Atlanta, she quit to go

somewhere else. And the president of the network, the most phenomenal man, Tom Johnson. At the time, it was two and I had just managed to get myself out of headquarters and into the field and doing the job that I really wanted to do. He called me up and he thought he was being incredibly whatever rewarding and kind to me and empowering, and he asked me if I would come back to Atlanta and take the job of this anchor presenter who had just left. Her name was

Catherine Cryer. Honestly, I burst into tears. I was so upset. I didn't know what to do. And I know this is meant to be a great promotion. But I'm so happy here and this is what I wanted to do, and I don't want to come back to be an anchor in Atlanta. I don't want to do it. But what if I say that, then are you going to fire me? Am I going to lose my you know, my dream job? And he couldn't have been nicer. It did take me a couple of days to get back to him and tell him that I just couldn't do it.

A lot of crying went on and soul searching, and I really expect him to say, well, thanks, Christianne. Well if you can't do it and have to get somebody else, and you might as well pack your bag to leave. Absolutely the contrary, he just embraced me and he said that's great. So I would say, after my childhood, my time in the field was the place of maximum happiness, and then right now, my son, my child is my depository and repository of maximum happiness. What relationship, real or fictionalized,

defines love? You? You know, I see love and I feel love very frequently. It's not just something that's compartmentalized or that I look at one or two people and think, oh, that's a great example, or that I have a friendship or a relationship with whoever, and think that that's the paradigm. I get so much love that I hope I give as good as I get. And so it is obvious and it's a cliche, but it is absolutely true that my son is the human being that I love the most,

to who I love the most in the world. I didn't know whether I wanted to have children when I was in the field. I was late to motherhood. I was forty two when he was born. I had done everything I loved up until then, my job, my friends, the danger, the racing around the world, the doing I hoped a little bit of good for the world by the stories I told. The love that I felt came to me from many of the people who I reported on, who just were happy to be, you know, invited to

talk and tell their stories to the world. I felt real love from people when they were in front of my camp. I'm not talking about leaders now, I'm talking about people who I would go and engage with on on a daily basis, which I did for most of my career. That that was what I did. I talked to people about what was going on in whatever crazy state of affairs in their particular part of the world. And I got a huge amount of love from that,

and I was very happy and satisfied. And I know that I could not have done my work and loved it as much and put so much into it had I been married or had a kid at that time. And I consciously delayed that part of my life and I didn't know whether I would ever have it, And I didn't grow up wanting to be a mother. That was not what was in my worldview or my list of goals to take off. I didn't think i'd be a terribly good mother. I don't know why. I don't

think I analyzed it much. But then when I had my son now nearly twenty two years ago, on a dime, it all flipped on a dime. I mean, it changed everything in my life, and I am so grateful that I have that opportunity to give and to experience that kind of luck. But then, you know, you see the humbling kind of love that people I don't know, whether they're nuns, whether they're angels, whether their doctors, whether their neighbors helping neighbors in the middle of a terrible ethnic

cleansing in a war. The kind of love that strangers give to each other, the kind of is just humbling to behold. The kind of total devotion, the complete strangers can give to somebody in need is just an amazing thing to behold. And the kind of love that enables you to be so brave as to risk your own life to, let's say, shelter somebody who's being persecuted and has come to you for some kind of help and to try to save their lives. That's an amazing thing

to witness. That must be such an extraordinary thing. I mean, I think of it reflected in the world that we're living in right now, where so much, particularly in the US, neighbor is against neighbor, or whether it's literally or the next state or the south of the north, of the east, of the west. The idea of being able to recognize there's a leveling that humanity will do if you let it of kindness, and how love comes out of that.

So seeing it firsthand, it must have been extraordinary in Sara Jeva, in Iraq, wherever you were observing that, because I've seen the opposite as well, you know, and I mean Sarajevo, Iraq, but Rwanda and places like that where neighbors were turned against each other. And the thing that infuriates me many is that it is not the natural state of affairs, even in the United States right now, even in our country here in the UK, you know,

where there's so much division along mostly political lines. This has all been drummed up by leaders or people who call themselves leaders. It's the politics of fear and hate and division that have turned people against each other. If you can come together in places like Northern Ireland, which they did in order to have a peace process, it is not perfect, but they were able to do it.

