and. this is news and these are our top stories experts say it could take weeks to dislodge a huge container ship blocking egypt's suez canal some 200 other vessels are waiting to enter what is one of the world's key shipping routes. taking a much longer route around africa closure will impact global trade. u.s. president joe biden says china's using ping and russia's vladimir putin are among

40 world leaders he's inviting a summit climate change has made climate a top priority for his administration the virtual summit is planned for april. france bears a moral responsibility in the 1994 rwandan genocide that's the conclusion of a report commissioned by the french government some 800000 tutsis were killed in just a few months then the report found that france under then president. was quote blind and slow to respond but it cleared france of any complicity in the slaughter this is news from berlin you can follow us on twitter and instagram news and visit our website. you're.

welcome to arts and culture on this edition. an artist puts a contemporary spin on old traits by the subjects faces. and an architect and travel lover turned baker manages to combine all 3 of her passions. but 1st beethoven famously said that music can change the world that's nowhere more evident than in a new exhibition at the german history museum in bonn it charts the course of popular music through germany's post-war history and highlights how over the years its co-existed with influenced politics. music is history the 1980s were political a young german woman encapsulated what people were feeling.

different this was the time when the big question of whether nuclear weapons should be stationed in germany was at the for a question that didn't only interest young people in germany antiwar song 99 red balloons was an earworm for many all around the world. you know it was an overnight sensation. in the 1950s germany tapped its feet to us walking no music from the likes of elvis presley. and bill haley. the music captured the sight christ the music was can she too but 1st and foremost it captured a way of life you'd hear a great song then you'd go out and buy the record and listen to it and play it at the next party. in. the 9060s rock band

revolution german concerts by the beatles and the rolling stones often got a little out of hand. punk rock arrived in the 1970 s. . rules of the german roost. linda merged ventured into east west politics in the eighty's the west germany got to perform in communist east germany. the us rock musician bruce springsteen his $988.00 gig in east berlin was the biggest opening concert in the other germany's 40 year history. after the germany had the crazy idea that if we let the big questions into play concerts that would satisfy our young people and help us control them. the idea was doomed to failure the

burden wall fell in november 1989 and one song became the number of german reunification. farther. down. and for a trip down memory lane my colleague adrian kennedy is in the studio with me and ambitious exhibition adrian so what does popular music tell us about german history well a recurring topic is of course german unity we had that have been able to put on a one off concert in east germany in 1903 but they're off he was not allowed back and he had to wait until after the wall fell to fulfill his dream of a form of eastern germany an emotional show in the light seeking 990 is part of the

exhibition and we heard nina's famous antiwar anthem that that presented a new face of germany to the world it is. also a year earlier nicole had had a surprise victory in the your vision song contest with a little piece i remember it quite well because it was number one in the u.k. during the falklands war but these 2 songs to kind of a stamp edition new idea of the german as amused me in saying can stop the sandal wearing peaceniks undies think that those songs played a big role in changing germany's international image where they at least reflected the change that was going on. up until then most peoples owning council were german port had been crushed for a very different image of the german the check in a crap rather cold emotion although we have to remember that in the music of.

craftwork it's quite sentimental and has a lot of warmth it's called right and adrian i had that it was an encounter with a music that actually brought you to ballad yes i was inspired by legendary. noise about. this was a west berlin band that made music with cement mixer is pneumatic drills metal pipes the concert was dubbed the best gig since the crucifix haitian christian crucifixion sorry and it really quite blew my mind and prompted me to jump on a bus and get over to west berlin to find out what was going on and we're very glad you did and the rest as they say is music and history thank you very much my colleague adrian kennedy thank you. some other news now brazil's christ the redeemer statue is getting a facelift ahead of its 90th anniversary celebrations in october dozens of

engineers architects and geologists are scaling it's 38 feet is to remove rust and replace weakened rocks before the pandemic some 2000000 people visited the statue every year. scotland's aberdeen university is to become the 1st institution to return a benny and bronze sculpture to nigeria the university said the work depicting a king was a quiet in reprehensible circumstances bush stole just destroyed by any city in the late 19th century losing thousands of treasures from the palace the move raises pressure on other establishments including the british museum to follow suit. well dozens of german museums still have been bronzes to the culture minister monica cletus has called a special summit to discuss restitution and we'll have more on germany's role in looted african arts next week here on arts and culture. now to an artist who takes

what's gone before and really interprets it painter for her hair mass has a love of the old masters and their portraits he's particularly interested in the clues they offer about their subjects and the times they lived in and he's found a unique way to reveal the secrets. europe's museums are filled with paintings like leaves the rich and famous of centuries past. portraits painted to exude high status and noble character. artist for a guy hammers looks to portraits of the past for inspiration. he takes the paintings of old masters and the reworks them digitally with one big twist. the subjects faces are veiled.

