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The Amanpour Hour
Interview With Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy; Interview With Former USAID Deputy Administrator James Kunder; Impact Of USAID Cuts On Thai Refugee Camp; Interview With Oscar-Nominated "The Apprentice" Actor Jeremy Strong; Marking 35 Years Since Nelson Mandela Was Freed From Prison. Aired 11a-12p ET
Aired February 15, 2025 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:00:34]
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello, everyone and welcome to THE AMANPOUR HOUR in Munich.
Here's where we're headed this week.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: America first, allies last? That's the message from Donald Trump. But will America emerge stronger or weaker in a new law of the jungle?
As leaders gather for the Munich Security Conference, I asked President Volodymyr Zelenskyy whether he thinks Trump's America backs his quest for justice against Russia's aggression.
Then --
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: There isn't a single doctor on duty for this community of more than 30,000 people.
AMANPOUR: From Africa to Asia, what happens when the United States, the world's biggest aid donor, stops sending humanitarian care?
Ivan Watson reports on how refugees from war-torn Myanmar lost their medical aid overnight.
Also ahead --
JEREMY STRONG, ACTOR: There's rules.
Roy Cohn's three rules of winning.
The first rule is the simplest. Attack. Attack. Attack.
AMANPOUR: "The Apprentice" charting Donald Trump's rise and the mentor behind it. Jeremy Strong joins me about portraying the villainous lawyer Roy Cohn.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour, reporting from a snowy Munich Security Conference where the stakes this year could not be higher.
Ukraine and its NATO allies are waiting anxiously to know exactly how President Trump plans to negotiate with Vladimir Putin to end the brutal war that he launched right after the conference in 2022.
Trump's phone call this week with Putin, before even talking to America's besieged ally, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, set off a swift backlash.
Zelenskyy rejects any U.S.-Russia deal without Kyiv's involvement. NATO allies slammed any quick fix, saying that would be, quote, "a dirty deal".
And they even warned that Trump has already negotiated a victory for Putin. Indeed, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had earlier echoed Putin's talking points during his first NATO meeting.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETE HEGSETH, U.S. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: We must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective.
The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: Hegseth did say that any settlement would have to come with firm security guarantees for Ukraine, but NATO troops would have to patrol the lines without American peacekeepers.
So does President Zelenskyy feel the rug being pulled out from under him, or as he tells his people, quote, "We believe that America's strength is sufficient to pressure Russia and Putin into peace.
I asked him here at the Munich Security Conference how he's feeling about it all.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: You, after your phone call with President Trump, said that you did not hear enough detail to make this a peace plan. Can you just elaborate what you meant by that?
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: Can I speak Ukrainian?
AMANPOUR: No.
ZELENSKYY: Ok. Don't pressure on me. Ok.
So, yes, we had really a long conversation with the president of the United States. Not short one and not last, I'm sure. And we, I mean, really, between us, I'm not sure that by phone we can manage all the plan, all security guarantees with all the details, because, you know, devil in the details. Yes.
And we know where is this devil? In what country now. Yes. That's why we have to stop him, to stop Putin. And it's very important for me.
That's why we the atmosphere of the -- of the -- our discussion is good, but really it's always good. Yes. But we need urgent, very concrete steps.
And I think we have to work on it. Our teams we began. But I think that we have to start immediately to do more deep decisions.
[11:04:51]
AMANPOUR: We'll get into that in a moment. But you did also have a separate conversation with Vice President J.D. Vance last night. You and your team and his team as well.
Did he provide any more details? And you know, we have to bring up that in 2022 here, basically, J.D. Vance said he didn't, and this is a quote, "I don't care what happens to Ukraine one way or another."
Do you feel that he's changed, that the Trump administration and the actors you're dealing with understand what's at stake?
ZELENSKYY: I'll be honest. We have to work on it. All of us, not only me. Me is not enough, really. I think we have to work because I think that, you know, we together in Europe, the war is in Europe, and America is far from -- far from the invasion.
And I think that we need to share more details because to my mind, there are a lot of different voices around new American administration. And I'm not sure that all these voices on our side.
AMANPOUR: You said Putin doesn't want peace. I mean, you just said it loud and clear here.
ZELENSKYY: Yes, that's true. That's true.
AMANPOUR: So what is the dialog? And have you convinced the Americans that a, Ukraine has to be at the table? And b, I guess the Europeans have to convince them that they have --
ZELENSKYY: On all their levels -- on all the levels, we directly yes, very directly send these messages that we have to prepare security guarantees like a main part of the stopping Putin and stop this war. And very important, essential.