If you can do it in South Africa when you've had, you know, the majority of the population of South Africa, you know, oppressed by a minority white supremacy organization under apartheid. And if you can come together like they did and like they have done, even though it's not perfect and it's not resolved, and it's not over and history hasn't stopped just because apartheid felt, it means that we can

all do it, because all do it. In Sarajevo, I watched Serb citizens of the city of Sarajevo, who refused to flee, refused to listen to Slovna Velosovitch and Radovan Carritage and all those fearmongering, hate mongering, you know, ethnic cleansing, genocidal maniacs, refused to listen. A very few of them, the majority unfortunately did listen. But a few of them stayed and sheltered their Muslim neighbors and helped them. And

it's remarkable. I mean, that's the kind of stuff that brings me to tears because it's such a deep love, so morals, so ethical and so brave. Do you think that that humanity, that that level of humanity. Do you think that that because you've you've seen it up close a lot can ultimately triumph if that's the right word over the lack of morality in in quotes leadership from governments who would stoke that division to serve their own desires. Well, look,

I hope so. I'm an eternal optimist, and I like to think that if I have, you know, thirty odd years witnessed the worst of the worst of humanity and of bad leadership, ship and malign leadership, if I can believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel and people and people, and left to their own devices, they will, you know, show their humanity and their love. I mean sitting in Rwanda when they had there, it's called courts. They were sort of unofficial I mean courtrooms,

but not really. They were in the outdoors, and you basically had kind of a version of truth and reconciliation where the murderers would come and meet with the victims and the families of the victims, and they would talk about what they did and they would hopefully apologize, and then the victims would accept the And I watched that when I realized that these are people who started each other with their bare hands and with clubs and machetes.

You know, eight hundred thousand to a million people dead in three months, and here they are sitting in this you know, local court situation, truth and reconciliation of a kind and hugging each other and crying. So that gives

me hope. Obviously it's possible, It's absolutely possible. But then you look at these leaders, even in the democratic world, who we elect, who are elected because of the hatred and the division and the other thing that they do and that they inculcate, and the fear that they inculcated people, and then I get very down and depressed, and I wonder how that's going to stop, if they can other than we can also unify, I mean, people can and will be unified. I do think the pensionum is swinging

incredibly hard at the moment. I've got to believe that balance will be addressed. I feel like historically it does. It takes a minute there. I agree that you you must have seen that over and over again, which I mean, it's part of why it's so fascinating hearing you talk about this, because you've made a career of witnessing and

reporting literally you know, and disseminating the situations. So it makes me hopeful even though were all properly in it at the moment in both the UK and the US, I mean obviously and elsewhere and elsewhere that I agree with you on that, and I would say that witnessing,

even witnessing, is becoming hard her and harder. Bernard R. Levy, the French public philosopher, he has just written a book and he's done a documentary and he's entitled it The Will to See, The Will to See we have to sum up now, summon up the energy and the courage and the will to go out and see and witness and report and make sure these things don't go unnoticed.

And the lack of will is quite profound right now in great swaths of society, not just in political leadership, but the lack of will to go out there and put yourself on the line and do the old fashioned, you know, job of being the eyes and ears and the feet on the ground so that you can bring back these stories. It's very difficult because everybody is now sitting in their armchairs siloing in social media, thinking that they're living in a real world where they're not there,

in something that doesn't exist. Twitter is not a place, as Dave Chappelle said, you know, it's not a place that's exactly it. Well, and it's also interesting that we are clever monkey brains have created these constructs that we then assign reality too and meaning too, but they are constructs. They don't exist. I mean, if ever, the Matrix and the Wakis look more prophetic in what they created in

those films that then what we're living in now. You know, I can't I can't think of it because it's true. We have to be willing to see, and it's very easy to not see and to just curate what you want to see on Instagram, for example, and then an algorithm that is also augmenting that exactly. It's fucking terrifying as a matter of fact, because then you go to the great, fantastic, phenomenal David Attenborough and you see what he's had the will to see. Yes, and he's still

out there at ninety five years old. I don't know whether you've seen the Green Planet, all your listeners. I hope we'll go and see, because that is joy, that is love, that is hope, That is phenomenal. He enjoys this world, he really does. What is the quality you

like least about yourself? The inability to recognize my great good fortune sometimes not always because I usually always recognize it, but sometimes not taking enough time to take a few deep breaths when things are not going well, and to sort of semi I mean panic is not quite the right word, but to go into that stage of fight or flight without really just taking a breath and resetting and understanding, you know what I have on my plate, which is so much good fortune and the other thing

I don't like is that I can be a bit righteous, Minnie, I'm afraid to say I can be a little bit righteous. What do you get righteous? Bread by everything? But mostly, mostly I like to think about the big things, you know, about genocide or not genocide, you know, the victim versus the aggressor the human rights and all of those kinds of things, the things that we should get righteous and morally angry and there or motivated to do something about.

