Sue Lloyd-Roberts Remembered

Sue Lloyd-Roberts died in October. She was an utterly extraordinary

pioneering journalist. Pretending to be lost travellers

with the camera concealed in a bag, I get the closest yet to China's

forced labourers. She was one of the very first TV reporters to shoot her

own footage. She was renowned for challenging authority. I'm afraid I

don't remain an impartial observer. Why not?

And giving voice to those who needed to be heard.

I'm told to run as shots are heard and soldiers are seeing at the end

of the street. We should hide because when the security forces

attack, the first thing they are looking for is the camera. As one

fellow journalists said, she exposed human rights abuses in so many

countries it always surprised me the world's Thai red is didn't gain up

to stop her. -- tyrants. In this special tribute we look back at some

of the landmark reports to reflect on what made her such a unique

journalist. One of the most remarkable Expose is came early in

her career at the BBC. Under this guy, left by a kidney transplant

operation in China, there is almost certainly the kidney of an executed

prisoner. Posing as an amateur or apologist, Sue Lloyd-Roberts sneak

into China to gather evidence of a secret trade in human organs. It's

believed hundreds of foreigners are coming to China every year for their

kidney transplants to hospitals like this in Canton, that services the

Hong Kong market. The number is increasing all the time. What

worries human rights organisations is the possible connection between

this growing business the number of death sentences handed sentences

handed out in China today. She was adept at getting into countries that

were off-limits. -- death sentences handed out. TRANSLATION: My kidney

was very fresh. The doctor said the prisoner was young, under 25 and

healthy. Although the patients were keen enough to talk, the use of

executed prisoners as organ donors is not usually talked about in China

and certainly not to foreigners. Myself and my Chinese colleague was

asked to leave. It was regarded as a routine manner when we enquired at

the hospital about arranging for an operation for a fictitious patient.

We discuss money, a meeting we filmed secretly. No, we don't take

credit cards, she said. With perfect -- for cash, preferably dollars.

Things are done differently here, she said. We can do things that are

impossible in your country. TRANSLATION: I am not saying whether

it is prisoners or not. The state policy is that you can't meet the

donors. I suggest you stay out of this and don't get involved. But she

did. After this broadcast went out, she was tried by the Chinese

authorities in absentia and sentenced to seven years in prison.

It didn't stop her returning. Sue's career began in 1974 at ITN.

In the 1980s she pioneered the use of the hand-held video camera. These

pictures, taken by hidden camera, show people queueing for hours for

the most basic food. It meant she could travel alone and undetected to

countries that weren't always keen on foreign reporters. The man who

has ruled Romania for over two decades is the Communist leader most

likened to Stalin today. He now wants to remain Rowe -- destroy

Romania's village life in a programme to eradicate the

differences between the rural and urban man. TRANSLATION: I house was

knocked to the ground. They made us live in new blocks. Everything is

wretched and miserable. What can be done? The villagers say it is a

death sentence. No longer able to grow their own vegetables and sell

their chickens in private markets, they say they will starve in private

Russians. This gypsy woman offered her her sister's child. Sue returned

to Romania in 2000. This time to report on the sale of babies. Most

of them have been abandoned by their parents. The country is poor today

than it was even under the previous regime. -- poorer today. At first

everyone thought we were here to buy a baby. When we told them we were

investigating illegal adoptions, we were immediately referred to a house

which was little more than a brewing on the edge of the village and to a

grief stricken father. TRANSLATION: I took the children to the orphanage

so that they wouldn't die. We would have certainly died if they had

stayed here in the village. They never came back. Using a secret

camera with a translator we paid a call, telling the director that I

was a wealthy woman who wanted to choose a baby. She showed me around

the orphanage in between taking calls on her mobile phone. Such

access is forbidden in Romania. She never asked to see my papers. Maybe

she assumed I had permission from the UK. There were 60 also baby is

here. They all looked clean and fed, not all shared the rocking motion of

babies suffering from neglect. She offered me three boys to choose

from. I asked whether their mothers had given their permission. We have

all the old files with Agassiz, signatures and everything. We will

forge the signature. He wanted will check? With by their parents some

cardboard rolls to cover the roofs of their houses, bread, cornflour

and so on. A never complained. Are you saying I simply await the baby?

Sue reported many times from Burma during the period of the military.

