'Defining Moments: Stories that touched our lives'
LONDON, England (CNN) -- CNN, the pioneer of 24-hour news, marks its 25th anniversary on June 1 with a special program offering a front row seat to history.
"Defining Moments: Stories that Touched Our Lives" is an intimate recounting of the biggest television news events from the past 25 years, as told by the newsmakers and journalists who lived through and reported them, touching the lives of millions in the process.
The past two-and-a-half decades have brought sweeping change around the world, marking a generation of extraordinary change at an astonishing pace.
It has also been a period of unthinkable upheaval as political systems have crumbled and remarkable courage shown in the face of oppression.
CNN veteran journalist Jim Clancy recalls the events that led to one of the most iconic events of the last 25 years -- the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall -- and Richard Roth explains how events in Berlin triggered a wave of revolutions that swept across Eastern Europe.
Haunting images and horrifying reports from the conflict raging across the Balkans in the 1990s helped bring to public attention crimes against humanity and the impact on millions of civilian refugees.
CNN's Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour won prestigious awards for her reporting from the region and her reflections make up another of these "Defining Moments: Stories that Touched Our Lives."
This 25th anniversary special also affords the opportunity to look at the Middle East as Wolf Blitzer recalls the new hope of the hugely symbolic handshake at the White House in 1995 between Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin, before Walt Rodgers then looks back at the international horror just weeks later at the news of Rabin's assassination. (Special report: Land of conflict)
Perhaps the most recognizable CNN footage was the network's exclusive coverage of the first Gulf War and attacks on Baghdad in 1991 as tracer fire lit up the sky.
CNN's team, based at the Al Rashid hotel, stayed on in the city and were the only network to broadcast as the bombs began to fall, producing remarkable television that was shown all over the world.
CNN has taken viewers to events that have shocked, inspired and impacted millions.
Broadcasting an unprecedented window to the world for the last 25 years, from the fall of the Berlin Wall to the release of Nelson Mandela, the death of Princess Diana to the dawn of the Millennium, the attacks on September 11 to the installation of a new pope, at the moments that mattered most, CNN was there.
"Defining Moments: Stories that Touched Our Lives" airs:
Wednesday June 1 at 1500, 2100 and 0200 CETSaturday June 4 at 1300, 2300 CETSunday June 5 at 1400 and 1900 CET