But sometimes I can bring all that righteousness into my you know, everyday life and opine as if you know, I was always right. In fact, I had a great friend and colleague from the Washington Post, and he once told me when we were in Sarah, but he said, you know, Christianity, you ever write a book, it can be titled I was right. And of course, you know, he was obviously being funny and sarcasty. I thought this was a brilliant title. He was, you know, quietly mocking me.

But it is a funny anecdote. I do think you should write I was right. You know, I'm not going to, although I'm very often right. You see, you've already got your forward to the book. Now can I tell you, there's quite a famous story about the producer of Dirty Dancing. This writer came up with the title Dirty Dancing, and then the producer basically bankrolled the whole movie just based on the title alone, because they were like, this is

the greatest movie ever. That's great. They work backwards from the title. So I was right, can begin right here? Yeah, I think Dirty Dancing is a little better than I was right, But I get it. I understand. Thanks for

the permission, You're so welcome. Can I just ask you really quickly when you said not being able to see what's good or sort of panicking when something bad happens, do you ever rather like a centrifuge when something is going wrong, suck all these other bad things that might be happening into that centrifuge, and so it kind of becomes exponentially bigger, and so the thing is never really the thing. It's about everything. Yea. So in therapy speak

they call it catastrophizing. Is that what they call it? Yeah? They do. You know, you see something and instead of immediately figuring out, you know this, we can fix this, We've got this, it's like, oh my god, and then that's going to happen, and then that's going to happen, and then I'm gonna fall under a taxi and die or something like that. Ship That's what I do, Okay, So what do you do to not do that? Because this is free therapy for me, because you have clearly

done heard this word. Now, will you please tell me what you're supposed to do in those situations? It was time, it was a lot of time, and I have to say, going out into the real catastrophes, that taught me how to differentiate between a catastrophe and catastrophe light. So I don't operate like this in the field. I am very calm, very intense, and very together. I do not panic. I don't lose my cool and I don't even know where that came from, maybe from the horse riding. But I'm very, very,

very super focused. When I'm in the field and danger is happening all around me, or when I have to do an interview with the world leader and I just gotta get it right, I've focused and I'm laser focused. It's mostly in my personal life, well everything, that's mostly. That's the way I remember when you was there are fat who hung up on you? Oh, yes, he did. Yes, Yes, that was an extraordinarily poised conversation. There was no fluster

at the end of it when he hung up. It was kind of fantastic and it was almost the greatest third act that heat that he sort of could have come up with. It was pretty amazing. It was right. I remember exactly where it was. It was two thousand and two. We were at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, and I had a satellite cell phone linked to him as I was broadcasting live. And it was at a time when the then government of Ario Sharon decided to

go back into the West Bank. They tore down his headquarters and it was in response to some Palestinian suicide bombings inside Israel. And it was after nine eleven, so remember the state of affairs then was very very tense, and Arafat he was really being pushed into a corner and I asked him something like do you take responsibility for and I named the suicide bombing location and he just went ballistic. But I mean ballistic. I'm here in a prison, They've got me surrounded. I am General Arafat.

Do you know who got up? He said to me. He literally shut up. He was so angry, and meantime, I know the cameras on me, right, so I'm live with the camera on me, and I am going read from the bottom of my feet to the top of my head, and I'm thinking the whole world is watching me being torn to treads by yasa Arafat on live television. And then he hung up, and I'm like, okay, well I said, I comment what I said, but something's you know, that's live television, folks. And then of course all the

producers lovely. Oh that's great TV. It's great. Just and I'm like, okay, but that was me being humiliated. But anyway, I got over it. That was yasa afred me. The thing is like, I remember how calm he remained in the face of that rage, and you do it so acutely. In your professional life. You have done that, but it's really interesting to hear that in your personal life, it's

like more challenging. It's slightly more challenging. I'm a bit better than I was, but yeah, I just forced myself to stay cool and to not change my expression too. My Clinton did it to me as well. In a live two way from Sarajevo, I asked him a question that got under his skin, and he went he said, there have been no constant flipblocks, Madam. He maddamed me in front of the world, and then my face just went beat red. But I'm not sure that you could

actually recognize that over the satellite. So I had an advantage, right, I was thousands of miles away blushing and freaking out, but staying cool and not changing my expression. And then the funny thing was actually every time I went anywhere after that, all these people who would go and interview you know, prime ministers and I don't know, army chiefs and this and that, madam, they would grieve me with every time I went in. So it was a bit

of a joke for a while. I think it's really interesting to like to get to experience the best version of our response to stress and conflict, and you can quite literally see you on television or on YouTube or whatever doing that thing, but taking it out of that place and applying it into our lives. I'm fascinated by why we can do it in some areas of our lives, but it's more challenging in others. And you do it in the place that you would think would be more challenging.

