Â鶹ԼÅÄ

Pascale Harter introduces correspondents’ stories from Somalia, India, China and Lithuania.

Once, Baidoa was a trading hub, renowned for its sorghum and livestock markets. Now it’s feeling the impact of Somalia's worst drought for decades, as thousands of families who’ve lost nearly everything arrive to pitch their shelters and look for humanitarian aid. Andrew Harding recently got a view of the many dangers surrounding the city, and Somalia as a whole: the threat of famine, outbreaks of disease, and the armed militants of al Shabaab.

The lives of women and girls in rural India are governed by many conservative social norms, which often restrict where they may go, when, and in whose company. Cases of violence against women have often been explained away by besmirching the victims’ character. Geeta Pandey reports from Uttar Pradesh on the aftermath of a double murder of two sisters who’d been abducted and raped before they were killed – which has convulsed the state.

Working as a journalist in the People’s Republic of China has rarely been easy; but over the last few years the limits on foreign reporters have been drawn ever more tightly. Wherever Stephen McDonell and his team have gone recently, they’ve been given new reasons for cancelled interviews, official stonewalling and refused access.

And on the shores of the Baltic sea, Heidi Fuller Love joins a beachcomber hoping to pull riches from the depths. The treasure seekers Lithuanians call 'ginatarautojai' might not earn fortunes, but there’s enough profit in the amber to be found on the coastline to make braving the cold and the wet worthwhile.

Producer: Polly Hope
Editor: Richard Fenton Smith
Production Co-Ordinator: Iona Hammond