after this programme. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur, and today i'm in brussels, where eu leaders are hosting their counterparts from latin america. relations between the two haven't been easy of late, not least because of latin american scepticism about european military support for ukraine and its war against russian aggression. my guest today is gabriel boric. he's the president of chile. he's young. he is the architect of a new brand of progressive left politics. but right now, he's running into big trouble back home. has his political bubble burst?

president gabriel boric, welcome to hardtalk. thank you very much. it's an honour to be here with you and on bbc. well, we are delighted to have you as a guest. now, you're here at the eu headquarters for a summit meeting which involves most, if not all, of latin america's leaders. many of those leaders right now are self—described socialists. you also are a leftist, a socialist. but it seems to me there are many ways in which you are somewhat different. would you agree? well, i'm younger! they laugh. you're definitely younger! but that's not a good thing in itself. we have differences. but first of all, i want to say

that i feel really part of latin america, and i think that chile should project itself from latin america and not only look away from a region. so i'm really proud of our common history and ourcommon ground. one of the things that we have had some differences is that i strongly believe that there are some advances that we have achieved as humanity that cannot be questioned. and it doesn't matter who is in government — we have to stand up for, for example, human rights. in chile, we lived a hard dictatorship for 17 years, and we know what it means to lose democracy. so when democracy is lost and when human rights are violated by any regime —

it doesn't matter the political colour of the government in charge at the time — we should stand up for the people. i'm going to stop you there, because that is such an interesting way of introducing your view of what's happening in latin america, because you know as well as i do that there are key countries in your region which take a very different view of what leftist socialism is and should be about. i'm thinking of cuba, i'm thinking of nicaragua, i'm thinking of venezuela. you have been critical of all three governments in those nations, in a way that many of your fellow socialist leaders in latin america have not been. the three cases you mentioned, of course, they are different in between. of course. but the main thing is that if human rights are being violated — and that, of course, is with no doubt is happening

in nicaragua, for example, as you were saying — you shouldn't, like, look aside because they say they are from a "left—side government". if freedom of speech is not permitted anywhere, we should stand up and say, "hey, the way of defending our leftist ideas is with freedom of speech. we cannot impose them. we have to convince." perhaps the biggest single international diplomatic issue and challenge right now is the war in ukraine. russia's aggression, ukraine's response, a war which shows no sign of ending. again, most latin american leaders, led, for example, by president lula in brazil, have asked for an immediate ceasefire. they do not support europe sending more and more military equipment to kyiv to help the ukrainians. you appear to take a different position. why do you think you again

are out of tune, out of step with your fellow leaders in latin america? well, first of all, i recognise the leadership of lula. he's a strong leader with a lot of experience of the biggest country in south america — 180 million. he has a great trajectory and i... i feel admiration for him. but you disagree with him? i disagree. i disagree with him in... well, first of all, i agree with him in that we have to talk about peace and not only keep on talking about war. the point of my... i don't know if it's a difference, we should talk to lula, but my position or the chileans�* position is the war... it doesn't matter what do you think about ukraine, what do you think about volodymyr zelensky. it doesn't matter what your opinions are about mr putin or russia.

the war is not both parts�* fault. it's russia invaded a free country and wants to take part of his territory, and that violates the international law. and we should defend... at least this should be a common ground for everyone. we should defend international law. because now it's ukraine, tomorrow it could be us — it could be anyone. so you might have any opinion on the reasons on the conflict, but we should agree that international law should be respected at all times. and that goes for russia nowadays, and also goes for, of course, for... in other cases. i don't want to make a draw, you know? but in that case, my position is strong. it's an illegal invasion. russia should withdraw. of course we want the ceasefire, but we have to respect ukraine's territorial integrity. in a sense, the big

picture behind this is one of geopolitics. you're at the european union right now, talking to eu leaders and there is a concern in the european union that in regions such as yours in latin america, china and perhaps russia as well, the powerful authoritarian regimes in the world today are winning trade, they are making important investments, winning friends. and in a sense, here in brussels, there is a concern that the west, the europeans in particular, are losing ground in your region. do you think that's true? yeah, it's true. i think that's true. actually, that's not a supposition. do you worry about that? you say that your prime political principle is defence of human rights and democracy. so do you worry? let me tell you the following thing.