It's a really interesting practice, but it just kind of seems to reiterate to me that life is all practice. It is. And then you've got to, as one of my producers is to say, you've got to know when to hold them and when to fold them. In other words, know who you're dealing with and when you're dealing with. So you reacted a certain way at a certain time and different ways at different times. You don't want to bring all that mega SAINTFROI, you know, that cool under

fire into your private life. You want to be more vulnerable, more open, more reactive, more and more you know more. But it's quite a paradigm to existing to be able to move from an extraordinary place of conflict in the world back into home life and children and husband. And yeah, there's are amazing poles to navigate. And again I agree with you, and so many of my colleagues have not been able to navigate that and have suffered very, very

deeply from not being able to navigate. And you know, so many people in many different professions obviously find that difficult, and it is challenging, and it does take lots of work.

I would simply say again that I do believe the foundation that I was given as a child has helped me in every which way, every which way I come back from these terrible times in the field or great times as well, I mean, and and I reunite with my family, you know, family, lunches, family dinners, friends, or that's what keeps me human and keeps me alive, and keeps me loving, keeps me happy, keeps me friendly. Because

I stay alive, I don't close myself off. You know the classic stories, right of I don't know your grandfather's, your grandparents or whoever. In World War two. Let's say my father, my father flew in World War two, and he probably never told you, right, he probably didn't talk never, They never talked. And I understand it to an extent. And I don't talk war stories much, but I do talk. And I do. If somebody, one on one, somebody wants to know about this, wants to know about that, I'll talk.

But I do otherwise talk and open myself. And you can try to bury it, carry on, make a new life, support their families and and try to to forget it. But truth is, you can never forget. And there's always is PTSD. Did you know in the Second World War they called and it was in the First World War two they called PTSD l O m F, which was lack of moral fiber. That makes me want to cry. It's awful. That was the acronym, which is why I think men didn't talk about it. Women didn't talk about it.

That's really tragic. And how about the shell shock and all of that, And how about they treated the World War One conscientious objectors as cowards and mentally deranged. I mean, it's just tragic, tragic. What person, place, or experience most altered your life, I would say I have to say the Iranian Revolution of nine because that completely was the division between my childhood and my adolescence and my adulthood.

And in a way, overnight, I grew up, and I grew a conscience, and I grew a political awareness, and I grew an ambition, and I grew maturity, and I just went from a very happy, go lucky childhood not knowing a huge amount about democracy and dictatorship and and all of those kinds of things and freedom and not really understanding what they meant in the big picture, to only wanting to go and talk about that stuff and bear witness and report and tell those kinds of stories

around the world to people who may not be able to go and see for themselves. And that for me was the most fundamental turning point in my life. Were you living in Iran at the time and did you move? Yes? So my education spandy around the UK, and after the revolution I went to the US for my university and I started CNN in the United States. But I had sort of got a an involuntary gap here Mini. I had failed to get good enough grades in my what you would call high school here a levels to go

to medical school. Yeah, I feel myself right now or whatever. But you know what, I am so pleased because in the end, it's one of those failing to accomplish what you think you should have done that led me to this profession, into this life because it's not just a professional it's my life. And so I'm very grateful for that. But I spent the whole year of the revolution, so from January nine seventy eight to January nineteen seventy nine, watching this happen in my homeland and in my neighborhood,

and suddenly everything I was right was wrong. The people who had grown up believing in were now the people who I should be condemning. I couldn't leave my house without their being soldiers and guns aimed at. During martial law, you heard the Atoller harmonies imported smuggled in cassette tapes put on the loudspeakers from the mosques nearby. I mean chilling stuff. It was chilling, and you just didn't know

where it was going to end up. Well, now we know, right, I mean, the Iranian Revolution shaped and changed the whole world. Would you say that was the first time that you were really aware of the division of ideology, Like there is another way of thinking that is being applied in this place that is so familiar that I thought thought one way, that's such an interesting way of putting it.

And I would say yes. But I had known obviously, because we were living through the Cold War and Iran was right in that place where you know, the United States liked Iran as an ally because it was, you know, faced off against the Communists and this and that. So in other words, everything that was happening politically at that time, particularly where I was living, was East versus West, Communist

versus the United States. Communism was everybody grew up in my generation anyway, knowing that as the first big ideological issue. And then it was the Iranian Revolution, I will say interestingly, and I cannot exactly remember. I probably could go back and figure it out. I can't remember where there was just before the Iranian Revolution or just after. But my parents,

my mother particularly had Palestinian friends in Iran. They were Catholic and she was Catholic, and she met them at church and they had been refugees, they had been turfed out after the forty eight war, and they had found the way, their way to various places and ended up in Iran. He was a pharmacist, and I can't remember

what she was for rminal people, phenominal people. And from him, I remember him taking me on a visit to a museum and telling me the story of Palestine, and that was possibly my first real conversation about history divides and what happens when one side wins one side loses, and when there's never justice and when this wound continues to be open, and so that was also a very early lesson.