presents them in a way that modern viewers can't so easily ignore. countries or who go there it can break down the hurdle to these works if you just had a humorous aspect which at the same time highlights important features of the image without overwhelming it. by masking hammers ams to unmask he takes elements already present in the works and multiplies them. the idea is to exaggerate visual codes already built into the paintings because that people at the time would have understood but that viewers today need help decoding. the luminous wigs for instance

one stood for great wealth for the hamma satirizes the conventions of past arabs masking the actual faces to refocus the attention. and they missed. by removing this individuality the faces and blocking our access to this. it's almost as if we were standing in front of the painting and holding one hand up to it so we can concentrate more on other areas. so the incredible diversity of these pictures revealed becomes far more pronounced when i take away the faces. because if that. has been creating these hidden portraits now for around a decade last year he began posting them on instagram and became a global sensation perhaps because so many of us can relate to wearing masks.

maria trots chi as studied architecture in moscow in paris in 2012 she discovered baking and it became a passion now she mixes her fields of interest making desserts and even taste like famous landmarks. the skyline of copenhagen the eiffel tower in paris the sydney opera house these edible works of art are the creations of maria trucks going on. here but i'm primarily interested in the artistic ass backwards it's a kind of performance for. her copenhagen berlin kate is especially elaborate and took 3 days to complete it's made of short crust pastry with nuts chocolate sponge workout flour coffee mousse and a grassy glaze made from salted caramel the optical highlight is the chocolate skyline. what's important is that the landmarks of those cities are recognized.

it was a special request from a customer who loved both european capitals. cannot be version of st basil's cathedral of her hometown moscow was up course a must see the shape of a cake is just as essential to her as its taste each recalls the flavors of the respective country this was where moscow tastes like the typically eastern european blend of spices but combined with something light and fluffy like a butter cream it doesn't seem to bother her that her artistic creations end up being devoured. remember that's the most important part of the taste is everything . and they didn't leave a slice for me. you can find more on all those stories on our website that's d w dot com slash culture and as venice celebrates its 1601st

day i'll leave you with just at the very days la traviata sung by francesca dato at last the nikkei opera house the same venue of its 853 premiere from the whole team from arts and culture in berlin even dad she. there's.

what secrets lie behind us was. discover new adventures in 360 degree. and explore fascinating world heritage sites. t.w. world heritage 360 get kidnapped now. been robbed of their soul that's what it people experiences when their heritage is taken from them countless cultural artifacts were brutally stolen from africa by colonialists can't carted off to europe. what should be done with the stolen art from africa. stolen sold on t w. 'd

this is the story of a world whose borders and territories were drawn by the slave trade where violence subjugation and profit impose their own roots this criminal system shaped our history and our world. unsubtle me the portuguese invented an economic model with unprecedented profitability the sugar plantation. was the 1st black colony of 1st slaves as are others. where when i was a black man with sugar care. in the 16th century other european powers were eager to follow their model their greed would plunge an entire continent into chaos and violence nearly 13000000 africans were cast on to new slavery routes to the new world where the english the french and the dutch hopes to become wealthy in measurably wealthy.

because the caribbean has similar climatic features to sound tony it eventually became the principal crossroads of the slave traders routes for people in the western world these islands are today associated with the cation what a loop offers tourists a dream destination sunshine and pristine nature rekindling myths of a lost paradise holiday makers tend to confine themselves to the beaches of the. un and self. but as this sign indicates they are all too close to another side of the islands heritage that was anything but a paradise. just a few meters away from the bathers is a burial site where countless. skeletons were discovered. between 501000

graves are still buried beneath the sand. that is the one player beach is one of 15 slave cemeteries that have been excavated. 15 among the 1000 that exist in the caribbean. 89 skeletons have been examined by french archaeological research experts judging by the state of the browns they concluded that these men and women had not reached the age of 30 by the time of their death the toll from working on the plantations had so deformed their bodies that they seemed more like 75 year olds. these people were human guinea pigs for the sugar experiment the collateral damage of an unprecedented trade war the sugar war. 74 percent

