president trump has named john bolton as his new national security adviser. he'll replace general hr mcmaster in the latest change in the administration's personnel. the prospect of a trade war between the us and china is looming. president trump has initiated punitive measures to counter the theft of intellectual property, while beijing has said it will defend its interests. and this video is trending on bbc.com. tests have confirmed this small 15—centimetre long skeleton found in chile in the atacama desert in 2003 is not, as some believed, an alien. dna tests now confirm it belonged to a newborn indigenous girl with genetic mutations. that's all from me now. now on bbc news it's time for hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk,

from little rock, arkansas. i'm stephen sackur. nowadays, this city is associated with bill clinton. this is where he launched his political career, serving as state governor. but little rock has another important place in america's recent history. it was here at little rock central high school that one of the key battles of the civil rights era was fought. in september 1957, nine black students enrolled at this all—white high school. it followed a supreme court decision to end school segregation but the state governor here and his troopers were determined that that wasn't going to happen. after a protracted standoff, the little rock nine won their right to enter central high.

and this is the monument to their achievement. like rosa parks before them, they came to embody the bravery behind the civil rights struggle. and my guest today is one of them, elizabeth eckford. she wasjust 15 in 1957, but one extraordinary photograph ensures that her role will be forever remembered. as i was walking into your house. you have had six decades of people beating a path to your door, wanting to talk to you because, as it happened, you played an extraordinary role, as an individual, in the civil rights movement here in the united states. i just wonder whether you ever sometimes wish that things had gone differently, that you did not have all of this attention upon you? well, you know, when i was a child, i was very, very shy. i was a submissive child

from a household where my parents, frankly, were benevolent oligarchs. we knew that they loved us. each worked two jobs to take care, six kids, paid a car note and paid a house note... in this very house? yes, same house. yeah. it does not look the same but it's the same house. so it was not a household that was full of sort of radicalism, the beginnings of the sort of demand for civil rights, equality and justice. how could it be that you, as a pretty shy, timid 15—year—old, ended up on that first list of black students who were going to enrol at the white high school — how did that happen? actually, it almost didn't happen. i had asked my mother, during spring, when we were told that central would be desegregated the following fall, if i could go.

and — i call her the queen of no, now that she is not around... this is your mum? yeah, um, but this time she did not say no and that was uncharacteristic of my mother. here is what a writer who wrote a very interesting and long piece about you on the 50th anniversary of the events at little rock high in 1957. he wrote this, he said, "she was..." talking of you, "she was a painfully shy 15—year—old daughter of a hyper protective mother, who was actually reluctant to challenge the age—old so racial moras, in fact, elizabeth was the unlikeliest trailblazer of all." yes, yes, not only because of my personality but also because of my mother. in our household both parents were always on the same page for decisions.

it took a long time to get to "yes" for them and so when the names of the 17 students who were selected were in the newspaper, i told my parents that it was almost too late, that i had to go. the reason i wanted to go is that i wanted to get the best education possible. i had been brought up in a working—class family but i had been brought up with the assumption that i would go to college and i knew that, to do that, i needed to get scholarships. but do you think that you or your mum or your dad had any idea of the scale of the opposition and the hate and the violence that could be start up amongst whites in this town? this was a total shock. violence in school

was not part of the 1950s and it being allowed to continue day after day... first it was thought that things would get better as time goes on, and when it didn't change and even a few students who had made friendly overtures to us now turned their backs so the only voices being heard were the voices of people who were organised to attack us, both physically and verbally... who were systematically racist. yes. but before we spend too much time thinking about the impact that had on you once you started at central high, let's stick with the moment that you actually were the first black student to appear at the high school — i believe it was september 4th, when you first tried to get into the school and,

because of a bit of a mixup over timings, the other eight were not with you? yes, but i was not the only one who came there independently. terence roberts, who lived within walking distance of the school, less than ten blocks away from the school, walked to the school, and after he was turned away, he came and tried to encourage me to leave with him. right, but the fact is, for several minutes, you are pretty much isolated as you faced, notjust one or two, but actually a couple of hundred, at least, white people — now, some of them young and some of them old — who had gathered to try to block any black student getting into school that day. yes. that was shocking. what was more shocking to me was that i had thought that the national guard was there to protect

all students, including me. they were there to keep me out and i did not realise that, until i was turned away the third time and even directed to go across the street, where those angry voices were. i have been reading some of the words that were directed at you — 15 years old, and these are some of the words, "lynch her", people said. they used the "n" word. and they said, "get out of our school," "go back to where you came from." and some said they thought i should go back to africa... laughs they actually said that? yes. even though you were born and raised in their town, your town. some believed that i was somebody who had been brought here, specifically, to disrupt their lives... to make trouble. to make trouble, yeah.