But then, of course, then I go to Bosnia and I witnessed genocide in Europe for the first time since the Second World War, So that was right in my face. I mean, I could have read about Anne Frank and I read the book, but I didn't see it and understand it until I saw it and understood it and reported on it and was called to make a judgment. And my judgment was that I would not be neutral in the face of outrageous violations of humanitarian law. I would not be neutral. I would not be an accessory

to genocide as a journalist. By being neutral, I sisted on telling the truth and it made me very unpopular in a lot of quarters. I remember it being apparently so controversial to take a position, but I didn't have enough political acuity to really think about that. But I do now, and it's astonishing to me that taking a position on genocide that you would have been called partisan

for that it was. It's absurd now, it is, absolutely But remember the victims were Muslims, they were European Muslims, and the aggressors were European Christians. It was very, very tough. It's a very particular context that you then go out into the world to do what you do, and I think it's astonishing that you survived that, not just physically but mentally. And I know you've said that so many

people didn't. Well, to bring it back to what you've been asking me, I survived because of love and happiness and joy and knowing how to see it and how to recognize it and wanting it. What question would you most like answered? Oh? Many, I'm glad you didn't say. What question would you look most like to ask? Right now? I'd like to ask Vladimir Buotin? Why what is your problem? Mate? Why are you trying to bully a country that's done nothing to you in any of it? So? What question

would I most like answered? Look, you know, I think most people would like to know what happens on the other side. You know, isn't worth it being good and moral and loving and happy and doing all those things? You know? Here? Ah, that's interesting. Is there a payoff? I don't really care because I like my life anyway, so I don't really care if there's a payoff or not. I like how you framed that. It's not what happens when we die. It's listen, did I really have to

be good in order to get access to heaven? This is the Catholic in me. That's the Catholic in me. But you know what, I would love to know, honestly, because I have this image that everybody who's gone before me, all my friends, my family, my lovely dog, everybody who's before, they're up there having a nice time. You know, they're they're also enjoying. And I'd like to go up and have a really nice time. And I hope that exists.

I hope that exists. You know, do you think that if you knew that was what was going to happen, do you think you would live your life differently? No? I wouldn't live it differently. No. No, There's certain things I wish I had done, you know, more boldly, and maybe taken a few more risks here and there on more personal issues. But overall, I'm good. I'm good. I've got I've got two more questions before you send me on my way packing. I would like to know where

the democracy and truth will survive. And I'd like to know whether we will ever live on another planet, you know, in another atmosphere, in another environment. Wow. I wonder if democracy will exist on another planet or we can create it. I wonder if we did get to another planet. Would we take all the same constructs of law and society with us, or would we make amendments that could continue

to be amended? So shouldly, I wonder, Well, I hope we would perfect something that we started here on Earth, because we are in that moment. By the way, we're not just fantasizing you and I write now democracy is on the threat by the very nations which perfected it or tried to well. That just we were being reminded that it is an experiment. It is this experiment. And how about truth? What if there's no truth? That's the worst, That is literally the most terrifying thing. So I would

like to know will truth survive? And on that happy note, Mini, and on that bombshell, thank you so so so much, well, thank you for having me. I'm not sure an answer to one of my questions has ever cut quite so close to the bone as Christiane's answer of what questions she would most like answered being whether truth and democracy will survive. It's been a hard two weeks to watch

what's happening in our world. And I would like to say, and I wish I could say it to Christian right here and right now, that the strange byproduct of what Putin has done is to actually unite the world, which I know he didn't intend, but nonetheless, bar quite literally a couple of countries, that is what he has done, and perhaps that's how truth and democracy will survive, because

we will unite. You can watch Christianne's one hour late night public affairs series Amm and Paul on CNN International and Aman Paul and Co. On your local PBS station. Mini Questions is hosted and written by Me Mini Driver, supervising producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer Morgan Levoy, Research assistant Marissa Brown. Original music Sorry Baby by Mini Driver, Additional music by

Aaron Kaufman, Executive produced by Me Mini Driver. Special thanks to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson, Addison No Day, Lisa Castella and Annicke Oppenheim at w kPr, de La Pescadore, Kate Driver and Jason Weinberg, and for constantly solicited tech support, Henry Driver