Bangladesh and East Germany

Owen Bennett Jones presents personal insights, memories and analysis from BBC correspondents Mark Tully and Nick Thorpe.

In today's edition, our correspondents go back in time, to eras when the map of the world looked very different.

As Bangladesh prepares to celebrate 40 years of its independence, Mark Tully remembers reporting on the armed struggle at the birth of the nation - during its breakaway from Pakistan.

Meanwhile, Nick Thorpe reflects on a nation which has ceased to exist - the GDR, or East Germany - and the dilemmas which its demands for socialist loyalty posed for writer Christa Wolf.