i think we all...countries should agree on defending human rights because that's a civilisatory advance that we shouldn't deny. do you think china and russia are in a strong position to defend human rights? i think they are not. and i think also the states, the united states are not also. and i think my own country at some times, and in latin america, there are a lot of countries that have violated human rights. so that's why we should defend at any time and any government the importance of the universality of human rights. butjust in a word, do you worry about the extent, for example, of china's reach of its influence in latin america today? i want to answer that. when you talk to chinese people, they don't talk... ..they don't talk about the difference between their culture and the united states. when they talk to you, they talk about what they can

do to have more investment, how they can help on this or that. and of course, you don't have to be naive about that. but china is effectively having a stronger position, and i think that is because they are doing better their jobs. do you? well, they are. i can say that because the states, the united states, they have... first of all, i think they have a strong debt with latin america, especially with latin america. for a lot of years... you mean a history which is negative? which is negative. i don't think that's mr biden's fault. and we have talked about this. but they should. . .the united states should recognise that, that they did wrong in their relationship with latin america,

promoting military coups. that's why i think that this summit is so important, because i strongly believe in that in latin america, we should have no dependence. nor united states, neither china. we should be independent. and how you can be independent in a world that is becoming polarised, more polarised every day? well, with countries that think alike and with countries that you have shared values. and europe is that for us. we have shared values with europe. i'm really proud about the bonds we have with all the countries here. and, well... mr president, i'm going to stop you there, because i do want to talk to you about chilean politics as well. now, you came to power with very big ambitions and high hopes as a historically young president determined to work on a progressive agenda.

and one of the symbols of that was the desire for a new constitution. you backed this constitutional council which sat, which came up with a whole new reform programme based on constitutional change, which was going to make a new chile. you totally backed that idea. your problem is and was that a clear majority of the chilean people rejected it last september. yeah. what went wrong? well, first of all, i think that as a leader, you have to love more your people than your ideology, you know? and so you cannot say, "it's the people's fault. they didn't understand what we were saying." no, that's... so if it wasn't the people's fault, maybe it was your fault? of course. it was our fault. it was the fault of the people that were backing up the project that was rejected. if we... the way that we can stand up

and confront the ultra—right movements, it's not telling them that, "you are wrong, you are wrong, you are bad," it's like offering a better horizon to our people. i'm going to quote, if i may... i think we failed there. well... but we are trying again. and i'm really proud about the institutions of chile, because, you know, when we had a big crisis in 2019, we chose to go deep into democracy. and we chose to fought our problems with more democracy, not with less democracy. and... but your problem now is that democracy in the last few months has produced a new constitutional council, which is essentially controlled by the right and the far—right in chile. so there is no way that you're going to get your progressive rights agenda through. it's not going to happen now.

i hope... and the conclusion — hang on — the conclusion from one former finance minister in chile, andres velasco, is that "boric has to understand chileans want to fix capitalism. they do not want to overthrow it." do you accept that? no, i disagree with andres velasco. i think that's a thing that is in dispute, in a permanent dispute. so there's a part of you that wants to overthrow the capitalist system ? part of me, i strongly believe that capitalism is not the better way to solve our problems in society. but i don't think that you can just overthrow it if you don't propose an alternative that is viable and is better for the people. it's... one of the things that i have learned in office, well, not only in office, it's kind of obvious, but now it's so crystal clear is that you cannot refound a country.

you have to... all the changes that... changes that last in time should be progressive and should be with strong majorities. and you have to build that strong majorities, and that strong majorities are not easy to build. but you only build a strong majority if you convince the people that you are competent at the business of running government. of course. and you have some specific challenges, which right now the opinion polls suggest most chileans think you are failing on. the first would be law and order — basic security in your country. if one looks at the figures, the homicide rate has increased by 32% over the last year. that is the 2022 figure. three quarters of chileans now tell the pollsters they fear becoming a victim of crime. there have been some terrible incidents. one month recently, three police officers were murdered. the feeling is you're not on top of this,