And we say that it can't be without us. First of all, we have to make a plan with you, I said to the president. It was the day when he had phone calls with Putin and with me, and first with him and then with us.
AMANPOUR: And how did that sit with you? ZELENSKYY: No, I said that.
AMANPOUR: That first with Putin and then with you.
ZELENSKYY: Oh, I'm not happy. I mean, yes, but I think that that more dangerous if first meeting will be with Putin and then with Ukraine.
AMANPOUR: Did you get a commitment from President Trump that you would meet with him first? Do you have a plan to meet with the president?
ZELENSKYY: He said to me that we have -- we have to meet. And I said to him also, we have to meet. I think that I said first that we have to meet, yes. And but we understood each other because I didn't say about it once.
AMANPOUR: You said it several times.
ZELENSKYY: Yes. So that's why I think we understood each other. And it's very important, yes. Because if we can repeat the words that each day we have losses and if president of the United States or other leaders repeat this words, Ukraine has losses. We have to stop the war.
I mean that it means that we have urgently to meet if we really want to stop, to meet with the concrete dates and days and plans.
AMANPOUR: You talked about security guarantees. What details do you think about what would be a security guarantee apart from joining NATO right now? What would be a security guarantee in any ceasefire, or to freeze or monitor any line of contact, which is some 1,300 kilometers long? Because already Defense Secretary Hegseth said there'd be no U.S. troops. We don't know what -- what it looks like. What do you think it looks like?
ZELENSKYY: More strong sanctions. Not if they will invade again. Just more strong sanctions at the very beginning. Then -- then, like you said, really difficult to hold the border. Long border, because yes, for Ukraine and Ukrainian soldiers. That's why we need big army. I shared it yesterday.
Yes, we need army more than now. If we are not in NATO, then as I said, NATO has to be in Ukraine. It means only one, that we will need the army comparable with soldiers of Russia. It's 1.3 or 1.5 million soldiers.
So we need money for this. The package of money, real money. And its big deficit even today, for us, its 40 billion per year. So this money and then weapon and the package of missiles, what was written in the victory plan, the package which we will not use, we will not use, but it has to stand on our territory. And if Putin will begin new invasion, we will use it.
So I think these issues are very important. This is priority.
[11:09:53]
AMANPOUR: And foreign troops? European troops?
ZELENSKYY: Yes. We're open for this initiative. We understand -- I mean, mostly we understand the details, but we need to discuss these details with leaders.
I don't want to be, now, you know, very loud about it. So -- but we understand that we need it. It will help us.
Did you tell it was reported President Trump that Putin is only doing this and agreeing to talks because he's afraid of Trump? Did you tell him that?
ZELENSKYY: Yes. I told Trump that Putin afraid of him. Yes. And he heard (ph) me. And now Putin knows.
AMANPOUR: I shouldn't be laughing. But you do make me smile so --
(CROSSTALKING)
ZELENSKYY: We want peace.
AMANPOUR: Mr. President, thank you very much.
ZELENSKYY: We have to live and we have to smile when we have time.
AMANPOUR: That's so true. That is true.
ZELENSKYY: Of course. Thank you.
Thank you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Zelenskyy, NATO allies and America's adversaries will be listening carefully for what the new administration has to say. Trump has sent Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President J.D. Vance here to Munich.
Coming up later on the show. The worldwide fallout after Trump and Musk gut USAID.
[11:11:32]
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AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the rest of our show from our London studio.
Schools, vaccination programs, life-saving medications, clean water, food for the starving -- just some of the vital USAID activities that are now on the chopping block.
The Trump administration says that it wants to end federal bloat and reform government agencies. And yet, it appears to be destroying them, including USAID.
For decades, it's been the vital arm of American soft power, not just saving lives, but winning influence around the world, which defenders say has made America stronger and safer.
On his first tour of Latin America as secretary of State, Marco Rubio said this about the suspended programs.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARCO RUBIO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We're not trying to be disruptive to people's personal lives. We're not -- this is -- we're not trying to -- we're not being punitive here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: He also said he didn't want anyone to die. But the U.N. says more than 6 million will die from HIV and AIDS over the next four years if Trump's global funding cuts become permanent.
I spoke with James Kunder. He's the former deputy administrator of USAID under George W. Bush. I asked him about all of this fallout.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: James Kunder, welcome to the program.