of all slaves carried off. would cut off because of sugar if you want to understand the slave trade you just need to know better a. sugar proved more addictive than pepper or cinnamon from the 17th century onward europeans crave this rare and expensive commodity in london amsterdam and paris sugar fever was rampant fronting a new generation of adventures to go to any extremes to get it ship owners and fitters merchants and pirates all knew that to produce sugar you needed a lot of slaves. john hawkins was one of these new entrepreneurs for whom profit reigns supreme the english privateer was a pioneer in understanding that a fortune could be made by shipping black captives to the new world in the mid 16th century he convinced queen elizabeth the 1st to lend him a ship the jesus of lu back for the expedition hawkins conspicuously set the tone

by choosing a trussed up black man on his emblem. i do confirm to your highness that i will bring home 40000 marks without any offense of the least that many of your highness's allies old friends. i will conduct this enterprise and turn it to the benefit of your whole realm with your highness's consent the voyage i proposes to load negroes in guinea and sell them in the west indies in truck of pearls gold and emeralds that i will bring back in abundance. 1620 a century after sugar plantations were introduced in brazil the atlantic became the battle ground for the sugar war england the netherlands and france wants to break spain and portugal as had gemini. in the caribbean the dutch took control of chorus out into his dishes and cemetery the french what

a loop martinique granada and. sentiment the english occupied the bahamas jamaica and barbados and dominican. only cuba and puerto rico remained under spanish rule. after the extermination of the natives are a white people the 1st sugar canes flourished on this fertile land the caribbean became a space of conquest for the europeans very early on really was the 1st place the columbus landed in the new world the 1st place that the spanish began to search for gold and the 1st place they began to enslave the indians so they were thoroughgoing spaces created by design of european planters and imperial policy makers and for their profit right there aren't so many places where you can completely overlay a territory like that so there are in some ways the caribbean is a space where you find the purest of colonial territories where the masters of the space actually get to create the space to suit their own needs. in one loop efi

plot of land every single square inch of ground is connected to this violent and deeply rooted history. today all that is left of the should know war is a field of ruins. of the 250 sugar refineries active in the late 1900 century only to remain in operation. 'd 'd in 2017 experts from france's national institute at preventive archaeological

research examine the remains of the sun. i'm shocked residents and sugar refinery in august at tom a mill stock rooms and 3 rows of so-called negro huts where hundreds of slaves were penned up together. in this brutal work camp human beings were but one tool among others each became a mechanized and they see a dead body consumed by work until their final breath. but the time in which the slaves were digging the cane holes and the times in which their harvesting are really the peak of the labor on a plantation you could almost see the slaves wasting away when they were digging these can holes because the work was so strenuous and they were getting fed so poorly. ringback you found women in all the gangs oftentimes doing the hardest dirtiest labor on the plantation alongside the men or even before the men and one of the things that

means when you find young women doing this quite debilitating labor is the birth rates are very low and the mortality rates the infant mortality rate is shockingly high and the mid 18th century people talked about 9 out of 10 infants born to enslave jamaican women dying right within the 1st year so there's no way in which the plantation can reproduce itself under those kinds of conditions. people does forces you to have the plantations were managed by overseas who saw the slaves in purely functional terms only exploit this this was absolute exploitation of the workforce it was a very particular society both good because the average race of life expectancy on the plantation was extremely low about 8 to 10 years after arriving. he said as though he's losing the logic of the slave system was one where the ability of the work force had to be absolute limit as well as we did and for this

man was conceived as an accessory of the land. by god they appeared as such in house him and doors used to describe above as slaves are listed next to records for livestock or manufacturing implements. to us but. that's the archaic aspect which was put to use by a capitalist system and which largely met market supply and demand with its fluctuations needs in competition free competition. the sugar plantation saw slavery enter a new era the stronger the demand for sugar the more the slave trade expanded and the more the slave traders sought support from banks to finance their expeditions. london is one of the oldest centers of global finance the city of london was the

1st to create a commodities exchange to develop credit markets and to issue bank notes on a massive scale without the invention of a centralized banking system the explosion of the slave trade in the 17th century would not have been possible preparing for a slave expedition was expensive and having a financial arsenal england a decisive advantage over its competitors. you've got to remember. the state is getting a tremendous amount of revenue from the plantation complex of a have a very strong vested interest in the slave trade if you had gone to the king of england in 1680 and said look i'm going to give you a choice you can either have these 13 colonies in north america early could have this one little island called barbados you have taken barbados of the split 2nd because of the sugar revenues and this is something that's going to persist as a very important interest for european states up until

a very in the slavery. to support the sugar war the city lent money on a colossal scale in the midst of these steel and glass buildings the 2 pillars of the english economy that financed the slave trade are still prominent on the london skyline. at the heart of the financial district is the venerable bank of england the world's 1st central bank. a couple of blocks away is britain's most powerful insurance company the prestigious lloyd's of london atlantic slave traders had to take on heavy debts to charter their ships without an insurance company most would risk to ruin on their 1st expedition we continued with. this late traders made investments as if playing a game of poker the risks were high but if successful the return would far outweigh any other type of investment insurers like lloyds had everything to gain by