that you're too soft. well, i think we are demonstrating that that's the wrong idea. we have invested a lot in reinforce the police, the police courts. the police corps. and we are putting back in an institutional path the fighting against delinquency. it hasn't been easy, but i think we are having some good agreements with all the political spectrums about security. actually, we are going to pass in this year about 31 bills, projects of law, about security issues. but isn't there a problem, mr president? wait a minute. there is a problem about security. i don't want to hide it. there is a problem in chile about security. and maybe the fundamental problem is that you came to power so focused on human rights and, for example, on, you said establishing

a dialogue with the people, the mapuche people, the indigenous people in one region of your country where there has been... and we are sensing in that way. ..sustained violence between the mapuche people and the security forces, because the mapuche people say that their rights have not been respected. not all the mapuche people. some little groups. very true. but you said, "you know what? i can fix this with dialogue. i can bring people together." the truth is you haven't, you've failed, and you're having to put the security forces back in there. i think it's too soon to decree or to establish that we have failed on that issue. of course, it's difficult. we never thought it was going to be easy, but i think we have achieved some advances. for example, in that topic specifically that you are talking, we establish a commission with... a transversal commission to establish a truth about the demand on lands. and we managed with a lot

of dialogue that all political parties from extreme right to extreme left, all political parties represented in parliament signed the support for this commission. so i know that i am not going to be able to solve 140 years�* problem in one year, but i strongly believe that the way to solve these historical problems in our country is not with violence. not only... of course you have to persecute people that commit crimes, of course, but if you only put your accent there and you don't see what's behind the story, what are the wounds of the mapuche people, you are not going to be able to solve the roots of the problem. let me tell you something. one of the things that

worries me is that the political times... the political times are not necessarily good for common good. not all the problems that we want to solve we are going to solve them in four years. but i have to think in long—term. and sometimes that means to take decisions that might be unpopular and that might take more than four years to give fruits. mm. you know? and i think the way we are facing, for example, the mapuche issue, mapuche and chilean issue, or the way we are fighting against the rise of narco traffic and that stuff are going to maybe not give electoral fruits right now, but they are in the right path. but then you have to find a way

to keep winning victories. if your strategic vision requires two terms or three terms, you have to figure out a way to win. of course. one very big strategic challenge for you right now is to figure out how to deal with a potentially vast economic opportunity that lies in your lithium deposits. yep. hugely important for the development of batteries around the world. you in chile, along with bolivia, argentina have major resource. but you, in the last few months, have completed what looks to many people like a nationalisation of the lithium industry. that's right. why is that wrong? because in chile we respect contracts, and we are not going to do anything that goes against international law and we are not going to violate our contracts. you haven't threatened their current contracts, but you want the state to play

a much bigger role in the future of this industry. yeah. and we want the state to be partner with the private sector and we think that the state and the people of chile has to be part of the wealthy that lithium might bring. not only... but the danger is that the actions you've taken have already led to the stock prices of those private companies sinking, sinking very fast. and also, there's evidence that within the next few years, the investment in your industry coming from the private sector in the lithium deposits is actually going to move to, for example, argentina, to australia. you're going to lose that key advantage. well, erm... do you think that an investor would prefer nowadays go to argentina than to chile because of social security? because of respecting the constitution? and the difference between

australia and chilean lithium is that the lithium in australia is in rocks. we have it in salt lakes so it's easier to extract. what we are doing is saying that we can build a partnership between a public company and private sector. and that's not weird — that's what europe does in a lot of issues. but i guess the private sector wants to know partly whether you are going to impose much stricter environmental standards, because your minister of science and technology has said that, "we have to take more account of future generations, the impact on the land, nature and climate." that suggests you're going to be much stricter. of course. of course we are. we want to higher the environmental standards. and what we have said, for example, to canadian mining companies, which they agree on this, is that we want to... ..that your companies apply the same standards you use