First, tell me why you think this is a tragedy.
JAMES KUNDER, FORMER USAID DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR: At two levels, Christiane, I think there are two issues being battled in Washington right now.
The first question is, does the United States of America want to have a robust foreign aid program around the world?
And the second issue is, if we want to change it, what's the right way to change it?
I'm actually most -- as an American citizen, I'm most concerned about the second part of that, because unlike the kind of orderly transitions we've had in previous presidential administrations, Democratic or Republican, what we have now is this insane Elon Musk- led Mafia takeover where patriotic American citizens who work for USAID in some of the most dangerous places in the world are being stripped of their job and insulted by the president of the United States while we're shooting ourselves in the foot from a geostrategic point of view.
AMANPOUR: And that for you is the tragedy?
KUNDER: To me it's a real tragedy. Because, look, I've watched these hearings where various Republican congressmen -- and by the way, I'm a Republican political appointee myself. I'm a Republican voter and I understand national security is the primary reason why we have the U.S. Agency for International Development.
I served in the United States Marine Corps. So, I'm all in favor of supporting America's strategic objectives around the world. And -- but that's what USAID does. It works with our soldiers and diplomats around the world to make sure that people understand that America cares about them.
And if they have a chance to feed their children, get a decent job, they're less likely to join the extremist organizations that want to attack the United States.
When John Kennedy started USAID, the battle was against global communism. Today, the battle is against extremist ideas around the world and a rising China.
[11:19:50]
KUNDER: And I guarantee you that they are celebrating President Trump and Elon Musk's moves in Beijing right now.
AMANPOUR: So, I want to ask you a devil's advocate question, obviously, and that is, what would you say, if you were coming in now, needs to be reformed at USAID? Where would you say the bloat or the agenda is? Because this seems to be massively ideological from what they're saying.
KUNDER: The critics of USAID are trying to fight the culture war issues of the United States, the domestic issues through the U.S. foreign aid program.
Well, if there were some crazy programs like that -- and frankly, that sounds crazy to me -- if there are such programs like that, they were directed by the previous administration. So, it's incumbent upon the incoming administration to change those programs and set some new direction.
I personally believe that the meta issue of aligning U.S. foreign aid programs more closely with U.S. foreign policy objectives is a worthy objective. There's a way to do this right to make the program work. But what I fear will happen is that these anecdotal stories will carry the day.
You know, when John Kennedy started USAID, Christiane, the global literacy rate, the number of people who could read worldwide was 42 percent, less than half the adults in the world could read.
Today, that number is 87 percent. A literate world population in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, South America. That's in America's interest, because those people are likely to understand then how democracy works.
And with USAID's leadership, we eliminated smallpox from the face of the Earth. The long-term strategic changes that our foreign aid agency has contributed to have been dramatic.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: And still to come. The real-world impact of these cuts. We have a report from a refugee camp on the Thai-Myanmar border. [11:22:09]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: Welcome back. We take a closer look now at the real people caught up in Trump's overhaul of USAID. As we've discussed the sweeping changes and suspensions are having devastating repercussions everywhere from Africa, Latin America to Southeast Asia.
In Uganda, the health ministry has announced the closure of all HIV clinics, providing treatments and preventative measures to a million and a half people.
In Colombia, Brazil and Guatemala, millions of vulnerable Venezuelan immigrants and refugees are now left high and dry. Experts are warning the cuts and the chaos they've created will cost lives.
On the Thai-Myanmar border, Ivan Watson takes us inside a refugee camp where people are unable to access critical medical care anymore.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is what happens when the world's biggest aid donor suddenly stops sending money. Families ordered to evacuate their sick loved ones from this hospital in the mountains of western Thailand. Days later, the hospital deserted, its front gate locked shut.
This is a refugee camp for tens of thousands of people who fled the civil war across the nearby border in neighboring Myanmar. The hospital here largely depended on U.S. government funding which suddenly stopped. And now, nearly two weeks later, there isn't a single doctor on duty for this community of more than 30,000 people.
It's a 30-minute drive from this sprawling refugee camp to the nearest Thai hospital. The director here shocked by the sudden closure of the camp hospital.
Has this been stressful, these last two weeks for you?
DR. TAWATCHI YINGTAWEESAK, DIRECTOR OF THA SONG YANG HOSPITAL: Yes. Yes, I think so. Yes. So dangerous.
WATSON: His facility has to suddenly absorb some of the refugee camp's patients, and that includes 32-year-old Mary.