now, what in a sense, made this particularly remarkable for you and lived through the ages as your experience was one photograph. the picture is remarkable for lots of different reasons. i mean, the dignity in your pose and the sense of isolation, amongst all those white faces, that there is in you, but, of course, the other reason it's remarkable is because it captures the rage in the face of one young woman, a fellow student, hazel bryan, who is right behind you and her face is twisted in a shout. at the time, were you aware of her presence and her shouting? for a long time, i did not know who she was and finally i did learn herfirst name but, after a while, i forgot it.

the trauma you went through — september 11th you were turned away, you had to turn back, the national guard were not going to let you in, the people did not want you in and you just had to turn around. i just wonder why your parents, at that point, did not say, "enough — we cannot put elizabeth through that again, we are going to have to go back on this plan, we're going to have to put her back in the black school." my mother had been an accommodator, to avoid difficulty with white people. she had grown up in rural arkansas, where schools only went to the eighth grade, and their livelihood depended upon the goodwill of white people. right. she came to little rock as a teenager in order to get high school education and she's not unique in that. when we get to the reality of what it was like for you, 15—year—old elizabeth, inside the school,

here are some quotations i have taken from what were later released as the collected papers of, i believe, the headmistress of the school. later we found this, an account of the days after you had gone into the school. october 28th: "elizabeth shoved in the hallway". november 20th, "elizabeth jostled in the gym". november 21st, "elizabeth hit with an implement". december 10th, "elizabeth kicked". december 18, "elisabeth punched". january 10, "elisabeth shoved on the stairs". january 1a, "elisabeth knocked flat". that was your reality? yes. and... a lot of the horrible things that happened was in gym. 0ur showers did not have barriers between... partitions between people,

so, when the water turned suddenly hot, very hot, i could see that the girl on this side and the girl on this side had turned their water off — they had anticipated it — which brings to mind the many, many bystanders who turned their backs and acted like they didn't hear or see what was happening. that makes a person who is being attacked feel like they think we are getting what we deserve and that is one thing that encourages me to speak out, to let people know how powerful they can be in someone‘s life who is being set apart and attacked and other people are ignoring it. there were two students at my school who engaged me

in ordinary conversation every day. you mean white students? yes, two white students, and i knew they had to have paid a price for that. i did not know what until many, may years later. i learned that the girl who lived outside the town, on a farm, and herfather hired armed guards, and the boy was supported by his parents. the atmosphere was toxic, really. yes. and you, this very year, have written a book about bullying and what children experience when they are terribly bullied. i just wonder, now that you reflect on it, do you think, frankly, that it damaged you in ways that you have had to live with for the rest of your life?

yes, that is apparent when ijump when i hear outside noises. but most of the attacks were behind me and i only turned around once and so i couldn't identify my attackers and. . . but what was most important to me were the people who supported me and that allowed me to want to tell students, particularly, that they can help somebody live another day by engaging them in a humane way, by acknowledging that even though they are different that that difference does not mean that they would hate them. that is very powerful to a person

who's been hurt and isolated. as an individual, you suffered so much and what you did was part of something so much bigger — that is, the struggle for civil rights — that wasn'tjust about desegregating the schools, it was obviously about so many other things too, but do you think, in a sense, "i was sacrificed to a bigger, wider movement"? it was a self—sacrifice, a self—sacrifice. i had to make a decision every day that i was going to go back into that hellhole. i knew what i would be facing after a while. um... but... one of the little rock nine was a girl who had a hole in her heart, years and years before open—heart surgery was available. in fact, she didn't have a surgery until after she had graduated from college and she

was in a crisis. so, um... how could i leave her behind? i wonder if, it it ultimately helped you to come back to little rock, because after school you spent quite a few years out of this place... yes. and i know those were really tough years for you. i didn't know the full extent of — of my experiences. i didn't know how damaging — damaged i was, but i felt like i was fortunate to be in environments where people didn't know anything about my background. right, you wanted to just be out of that for a while. yeah, uh huh. uh huh. yes. but it wasn't making you happy because you were... no, i had periodic depression, serious depression. but i never knew, i didn't understand why. i didn't understand that i had post traumatic stress, and i have...

when i... i didn't start talking to students until... 1990... 1997, i think. and... which is a0 years... yes. after. well, for 30 years, none of us talked about what it was like for us inside school. most people think the worst happened on the first day. yeah. but it was much more than that. but it also brings me to ask you about the complicated relationship that you developed with hazel brown, who was the girl we referred to earlier in the picture, who was yelling at you with hate in herface. yes, yes. the photographer who took that picture introduced me to her a couple of days before the 40th anniversary, and um... i knew that she felt a lot of trepidation about going public, um... she had told her sons, who were the older kids,

about the picture that they would encounter... to prepare them, but i remember being with herfamily members and i remember her daughter saying, that she was looking through a book and she said "that's my momma." she had not been prepared. um... but the point is, hazel wanted... she wanted... she wanted to reach out to you. yes. she had called me in 1963, during the summer... to apologise. but, um, she neversaid what she was apologising for. how do you — what do you mean by that? you think somehow she wanted you to forgive her but she didn't

want to delve deep into... where she was at and what she had done? yes, yes, yes. in fact, i began to realise — we spent two years together. you mean after 97? yes. uh huh. gradually i began to realise that she wasn't acknowledging the full extent of what she had done. she told one reporter that life is more than a moment and she should bejudged — should not bejudged just on that moment, but also i had acquired three different videotapes of her having some moments. and, um... she eventually said that she had amnesia... about her past. you mean about other incidents where it appears she was expressing racism?

