leopoldo lopez, in madrid, welcome to hardtalk. thank you very much. welcome to hardtalk. thank you for the opportunity. welcome to hardtalk. it s great to have you on the show. back in 2019, your big idea as a key leader of the venezuelan opposition was to undermine socialist president nicolas maduro by creating an alternative president and an alternative government. would you now acknowledge that big idea has failed? well, certainly we were not able to remove the dictatorship. and if we are measured by that standard, certainly we didn t get to the results we expected. but it s also true for any other alternative that we ve tried for over 20 years. we ve tried voting. we won the national assembly with two thirds of the vote, and the dictatorship also dismantled the possibility of the national assembly to exercise its constitutional powers. we ve tried by protesting. we ve protested with hundreds of thousands of people throughout the years, and we ve also failed to remove the
hello and welcome to the programme. we start in new zealand where, in the last couple of hours, chris hipkins has been sworn in as the country s new prime minister, after the shock resignation of jacinda ardern last week, who said she didn t have enough in the tank to continue in the job. mr hipkins was sworn in at government house in wellington, alongside carmel sepuloni, who becomes the country s first pasifika deputy prime minister. mr hipkins labour party will face a general election in october. 0ur correspondent, phil mercer, has more on this. this will be a big year for chris hipkins and his reshaped government. we are expecting a cabinet reshuffle in the next week or so and also a policy reset. the new prime minister says that inflation will be his key concern in the months leading up to that election on october leading up to that election on 0ctober1li, laterthis leading up to that election on 0ctober1li, later this year. cost of living pressures have been enormous i
now on bbc news it s hardtalk with stephen sackur. welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. venezuela s authoritarian leader, nicolas maduro, has, for the moment, outmanoeuvred those forces inside and outside the country intent on his removal. last month, the opposition gave up on their own alternative president and indicated a willingness to negotiate with maduro. in the us, in latin america and in europe, they seem ready to engage with the caracas regime, not least because oil supplies are at a premium. my guest is leopoldo lopez, long time venezuelan opposition leader and former political prisoner, now in exile in spain. is it time for him to acknowledge failure? leopoldo lopez in madrid, welcome to hardtalk. thank you very much. thank you for the opportunity. it s great to have you on the show. back in 2019, your big idea as a key leader of the venezuelan opposition was to undermine socialist president nicolas maduro by creating an alternative president and an alternative
we begin with microsoft. the tech giant has just revealed its financial health and investors are satisfied for now as it showed some strength in the face of a weak global economy. its cloud business hit wall street targets for the end of 2022 and revenues rose 2% to just under $53 billion. but what is the outlook? microsoft last week announced it would be slashing 10,000 jobs worldwide in a bid to cut costs. it s also investing in a company behind chat gpt the chatbot that is predicted by some experts to be the future of search. let s discuss this withjeremy goldman director of briefings at insider intelligence. good at insider intelligence. morning to you. looking at what good morning to you. looking at what microsoft had to say, after its resolve without, shares went up 4% and fell back i% shares went up 4% and fell back 1% higher by the end of the day, your thoughts on how it s doing? day, your thoughts on how it s doinu ? , ., day, your thoughts on how it s doin.?