WATSON: Is this your first baby?
MARY, REFUGEE: Yes, first baby.
WATSON: You're going to be a mama soon. You're going to be a mother.
MARY: Yes. Yes, sir.
WATSON: Suffering high blood pressure, she was rushed to this maternity ward this morning and is now in labor, far from her family and home at the camp.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): I just want to ask the U.S. government why they have to stop helping the refugees.
WATSON: On January 20th, President Donald Trump ordered an immediate 90-day pause in all U.S. foreign aid. He declared the U.S. aid industry is not aligned with American interest and claims it serves to destabilize world peace.
For years, Myanmar has been ripped apart by a brutal civil war, a military dictatorship that seized power in a coup in 2021 battling numerous insurgent groups. The conflicts forced more than 3 million people to flee their homes.
[11:29:52]
WATSON: And now, aid organizations tell CNN, they only have a month and a half of funding left to feed refugees along the Thai border with Myanmar, leaving smaller aid groups scrambling to fill the gap.
You're going into Myanmar?
KANCHANA THORNTON, DIRECTOR, BURMA CHILDREN MEDICAL FUND: This is -- we'll go across the border, yes.
WATSON: Kanchana Thornton regularly takes food, infant formula and medicine across the border river to desperate people in the conflict zone. The U.S. funding cut made matters worse.
WATSON: Why is it affecting you? You don't get money from Washington.
THORNTON: Well, patients come to us and asking us for help.
WATSON: Because they're not getting it from the original?
THORNTON: They are not -- yes, because they're not getting support that they should from the NGO that got the funding cut.
WATSON: Everywhere we go in this poverty-stricken border region, we hear about basic services disrupted and aid workers being laid off.
This clinic treats nearly 500 patients a day. It receives nearly 20 percent of its funding from the U.S. government. Washington has been sending money here for at least 20 years. But now, all of that has stopped.
WATSON: Uncertainty, now felt by Rebecca and her nine-year-old daughter Rosella.
Yes. Can you show me your favorite pictures?
The residents of the refugee camp who had to move out of the hospital when it shut down last month, even though Rosella was born with a bone condition, she needs oxygen around the clock.
"My daughter needs the hospital to be open," Rebecca says, "and so do I because I'm pregnant."
The cut in U.S. funding means this pregnant mother no longer has access to a doctor and she doesn't know how much longer her daughter's oxygen will last.
Ivan Watson, CNN -- on the Thailand-Myanmar border.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Coming up, Jeremy Strong, from "Succession" to "The Apprentice", and his role as Trump's lawyer and early mentor, Roy Cohn. I talk to him about his Oscar-nominated performance when we come back.
[11:31:58]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: Welcome back.
Now, Donald Trump's controversial policy moves are having reverberations around the world. But how did he become the politician he is today with his polarizing brand of rhetoric? "The Apprentice" seeks to answer that question, charting Trump's rise in 1970s New York as a young real estate developer under the tutelage of the notorious lawyer and fixer Roy Cohn.
After debuting at the Cannes Film Festival last year, Trump lawyers sent the filmmakers a cease-and-desist letter trying to block the release. And Trump attacked the film, saying it was politically disgusting, a hatchet job.
But despite the backlash and the struggle for financing and distribution, it has received critical acclaim, with stars Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong both receiving Oscar nominations for their performances.
Jeremy Strong joined me in the studio in London to discuss making this biopic.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Welcome to the program.
JEREMY STRONG, OSCAR-NOMINATED ACTOR, "THE APPRENTICE": Thank you. I'm honored to be here. Thank you.
(CROSSTALK)
AMANPOUR: Well, it's great to have you. I mean, it's such a timely film, obviously. I mean, it was done last year. I guess you didn't know -- nobody knew who was going to win the presidential elections when it came out.
When you see it now, since the election, what do you think of it? STRONG: I think it's taken on a whole other sort of harrowing resonance. And it's a film that explores the sort of embryonic stages of Donald Trump's worldview, I would say, and the influence, the malign influence of Roy Cohn, who sort of inculcated in him an ideology in a playbook that is encoded in everything that he does now.
And, you know, film can sort of send a transponder and bounce it off the past to speak more vividly to the present, which I think this film does.
But seeing it now, to me, it's about a very living danger. So, I find it troubling to see the film now.
AMANPOUR: And I'm going to play a clip. We have a few that you guys have given us, and it's -- this first one is the kind of genesis of the Trump-Roy Cohn relationship.