yeah, and her parents removed herfrom central sometime during march — no, i'm sorry, much earlier than that, sometime during october, 1957 because... they said for her safety. ijust wonder if here there may be some deeper sort of metaphor about where america is, because reconciliation is not easy. no, it isn't. and, you know, you've had the congressional gold medal, you've had the meetings with bill clinton, and the statues erected in your honour and the little rock nine‘s honour, and you have become a hugely respected figure because of the way you've handled your own personal experience, but in the end, for america to really come to terms with all of this is not about putting up just statues and giving gold medals out, it's about every person's heart and mind changing, and i wonder if you feel that is really happening. this is my mantra.

the only way we can have real reconciliation is to honestly acknowledge our painful but shared past. let me ask you this. i dare say not so very far from this house there will be a young 15—year—old black girl, who is currently enrolled in central high, here in little rock. do you believe that her life, her opportunities, her experience, is going to be much better, much easier, for sure, than yours, or not? i know that the possibilities for her future are — will be... better than mine were. because so much has changed, especially opportunities for women. but... that depends upon her being prepared.

i tell students that it is their obligation to prepare themselves for their futures, and those who don't prepare will be cast aside. i don't pretty it up, i just tell them straight up they will be cast aside. we've talked a lot about what has happened in the states in your long life and, i just wonder, when we talked about the journey and you expressed your concerns about america today, you said "the journey is nowhere near complete. in fact, we're still near the beginning", but do you have faith that ultimately, thatjourney will lead to a place where the races are equal, wherejustice and equality are guaranteed for all americans, including black americans? that's my hope for the future. but it's been a long time coming,

and it will be, uh... i don't know whether i'll live to see it. i don't know whether i will live to see it. but, um... it's my hope for the future. i understand my place in history. i'm an historicalfootnote — that's what i am, not a celebrity. when i started talking to students, i would cry during my presentations. i have worked my way to where that doesn't happen any more, but i guess i was doing my own exposure therapy. i didn't even know about exposure therapy until recent years. elizabeth eckford, it has been a real honour to talk to you and thank you for letting me into your house, and thank you for being on hardtalk.

thank you. when i have an opportunity to speak to the public, i always remind them of how powerful their voices can be in support of a person who's being hurt. hello there. thursday was another pretty mild day. we saw a top temperature of 15.1 celsius in the north—east of scotland, making this the warmest day of the year so far for scotland. now, during the overnight period, we are seeing a series of weather fronts moving in from the west, bringing outbreaks of rain. quite a lot of cloud around, also strengthening wind too.

but by the end of the night into the early hours of friday, i think most of the rain will be confined to scotland and northern ireland, northern england. the weather fronts further south will have barely any rain on it, as it reaches eastern england. just the odd spit and spot, mainly cloud. with cloud cover, a mild start to friday. so friday starts off on a grey note for many. heavy and persistent rain in the northern half of the country for friday. however, it's an improving in the afternoon. cloud will move away, sunshine will appear, and we should see one or two showers in the north and west of scotland. the far north—west of scotland, staying wet. temperatures single figures in the north. cooler generally, 10—12 for england and wales. friday night. this feature in the south of the country will bring further rain from the west country into central and southern england. with more cloud cover, not so cold to start saturday. but further north, under clear

skies, a touch of frost — temperatures around freezing. so, not looking bad for the weekend. some sunshine around. a few showers, most in the north of the country. temperatures will be mild and typical for this time of year. saturday may start off quite cloudy, damp in southern britain. outbreaks of rain confined to the south—east of england in the afternoon. the best of the brightness further north and west. a few showers for scotland and northern ireland. these will be wintry on the higher ground. temperatures ranging between 9, 10, 11 for the south. now, during saturday night, that rain should eventually clear away from the south of the country. largely clear skies. continuing showers in scotland, these will be wintry. a cooler night to come under clear skies, with light winds. hovering around four degrees in towns and cities. so a chilly start for saturday, but probably the better day of the weekend. a few showers in the north. wintry in nature over

the scottish hills. it could be a touch more mild. 10—13 degrees in the south. as we head through the new working week, temperatures will begin to fall away as we get closer to easter, importing cold wind and the risk of snow and a light frost. i'm rico hizon in singapore. this is newsday on the bbc. the headlines: john bolton's set to become the next us national security adviser. but what will the hardliner bring to the white house? fears of a trade war, as president trump hits china with tariffs worth $60 billion.

beijing vows to "fight to the end." i'm sharanjit leyl in london. also on the programme: setting sights on gun control. could the us follow australia's clampdown on weapons? and from darkness into the spotlight, how a blind singer overcame adversity to hit a high note.