In Conversation, previously known as Conversation With (CW) from 1999 to 2018, is a Singapore television programme broadcast on Asian news network CNA. The show has been on the air for 22 years and was twice nominated for Best Talk Show at the Asian Television Awards. Notable guests on the interview show include former US President Barack Obama and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Aung San Suu Kyi.
CW, originally titled In Conversation, debuted on 28 April 1996. [1] The show initially aired on Singapore domestic television, on Singapore's English-language station Mediacorp Channel 5 and was produced by the then Television Corporation of Singapore, which was renamed Mediacorp TV in February 2001. [2]
CW began airing on CNA when the network was launched on 1 March 1999, [3] and would later find an international audience when CNA began broadcasting regionally in September 2000. [4] The show is today available in 28 territories, according to CNA, [5] where the network is currently available. The program was reverted to its former name on 26 April 2019.
Since its debut, CW has been a personality profile conducted through one-on-one interviews in episodes of 25 minutes duration. The show has a broad focus with celebrities such as Jackie Chan having been featured, although subjects are mostly political and business figures.
The first subject on CW was Singapore's then Economic Development Board CEO Philip Yeo, with former US Secretary of State James Baker featuring in the second episode. [6]
In 2016, CW secured an exclusive interview with then US president Barack Obama on the sidelines of the US-ASEAN summit in Sunnylands, California. [7]
The programme currently broadcasts on Thursday evenings, with a different telecast timing for India. Previous episodes are also available on the CNA website's Conversation With catch-up page.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, sometimes abbreviated to Suu Kyi, is a Burmese politician, diplomat, author, and democracy activist who served as state counsellor of Myanmar and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2016 to 2021. She has served as the general secretary of the National League for Democracy (NLD) since the party's founding in 1988 and was registered as its chairperson while it was a legal party from 2011 to 2023. She played a vital role in Myanmar's transition from military junta to partial democracy in the 2010s.
The National League for Democracy is a deregistered liberal democratic political party in Myanmar. It became the country's ruling party after a landslide victory in the 2015 general election but was overthrown in a coup d'état in February 2021 following another landslide election victory in 2020.
Mishal Husain is a British newsreader and journalist for BBC Television and BBC Radio and a Sunday Times bestselling author.
CNA is a Singaporean multinational news channel owned by Mediacorp, the country's state-owned media conglomerate. CNA broadcasts free-to-air domestically in Singapore, and internationally as a pay television channel to 29 territories across the Asia-Pacific. It also streams on Mediacorp's domestic meWatch platform, and on free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) platforms and YouTube internationally.
CNA938 is an English-language radio station in Singapore. Owned by the state-owned broadcaster Mediacorp and launched on 2 October 1998, it broadcasts a news/talk radio format.
General elections were held in Myanmar on 7 November 2010, in accordance with the new constitution, which was approved in a referendum held in May 2008. The election date was announced by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) on 13 August.
The Lady is a 2011 British biographical film directed by Luc Besson, starring Michelle Yeoh as Aung San Suu Kyi and David Thewlis as her late husband Michael Aris. Yeoh called the film "a labour of love" but also confessed it had felt intimidating for her to play the Nobel laureate.
Derek James Mitchell is an American diplomat with extensive experience in Asia policy. He was appointed by President Barack Obama as the first special representative and policy coordinator for Burma with rank of ambassador, and was sworn in by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on October 2, 2011. On June 29, 2012, the U.S. Senate confirmed him as the new United States Ambassador to Burma. On September 4, 2018, Mitchell succeeded Kenneth Wollack as president of the National Democratic Institute, a position he served until September 2023.
The 2011–2015 Myanmar political reforms were a series of political, economic and administrative reforms in Myanmar undertaken by the military-backed government. These reforms include the release of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest and subsequent dialogues with her, establishment of the National Human Rights Commission, general amnesties of more than 200 political prisoners, institution of new labour laws that allow labour unions and strikes, relaxation of press censorship, and regulations of currency practices. As a consequence of the reforms, ASEAN has approved Myanmar's bid for the chairmanship in 2014. United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Myanmar on 1 December 2011, to encourage further progress; it was the first visit by a Secretary of State in more than fifty years. United States President Barack Obama visited one year later, becoming the first US president to visit the country.
