Friday 10 July 2009 - 22.30 BST - BBC TWO Presented by Gavin Esler From Gavin Esler: Hello, With more deaths of British soldiers reported in Afghanistan we will be assessing whether the UK and US are pursuing the correct strategy. Is there any alternative? And has it become the classic guerrilla war in which all the Taliban has to do to win is not to lose ... and sap the morale of the outsiders who have come to pacify them? Peter Marshall investigates the case of Nico Bento who was convicted of murder on the basis of CCTV evidence which is now being disputed by forensic experts. And The News of the World - what was it like working at Wapping? Richard Watson will be reporting. And then on Newsnight Review at 11pm: Martha is the only straight in the village on Review tonight as the playwright Mark Ravenhill, columnist Johann Hari, author Stella Duffy and fashion writer and man-about-town Henry Conway join her for a very gay Friday night Review. As the flamboyant fashion TV host Bruno unleashes his outfits on middle America, the panel will look at whether Sacha Baron Cohen's new film critiques or panders to homophobia. And how did he get Paula Abdul to talk about human rights while using a Mexican gardener's back as a chair? Mark Ravenhill makes the case that recent British TV comedy has dumped political correctness in favour of jokes about gays. Is he right? Or is the ability to laugh at a community a sign of its strength? The National Portrait Gallery's new exhibition offers up a range of faces under the headline Gay Icons from Graham Taylor and Nelson Mandela to Princess Diana and The Village People. Is there such a thing as a gay icon in this day and age? And we look back at the documentary Before Stonewall which shows the secret life of homosexuals in 20th Century America. Forty years on from the riots at The Stonewall Inn, which started the gay rights movement, is gay culture now mainstream? Join us at 11pm for all that. Follow Newsnight's Twitter updates by clicking here |