So, he's defending Trump against charges of committing racist practices in his apartment buildings when he was a young real-estater by blocking black tenants.
Now, that's something the real Donald Trump has steadfastly denied, but he settled with the prosecutors at the time. Here's the clip of that scene.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STRONG: Now, the government has failed to spell out one single fact concerning alleged discriminatory practices against blacks by the Trumps. I motion to have this case dismissed on summary judgment.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Overruled.
Counselor, continue.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you, your honor. Agent Green, what led you to believe that you were denied a lease at Trump Properties based on your race?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, not only did the newspaper advertise --
STRONG: That's Walter, DOJ. He runs the show.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw three Caucasian couples approved before.
STRONG: Objection. Speculation.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Cohn --
STRONG: How can you say for sure they were Caucasian?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Cohn. Please allow Agent Green to answer the question.
[11:39:47]
STRONG: I've seen Puerto Ricans whiter than my tush after a long winter.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
STRONG: I would say that Cohn stood for a kind of aggressiveness. He stood for a kind of brute force, dissimulation, and misinformation.
In a lot of ways, I see him as one of the progenitors of fake news. His relationship to the truth was very malleable, and he had a flagrant disregard for the truth.
AMANPOUR: There's another clip that we have, essentially what Cohn taught Donald Trump --
STRONG: Great.
AMANPOUR: -- talking about how he shaped him become the ascendant figure that he is today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STRONG: You want to know how to win? I'm going to let you in on a little secret. There's rules. Roy Cohn's three rules of winning.
The first rule is the simplest. Attack, attack, attack.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Civil Rights -- Cats (ph).
STRONG: I hope the pot -- your stomachs (ph) got real money, because after I get you fired, you're sure going to need it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Excuse me?
STRONG: Unless you drop your baseless litigation, I am countersuing the Justice Department for $100 million. You are going to ruin the day that you ever filed this --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who is this?
STRONG: It's Roy Cohn, calling on behalf of my client, Donald J. Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: I mean, it's brutal, but he was very successful.
STRONG: He was effective, and he was, I would argue, a great lawyer.
AMANPOUR: What are the three lessons? That one was attack, attack, attack.
STRONG: The three lessons, which are sort of distilled in the film, are always attack, deny everything, and never admit defeat.
And when you really internalize that and take that in as -- you know, as I did, and I think when you see the film, you can't help but understand it, it becomes like a dog whistle that you hear sort of underneath everything that's happening now.
I really think it -- I think you can't overstate the influence of Cohn.
AMANPOUR: How did you, I don't know, get over this fact that after the -- you know, the debut in Cannes, then there was the cease-and-desist from Trump, it was postponed on air in the United States.
STRONG: Yes.
AMANPOUR: It didn't get a wide distribution. Financing was difficult.
STRONG: Yes. I mean, it's been a sort of Sisyphean battle the whole time. I mean, there was a sort of -- there were sort of tacit threats of repercussion to anyone who touched the film or was involved with the film.
I think all of us making it were aware that we were sort of touching the third rail.
So, the film goes there at a time where I think that's more necessary than ever. Attempts to tell the truth about something and speaking truth to power in this moment is critical. And so, I think that created a lot of fear in the motion picture business.
So, the movie has had a sort of arduous thorny road to this moment.
AMANPOUR: And yet, it has had this recognition. How do you compute?
STRONG: Well, I think it's had a recognition from the creative community.
So, I think that the film attempts to show the age and body of this time, its formation and the pressures that have led us to where we are now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: And the BAFTA Awards will be handed out Sunday night here in London.
Still to come. 35 years after Nelson Mandela walked free from prison, his work to correct the historical injustices of apartheid continues to this day.
And what has Donald Trump and Elon Musk got to do with it? That is after a break.
[11:43:35]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: Welcome back.
Like a bolt of lightning South Africa was also hit this week by the full force of the Trump-Musk agenda. Not only did the president abruptly cut off vital American humanitarian assistance, leaving thousands of people in life and health-threatening limbo. He also just plain cut U.S. aid to the government and said the white Afrikaner minority could migrate to the United States as refugees.
Now, if that sounds like upside down racial logic for a nation whose 90 percent black majority was brutally suppressed by the white minority under decades of apartheid rule, South Africa says it is.
What's more, South Africa insists that it's based on false or wildly exaggerated stories of how the government is trying to rectify the many sins of apartheid.
