Defining moments: John Tusa

A BBC series is asking some of the world's most influential people about the defining moments in their life.

John Tusa is now in charge of the Barbican

John Tusa is a former managing director of the BBC World Service, and was in charge during the transition in international affairs from the Cold War to the New World Order. He is now managing director of the Barbican Arts Centre in London, home to the London Symphony Orchestra.

I remember sitting back in my office when I was Managing Director of the World Service, and then Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev had just been released from having been arrested and kidnapped and taken down to the Crimea. This was in August 1991.

And he came back, and he was giving an interview and he was asked how he knew what was going on.

And he said - and in a way I knew he was going to say it but when he did I think I let out a shriek of delight - he said he had kept in touch by listening to the BBC Russian Service.

Now that of course was a great moment for the BBC.

But even more importantly was that it was clear that from that moment the Soviet Union would change and that we were through the Cold War.

We were through dictatorship, we were through totalitarianism.

So Gorbachev symbolised, and in that moment represented, that absolutely historic transition which the people of my generation had lived with for almost all our adult lives

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Defining Moments will run until 23 July on BBC World Service's World Today programme. You can also read people's recollections on BBC News Online.