In 1997 GMT at the country using her Irish passport in order to evade the

authorities. -- she entered the country. Journalists are not allowed

into Burma today unless they sign a declaration promising not to contact

Aung San Suu Kyi, as that was one of the main purposes of my trip I

travelled there illegally as a tourist. I had been told that a

train ride is as good a way as any to look out for the images which

make up the ongoing human tragedy. The farms where the harvest is

seized by soldiers without compensation. The lines of shanty

towns where thousands have been forcibly relocated, again without

compensation, to make way for new industrial estates and luxury

hotels, which, because of the regional economic slump, stand

empty. The length one must go to to meet with Burma's only

democratically elected leader are observed. I was advised to dress

like the locals and get to a safe house by dawn before the military

take up their positions outside any house that she might visit in the

area. I was -- later she arrived and the military took up their positions

outside. Aren't people now afraid to join your call for democracy? Nobody

wants to live in fear and insecurity forever, but I'm afraid nothing

comes free. I've always been honest to the people of Burma about that.

Nothing comes free and if you want something that is valuable than you

have two make payment accordingly. These days it is difficult for Aung

San Suu Kyi to get any message to the outside world. After leaving the

house, I was followed, arrested, strip-searched and deported from

Burma. Fortunately we had devised an ultimate plan to get the tape of the

interview out of the country. -- alternative plan.

In 2011, Sue was granted where access to the secretive world of

North Korea, reducing a report which won an Emmy award. -- producing.

Everywhere she travelled, the mind is followed trying to control the

message. -- minders followed. At school, children are taught to sing

a song that tells them that they have nothing to envy in the outside

world and that they are the happiest people on earth.

A kindergarten with its own indoor fairground. For more than a week in

North Korea they invited us to indulge in a fantasy.

I think what surprised me most here was that they could believe that we

would believe that what they showed us was for real.

I asked to visit a farm to look at how the country feeds itself. And,

at breakneck speed, we drove past towns and villages in various stages

of dilapidation. I didn't see a single tractor in the owl it took to

get here to the cooperative farm, which our minders had chosen. -- the

owl. We saw other villagers that didn't look so tidy, neat and

orderly and indeed wealthy. Can we visit them?

Is that possible? No? Your medals? You wear them everyday? It was

explained that the medals and the feast were because the head of the

household was 60 today and retiring. Clearly some confusion here.

I am 59, I still work on the farm and I normally eat noodles for

lunch, he announced, before returning to the script.

When a tractor eventually drove into sight, the chief man here appear to

be trying to hide something from the camera. He told the tractor bearing

the European Union logo to driveaway. After all, the country

claims to be self-sufficient in everything, even food. Even your

tractor I saw was donated by the European Union, so the country is

not surviving without aid. As was to happen time and time again, my

minder refused to translate. Shall I say that again? Do you not

understand the question? I'm sure he knows all of these. It's not a

surprise to him. In the end they negotiated an acceptable response.

TRANSLATION: We had problems for a short time, but with our own

industry and output we can produce enough crops on our own without any

support from outside. Giving voice to people who don't get

heard. But the locals tell you a very different story. They say the

police colluded in a system. Challenging authority. Those were

the hallmarks of her journalism. Whether it UK, covering poverty, or

exposing the ill treatment of migrant workers in Qatar ahead of

the 2022 World Cup. Like children all over Britain, the children of

this family watch the TV adverts and mentally compiled their Christmas

Day present list. Next door in the kitchen, their parents who get ?140

a week wonder how they will manage. Agencies working with Britain's four

report an alarming increase in the number of people who are not having

access to regular credit, rely on personal finance companies and loan

sharks charging up to 40% interest rate and to live in dread of the

knock on the door. In all, six creditors come to the door today,

including the man from Taylor's finance. He is charging over 30%

interest on a cash loan of ?150. How busy are you are the Christmas? Very

busy. How many houses? About 30. Do you take advantage of people who

need to buy presents at Christmas? No. I don't take advantage in that

way, no. By the time the final to collect, she has run out of money.

Just give us a bell. All rights? An hour before dawn in the -- Joe Hart.

The nightshift leave while the dayshift arrived. A 24-hour

operation for the 1.5 million migrant workers here.

When the day shift ends at five o'clock, we follow buses that tech

workers up to camps up to 20 miles from the city. People have been

arrested to talking to migrant workers in Cachar. We had to be

quick. The men say they get ?150 per month, with ?40 extra for food.