When President F.W. De Klerk released Nelson Mandela from prison 35 years ago this month, they both acknowledged the crucial need to work together to peacefully rebalance historical injustices.
Here's my report from the archives when Mandela died just over 11 years ago.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Everything about Nelson Mandela is the stuff of legend. He had captured the world's imagination, though he was invisible to the world for more than 27 years behind bars.
And he held on to our imaginations and his death will not break that special hold.
Here's former South African President F.W. de Klerk, who started talking to Mandela about ending apartheid before even releasing him from prison.
Do you remember the first time you met him?
[11:49:54]
F.W. DE KLERK, FORMER SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: I remember it very well. He was brought under cover of darkness to my office from the Victor Verster Prison.
We did not discuss that evening anything of fundamental importance. We were just feeling each other out and realized that this is a very special man. He had an aura around him. He still has an aura around him. He's truly a very dignified and a very admirable person.
NELSON MANDELA, FORMER SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: I have a lot of respect for Mr. de Klerk, but even if I did not respect him, history has thrown us together in one country. I cannot ignore him. He would ignore me at his risk.
AMANPOUR: But in the fullness of time, perhaps memories have dimmed of the superhuman effort it took to keep negotiations going between the two sides, to finally dismantle apartheid, eventually setting the stage for those dramatic elections of April 1994.
MANDELA: I, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, do hereby swear to be faithful to the Republic of South Africa.
AMANPOUR: It was in prison that Mandela mapped out how to play the enemy and win. As he explained later, he told his ANC colleagues in jail that they had to learn Afrikaans, the white man's language, in order to learn how they thought.
MANDELA: By Accepting the integrity of people in the enemy camp and sitting down to discuss matters with them, especially when you have got a strong case, it is the best way to address problems.
There are difficulties, of course, those we expected, but when you take into account that the way South African society was split from top to bottom by tensions, conflict and bloodshed, what has happened in South Africa today is a miracle.
AMANPOUR: From prison it once took Mandela two years to get a message out to his ANC Party, which then published its clarion call. "Unite, mobilize. Fight on. We shall crush apartheid." And with those undying words, Nelson Mandela breathed life into a rainbow nation.
But as he said many years later, he was no superhero. He was the product of an Africa that desperately sought freedom.
MANDELA: I would like to be remembered not as anybody unique or special, but as part of a great team in this country that has struggled for many years, for decades and even centuries to bring about this day.
AMANPOUR: And in his own words, "As I near the end of my days, my determination to pursue these objectives will be even stronger. This I pronounce from the fullness of my convictions.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: And the current president, Cyril Ramaphosa, says that South Africa will not be bullied by the United States.
And honestly, these two leaders -- the white F.W. de Klerk, the black Nelson Mandela -- really show what can happen when two sides come together to end decades and decades of injustice.
When we come back, life under dictatorship. A new Brazilian drama takes us back to 1970s Brazil. I speak to Oscar-nominated actress Fernanda Torres and director Walter Salles after the break.
[11:53:35]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: And finally, "I'm Still Here". That's the Oscar-nominated political drama stunning audiences at home and abroad. Set in 1970s Brazil in the grip of a brutal U.S.-backed military dictatorship, Fernanda Torres gives a moving portrayal of a woman fighting for justice after her husband was arrested and assassinated.
It's based on the true story of political dissident Rubens Paiva. Now, as far right nationalism sweeps the world, it serves as a cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy.
I spoke to Torres alongside director Walter Salles, about the resilience and the power of her character under the most difficult of circumstances.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FERNANDA TORRES, OSCAR-NOMINATED ACTRESS, "I'M STILL HERE": Eunice, she has five children, so she cannot sit and cry. She cannot -- She is not allowed to do it.
It's like -- it's a Greek figure. It's a Greek mother. She faces tragedy and the only way for her to move on and to raise those children and to save their innocence, in a way, is to just say, smile and move on.
And I never worked with it Because normally, as an actor, you want to show emotions. And in the case of Eunice, you have to restrain them.
And the power of it is that the audience sits in the board of the chair like, please do something. So there is something that the audience feels with you.
[11:59:49]
TORRESS: You are not feeling and showing them. They are feeling for you. And I think this is very close to Greek tragedy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: And you can watch that full conversation on CNN.com/shows/Amanpour.
And that is all we have time for this week. Don't forget you can find all our shows online as podcasts at CNN.com/audio and on all other major platforms.
I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. Thank you for watching and see you again next week.