The 2012 Myanmar by-elections were held on 1 April 2012. The elections were held to fill 48 vacant parliamentary seats. Three of those remained vacant as polling in three Kachin constituencies was postponed. There was no plan to fill the additional five seats cancelled in the 2010 election and one seat vacated after the death of a RNDP member.
General elections were held in Myanmar on 8 November 2015, with the National League for Democracy winning a supermajority of seats in the combined national parliament. Voting occurred in all constituencies, excluding seats appointed by the military, to select Members of Assembly to seats in both the upper house and the lower house of the Assembly of the Union, and State and Region Hluttaws. Ethnic Affairs Ministers were also elected by their designated electorates on the same day, although only select ethnic minorities in particular states and regions were entitled to vote for them.
The Eleventh East Asia Summit was held in Vientiane, Laos on September 6–8, 2016. The East Asia Summit is an annual meeting of national leaders from the East Asian region and adjoining countries.
Htin Kyaw is a Burmese politician, writer and scholar who served as President of Myanmar from 30 March 2016 to 21 March 2018. He was the first elected president to hold the office with no ties to the military since the 1962 coup d'état. The second son of scholar Min Thu Wun, Htin Kyaw had held various positions in the education, planning and treasury ministries in prior governments.
Daw Khin Kyi Foundation is a major Burmese charitable foundation. It was set up by Aung San Suu Kyi in 2012, and is named for her mother, Khin Kyi. It works to improve the education, health and welfare of the people of Myanmar. Htin Kyaw was a leader of the foundation before his election as President of Myanmar.
There have been twenty-four United States presidential visits to Southeast Asia by ten U.S. presidents. Dwight D. Eisenhower became the first incumbent president to visit a Southeast Asian country when he visited the Philippines in 1960. Since then, every president, except John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter, has travelled to the region. The Philippines, a former U.S. colony (1902–1946) and a close U.S. ally, is the most visited Southeast Asian country with ten visits, followed by Indonesia with nine, and Vietnam with eight. Of the eleven sovereign states in the region, all but East Timor have been visited by a sitting American president.
The state counsellor of Myanmar was the de facto head of government of Myanmar, equivalent to a prime minister, from 2016 to 2021. The office was created in 2016 after Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won the 2015 Myanmar general election so she could lead the government despite being constitutionally ineligible for the presidency. The officeholder could “contact ministries, departments, organizations, associations and individuals” in an official capacity, while being accountable to parliament. The office was abolished by Aung San Suu Kyi's political adversary, Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Min Aung Hlaing, after he seized power from her in a 2021 military coup d'état.
General elections were held in Myanmar on 8 November 2020. Voting occurred in all constituencies, excluding seats appointed by or reserved for the military, to elect members to both the upper house — the Amyotha Hluttaw and the lower house — the Pyithu Hluttaw of the Assembly of the Union, as well as State and Regional Hluttaws (legislatures). Ethnic Affairs Ministers were also elected by their designated electorates on the same day, although only select ethnic minorities in particular states and regions were entitled to vote for them. A total of 1,171 national, state, and regional seats were contested in the election, with polling having taken place in all townships, including areas considered conflict zones and self-administered regions.
A coup d'état in Myanmar began on the morning of 1 February 2021, when democratically elected members of the country's ruling party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), were deposed by the Tatmadaw, Myanmar's military, which then vested power in a military junta. Acting President of Myanmar Myint Swe proclaimed a year-long state of emergency and declared power had been transferred to Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Senior General Min Aung Hlaing. It declared the results of the November 2020 general election invalid and stated its intent to hold a new election at the end of the state of emergency. The coup d'état occurred the day before the Parliament of Myanmar was to swear in the members elected in the 2020 election, thereby preventing this from occurring. President Win Myint and State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi were detained, along with ministers, their deputies, and members of Parliament.
Myanmar–South Korea relations are the bilateral relations between the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and the Republic of Korea. The two countries established their diplomatic relations on 16 May 1975.