in your country in our country. that's it. and we think that chile has a position in which we have to be very careful with the opportunities we have. we want to seize them. we want to seize the opportunity about lithium, about green hydrogen, about, of course, copper. but we have to do it in the right way, and the right way means environmental standards, also talking with communities, and also that the wealthiness that make these industries are well—distributed — not only in a few hands. i'm going to end with perhaps a somewhat strange observation, but i've never interviewed a head of state, a president as young as you before. and ijust wonder, as you've had almost a year and a half in office now, what you have learned about the ability you have to make good on your dreams, your ambitions for chile. because you wanted to be a different kind of leader. you wanted to be more open. you live in a pretty ordinary

neighbourhood in santiago. you've been very honest about your own mental health issues because you have ocd... yeah. ..obsessive compulsive disorder, and you've talked about that in a way that very few other leaders would ever talk about it. do you believe that your style of leadership is working, that it's what the chilean people want? well, it's too soon to say. but what i really want to do is to help and solve the inequality in my country, the lack of a social welfare state in our country. and i think if we demonstrate that with the proposals we have, we can have a better life for chilean people — for example, as we did increasing the minimum wage or having the public health free, or reducing the labour time, i think they are going to value it. because the style, if... you know, how young am

i, if i have tattoos, if i don't wear a tie are accessory things. that's not the main thing. the main thing is how is people living in chile? and i hope and i believe that when we end up our mandate in two and a half more years, people are going to live better than they did when we assume. and the people should decide it. president gabriel boric, it has been a pleasure to talk to you. thank you for being on hardtalk. it's an honour for me being in the bbc. thank you for this interview. hello. some parts of the uk, particularly parts of northern england and northern ireland, have already seen the wettestjuly on record. and you probably won't be too surprised to hear that we have got more rain in the

forecast at times through the remainder of this week. now, tuesday brings a mix of sunny spells and scattered showers. we won't all be seeing the rain during the day on tuesday, but let's look at the rest of the week. this is the jet stream. these winds you can see here continuing to drive areas of low pressure in towards our shores with showers or longer spells of rain moving their way through from the atlantic and pushing gradually eastwards. now, tuesday morning, a few spells of showery rain across parts of central scotland. also the odd shower for wales, south west england, east anglia too. heading through the day, this area of cloud and rain nudges further south and then we start to see showers bubbling up for eastern scotland and eastern england, which could be really quite heavy, potentially thundery, with some hail mixed in too. a bit more cloud and a few showers later on for northern ireland, but some sunny spells elsewhere. northern scotland, wales, south west of england, just 15—21 degrees at best, a little below par for this time of year. heading through the overnight period, into wednesday, then, most of the showers tending to ease away, one or two continuing

perhaps parts of wales, north west england to start the day on wednesday. but another fairly fresh night with temperatures getting down into single figures, in the countryside at least. heading through wednesday, here's the next area of low pressure, only gradually moving in from the west. so ahead of that, a fair amount of dry weather, particularly through the morning for much of scotland. few showers parts of northern and eastern england, but some sunshine for east anglia in the southeast. there's the cloud and the rain spilling into northern ireland, parts of wales, the south west of england. later in the afternoon, the wind picking up too. temperatures, perhaps a degree or so up, but still below average, onlyjust1li—21, perhaps 22 in the south. moving through into thursday now and low pressure sits out towards the north west of the uk. so we've still got a few lingering weather fronts. could be a bit more rain for parts of northern scotland, perhaps around the south coast of england, where it'll be quite breezy. elsewhere, we're looking at a day of sunny spells again and a few showers cropping up. still, temperatures only 15—21, perhaps 22 degrees on thursday. and then that unsettled showery spell continues right through the end of the week and the weekend, into next week, too.

perhaps something eventually a little bit drier and warmer as we head through towards the second week of august. bye for now.

live from london. this is bbc news. greece's prime minister warns of at least three more difficult days ahead. thousands are evacuated from the islands of rhodes and corfu

to escape the wildfires. massive protests overnight in israel after the controversial justice reform bill is passed. and we will have the very latest on day six of the world cup. colombia is 2—0 up against south korea. hello, i'm mark lobel. around 20,000 people have fled their homes on the greek island of rhodes, where wildfires are still out of control. fires are also burning on the islands of corfu and evia as well as rhodes. nearly 2,500 people have now been evacuated from corfu as fires burn there. greece has been sweltering under a lengthy spell of extreme heat with daily temperatures well above a0 degrees.