On Britain's bloody imperial past, and present

Craig Murray, scourge of the Blairite establishment during his time at the Foreign Office, and critic of the SNP after the party's refusal to let him stand as an election candidate, is always an interesting listen.
This weekend he visited the Newsnet studio to discuss current event in the US and elsewhere with our regular host Derek Bateman.

And, in true form, the man who was Ambassador to Uzbekistan until he objected to that country's oppressive style of government, has a book to promote. He has written a fascinating account of Scots-born Sir Alexander Burnes, a distant relative of the great poet Rabbie Burns, and one of the British Empire's earliest and best-known spies. Burnes died in Kabul as he attempted to make peace during the first Afghan War in the 1830s in one of the most colourful episodes of the British Empire.