participating in this game of chance a successful expedition could yield up to 3 times the initial stake in the lloyd's archives little evidence remains of the profits amassed by insuring these high risk expeditions most accounting records were lost in a fire in $838.00 the same year that slavery was abolished in the british caribbean . ports had to adapt to this initial straddle for africa and the caribbean in london blackwall became the slave trade principal wharf all manner of goods were sold here precious fabrics jewels porcelain weapons and brandy all bought on credit with the bank's money a giant port complex gradually evolved a city within a city entirely devoted to this new business. following london in 1663 other seaports rushed to take advantage of this lucrative trade

beyond copenhagen now rochelle bristol want liverpool more deal and work from all over europe slave ships set sail for africa when i began to see slave ships leaving from not just liverpool unarmed but from every port in the atlantic soon as the port becomes big enough to contemplate the transoceanic poor age there's a good chance that voyage is going to be a slave trade voyage and we've got like $170.00 separate courts tiny places today they've got no idea that once upon a time they send out slave boarders simply to support of the charles charming place and yet it's a slave trade pored. over a period of 2 centuries more than 3 and a half 1000 expedition set sail from french ports more than half of them left from

the part of not the main french hub of triangular trade. coop the sculpted figures along the kid a life force or fatal island are reminders of an era when the great slave trading families displayed their pride in being the main architects of the city's wealth it was they who made no want france's leading commercial port. wealth came from slavery there were negotiator ship owners and all those who produced foodstuffs to keep the vintners flour producers fabric producers hardware producers with your daughter to. be. the atlantic ports also generated well for areas that stretched very far inland as far as a leo in the case of known by exalting there. goods were also transported along the river to really fly over so the wealth that slavery prettiest was essential for

france. is also. 1669 from lunt or don't and after slavery money flowed back up river as to all well. and. it had such repercussions on inland areas that it became a national objective look at the 14th knew that to win the sugar war he would need a powerful fleet. the king ordered the construction of $500.00 galleons the atlantic became a theater of the naval war between france england and the netherlands a bitter fight in which each sunken ship was a total loss for the respective countries economy. it was very expensive to build and equip a $74.00 gun ship and pay its crew. if not more ultimately who bore the cost the bill for financing these wars the financing of ships and assholes was

mainly footed by french presence. in. the slave trade fleets were protected 16000 galleons were already protecting dutch commercial ships while the 3000 light and fast royal navy cruisers terrified their adversaries friends paled in comparison to these are modest. the each nation needed a fortress in africa if it were to compete in the atlantic race just like on the caribbean islands these forts were the bastions of the triangular trade. as military bases they offered a secure store for bartered goods and captives before departure by sea. in less than 80 years 43 such forts were built from senegal to the niger delta every stone every being every element of masonry was transported by boat from

europe and. most of these fortresses are built by state individual capitalists or even groups of trading capitalists did not have that kind of money in order to build those sorts of fortresses the english already had 13 the dutch 10 the danish 5 even the prussians with their 3 forts surpassed the french on the gold coast in today's gonna the fantail and ashanti rented europeans plots of land to build their forts the europeans established trading posts and fortresses all along the atlantic coast from the a way territory to the congo kingdom equitorial africa became the world's principal source of slaves. in this accounting documents written in 1688 we learned that over an 8 year period it shipped 60783 slaves. each cost the royal african company 8

to 12 pounds sterling the equivalent of between 950 and 1500 euros today they were all bought with trade goods the demand for slaves was so high that the europeans pressured their african partners to help them plan to rationalize and industrialized their system of mass deportation. slaves were often bought on credit. and sold out amount throughout european ships would come they would have a whole cargo full of textiles different metal wear or. tobacco whatever and they these would be given to the local merchants extended to them on credit and then the merchants would go inland with those goods and buy slaves and come back the biggest impact was the level of of. the level of violence

the rising level of violence the level of uncertainty. that permeated society everywhere and also the opportunity for new new big. 2 emerged new powerful leaders somebody gets a hold of more firearms somebody gets more aggressive they build their own personal chiefs up and suddenly they're powerful. among these leaders was on to read to a major conference in traitor from calabar in what is now nigeria in his diary he spoke of the methods he used to terrorize captives kidnapping detention and murder . about 4 am i caught up awful writing i will type in the city training asked