TRANSLATION: What can a poor man do? I need to earn money. Have you had

an accident? I wanted to ask how this man had broken his leg. At two

men burst into the room. They threatened to take the camera and we

were thrown out of the camp. In 2011, Syria was beginning to fall

apart. Posing as an academic researching

Syrian activities, she became the first Western TV journalist to enter

the country. She travelled alone to Damascus.

The road to Damascus, I am travelling without permission from

the authorities to meet with the protesters. Syria is a dangerous

place to be, particularly for those demanding a change in regime. It is

Thursday evening, the eve of what has become protest today in Syria.

People are dashing home before the roadblocks set up 20 suburbs of

Damascus and the city itself. The thing authorities want is for people

to converge on the city, recreating the Damascus equivalent of Cairo's

Tahir Square. And she returns to the country a few months later to the

very heart of the anti- Assad uprising.

The so-called capital of the Syrian revolution. Where, despite the daily

death toll, the protest continues. But the tactics have changed. Those

demonstrations are being held at night in an effort to minimise

casualties. And as the only journalist here to view the protest

first-hand, I noted another significant difference. Back in

March when they began, the protesters called for reform. Then

they called for the fall of the regime. Today, as the name of each

atrocity and massacre is carried out by Assad's army and his thugs is

called out, the crowd respond by demanding the death of the president

by hanging. These protests are taking place every night in Homs now

with a practically unabated enthusiasm, which is impressive not

least because they have been going on for seven months now and so

little has been achieved. I am told to run as shots I heard and soldiers

are seen at the end of the street. We should hide, because when the

security forces attack, the first thing they are looking for his

cameras. That is quite nice. Lots and lots of

black. She often said being a woman helped her get to places under

cover, because she could slip under the radar more easily than a man.

But that did not stop her confronting injustices against women

in society, sometimes forcefully, sometimes subtly and with humour.

The Saudi Harley-Davidson club out for a ride. To my astonishment, they

took me along. That is me, attempting to waive.

That was good fun, thank you. Their action broke all the rules which

govern Saudi society. Surely, I thought, such dashing risk-taking

young men would sympathise with the fate of the Saudi woman. Why are

their wives not with them? Do they have the right to enjoy themselves?

threaded throughout her work. At what also shines through is her

humanity. Aung San Suu Kyi said she confirmed her belief that the best

journalists were also the nicest. Her compassion and her absolute

belief in the power of journalism to change things is clear in this final

report about a group of young journalists in India. The boys in

Delhi who have been learning to read and write believe that only people

understood them, they would get more sympathy, hence the weekly editorial

meeting to discuss their newspaper. TRANSLATION: The reason we do this

is we are all poor. We have this paper because when one of us has an

accident and dies, the newspaper will not report it. The distribution

process must wait for nightfall, when the police, not the natural

supporters of youthful enthusiasm, let all and social reform, are less

likely to be about. It begins to look and sound like a schoolboy's

counting. -- outing. It is a monthly ritual. Sometimes they get away with

it. This time they do not. I am afraid I do not remain an impartial

observer. Why can't they put their posters up? Everyone else is

allowed. Whether the boys turn, authority appears to panic at the

sight of children asserting their rights. Why can't they put their

posters up? Every other political party and organisation is allowed to

hang their posters up, why not the children? At the monthly meeting of

their microcredit bank, they hear at last there have been given the funds

to start banking operations. They have a plan.

The boys have noted the long queues of the Delhi rickshaw drivers

waiting for fuel. These will be their future customers. They retain

the elated, only to be thwarted by adult authority again. -- return.

The only place they can call home has been closed without warning.

They are not even allowed to come back in to collect their schoolbooks

for the next day. Why is it you are turning the children out, they have

nowhere else to sleep? We are not authorised to give you an interview.

There was only two hours notice given. Is this reasonable notice? If

the government officials who have such power over the lives of working

children deny that they are human beings, you begin to ask what hope

there is that anyone will listen to them. They have convinced me they

know the solution. Stop attacking us, there are saying, but attacked

the poverty which destroys families. Let us work so long as our survival

depends on it, but give us the education and the help we need to

change our lives. Meanwhile, we will not give up. We will carry on with

working and with our dreams.