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Max Pearson presents a collection of this week\\u2019s Witness History stories from the BBC World Service. \\n \\nJournalist Claude Angeli discovered French President Val\\xe9ry Giscard d'Estaing received diamonds from a depraved African emperor, which contributed to him losing the presidential election in 1981. \\n \\nHow Bosnia\\u2019s small Jewish community helped people from all sides of the conflict, during the siege of Sarajevo in the early 1990s. \\n \\nThe story of the gang of thieves, who held up a British Royal Mail train on its journey from Glasgow to London in August 1963. \\n \\nPlus Jean-Michel Basquiat, a young black graffiti artist in the 1980s took the New York art world by storm. His paintings were selling for huge sums of money, but he died before the end of the decade. \\n \\nAnd the rise and fall of self-made businesswoman Brownie Wise, who inspired an army of US housewives to sell Tupperware at parties. \\n \\n \\nContributors: \\n \\nJournalist Claude Angeli \\nJournalist Pauline Bock \\nFormer vice president of the Jewish community Jakob Finci \\nAuthor Bob Kealing \\nJournalist Reginald Abbiss \\nPatti Astor, friend of Jean-Michel Basquiat

(Photo: French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing and Jean-B\\xe9del Bokassa in Bangui, March 1975. Credit: Getty Images)