where i met all the times and. we got ready to cut off that's. 5 am when he got the capital kingsnake. 15 s doubt that. very clearly these sacrifices were in town to do as a form of terrorism that were meant to make it very clear to the population who was the boss and who was naught the very much the way to. the mafioso type organisations. and behave in terms of making sure that the members of the

association respect whoever the godfather it was and if anybody steps out of line they can be assassinated or killed and so they don't step out of line obviously. for the benefit. of a handful of enterprising and unscrupulous profiteers the entire continental economy was transformed on the coast african brokers knew all of the inner workings of the sugar plantation. a slave ship from some a little. docked at loango in the kingdom of congo. it's captains drawings provide exceptional details of the negotiations between europeans and africans the merchants from the coast knew that the matthiessen have fixed captain was in a hurry he had to arrive in the west indies before harvest time this was the time of year when slaves sold best and when the best sugar was available so they

deliberately prolonged negotiations to drive prices up $312.00 captives were rounded up in $116.00 days. he said my feet arrived inside the mountain now having one year after leaving france only 9 captives had perished a good ratio for the crew who celebrated their success. in the drawings of the matisse afaik and no allusion to the slave suffering appears they were dehumanised shadows tallied and lined up like barrels at the bottom of the hole to. the transportation of human beings turned into a nightmare. it's very important to understand that violence on board slave ships would be used electively in other words no captain wanted to kill the entire allotment of people on board because that voyage with it

have no profit so when there was resistance what the captains would do is organize a spectacle in which a small number of people would be executed and if street. leave vicious horrific ways as a means of terrorizing everybody else all of the enslaved would be forced to come up on deck in order to view these executions one slave ship surgeon said that frequently the decks the main deck of the ship would just be completely awash in blood and the aftermath of one of these failed revolves revolts were common and they were almost always suppressed but the captains would use that situation to kill a small number in order to intimidate everybody else sending the message that if you resist us this will be your fate. i am.

and i've also suggested that the slave ship created categories of race for example the multi ethnic africans who are loaded on board a slave ship go aboard as ebo or fun day or men day but when they come off the ship they are unloaded as members of the quote negro race end quote and the same parallel process goes on among the sailors these motley crew they are english irish also in some cases african they leave their european port but when they arrive on the west coast of africa they become the white people. on caribbean beaches captives disembarked as blacks in

a world dominated by whites. co-opt providing an outlet for a society founded on violence and race the carnival maintains the memory of the days when the super industry imposed its. rhythms rights and seasons and set the pace for island life. was it was an era when drummers announced the end of winter and the resumption of cutting when fleeing slaves covered themselves in the glasses to help prevent their recapture. civil suit if you don't listen. what progressively distinguished atlanta it slavery what made it different from other systems of slavery was the construction of race silicon solution a house simplist it was precisely this superimposition that developed between

physical appearance with its own term and status. the kid behind them at the extremities of this continuum of the both status and color there was the white master and the black slave. met it lisc love moth. so there little the term white did not exist prior to slave societies. root them the law into closely that's why it's developed specifically in the antilles this so you can see our vital this atlanta area was to the construction of the racial categories that we still use now is all we use them as though they hadn't changed throughout time when in fact they have joy they thought it kinda sorta. race was a weapon of submission mentioned to carve into flash the supposed inferiority of

some people and the infinite superiority of others. cut off from their roots and their families the black slaves were reduced to a survival mass without names and without orientation. the plantation was a machine that devoured its workforce it needed a constant supply of new arrivals land owners wanted to transform the slaves bodies into tools. on plantations whipping and torture were used to deprive them of their humanity. in this garden of torture the master's authority was absolute. 'd so you take for example a character like thomas those who were and you can almost see in his diaries the escalation in the violence that he has to mete out of the things he has to mete out

to the enslaved to keep them working on the plantation. i arrived as a foreman on the new plantation barely 2 weeks ago. we had to carry out justice in the negro. understand. we civilly with him and robbed path of salt and lime juice into his wounds. 3 days later the body of another slave to his feet was brought to us by cut off his hat and with the body in public that was the only way to exert control of the new us. and this is the family reason it was adopted by all the colonies. in force and condition of the negro not relent just being knighted only strengthen biden's and

hold them back. these kinds of tortures and these kinds of punishments this kind of brutality actually became commonplace on these plantations where you had white people working out among armies of slaves who they feared they could not control the sound of the screaming and the stench of the burning bodies that also became a fundamental feature of the jamaican landscape right and that is what plantation society is it's that smell it's that sound it's that fear and terror that's compelling people to work and to obey their masters there's no way to separate that kind of terror.