Our World - Season 17 / Year 2022

Abortion has long been a fault line in American politics. Now those who want to ban it scent a famous victory, with implications for millions. Will the US Supreme Court effectively overturn the well-known Roe v Wade judgement of 1973 - and if so, what will that mean for an already divided nation? Sophie Long travels to Mississippi and Texas, two states trying to change the law to restrict access to abortion, and meets those on both sides of the argument.

With access to the new Taliban government, Yalda Hakim travels back to Afghanistan to find out what the country is like under their rule. The economy is close to collapse, millions face starvation, and the one-time terrorist group now faces a terror threat of its own. Can the Taliban form a government that can put their violent past behind them and help rebuild this broken country?

Bitcoin is now big business and a major talking point around the world. Whilst some countries like China have banned cryptocurrencies, others have embraced them. Kazakhstan has grabbed the crytpo revolution with both hands. It has become a leader in cryptocurrency mining, with companies built from scratch to power the technology that underpins these digital coins. But as Our World discovered, Kazakhstan's Bitcoin rush has come at a cost with electricity supplies threatened and profound environmental impacts being felt.

For centuries women have picked tea on the steep slopes of Turkey's Black Sea region. It is gruelling work, and much of what they earn has traditionally been handed to their husbands. But now, a new generation is turning their backs on tea picking, and the industry's survival is uncertain. Our World follows the young women who hope change is coming and the older ones who fear for their way of life.

With the seat of the Catholic Church in its backyard and the highest number of priests of any country, Italy is a bastion of global Catholicism. And yet, unlike many other countries, it has failed to tackle the scourge of clerical sex abuse. It keeps no official statistics on the issue, and the number of convictions remains shockingly low. Survivors of abuse have fallen foul of a combination of cover-up, complicity, and legal failings in their search for justice. Mark Lowen speaks to survivors, confronts those accused, and meets the officials working to uncover the dark secrets that the Italian authorities have been unwilling to investigate.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine, more than 2 million people have fled the country. Hundreds of thousands of them have passed through Lviv train station, heading for Platform 5. That's where trains take women and children to safety beyond Ukraine's borders and where many families have to part. Fergal Keane tells the stories of the people on the platform hoping to escape, the staff who bravely keep the station running, and those left behind.

1974 Beirut: It's the height of the Cold War. Mohamed Noman, a prominent Yemeni politician, is shot dead in his car. Some say, had he lived, Yemen would be a different country today. The killer was never caught, and the assassination was never investigated. Almost 50 years later, his granddaughter Mai Noman, a BBC journalist, seeks answers.

Myanmar is now in a state of civil war. What started in February 2021 as a mass protest movement against the military coup is now a nationwide armed uprising. The junta is under attack across the country from a network of civilian militias called the People's Defence Forces, fighting to restore democracy. The BBC gained rare access to the jungle training camps where young protesters are turned into soldiers. We follow a single mother and a student who have sacrificed everything to join the fight. They're up against a well-trained military willing to use brutal tactics to stay in power. As the death toll mounts and the world looks away, can they restore democracy? 
Narrator: two reporters in credits.

During the first year of the pandemic, San Francisco had more deaths from drug overdoses than Covid. In December, the mayor declared a state of emergency in parts of the city - in a desperate attempt to tackle the problem. In a spectacular U-turn, she declared the city needed 'tough love' and reversed her policies on defunding the police.

For Our World, James Clayton speaks to rough sleepers, addicts, and politicians and asks why one of the wealthiest cities in the world has had so many deaths from drugs. He looks at how the lethal drug fentanyl has ripped through the city and follows the story of a mother desperately trying to find her addicted son before it's too late. He also speaks to the two most important politicians in the city - the mayor and the district attorney - and explores why they disagree on how to fix San Francisco.

Axie Infinity is a hugely popular online game in which players breed, battle, and trade fantasy creatures. But for many people around the world, it's now much more than that - it's a way of making a living. The game's phenomenal growth is part of a bigger trend, as workers realise that they can make more money in the virtual world than they can in the real one. Our World follows players in the Philippines and Venezuela who are trying to escape economic problems at home by working in the metaverse. Could this be a glimpse of the future?

For decades temples across Cambodia were looted and their treasures stolen, smuggled, and sold abroad. But now the Cambodian government wants them back. Celia Hatton has exclusive access to the Cambodian authorities' fight to trace and reclaim their precious antiquities. We visit rarely seen temples, track down former looters turned state witnesses, and unravel the tale of the controversial British art collector who many believe was at the heart of the trade. The statues aren't stone objects for many Cambodians - they're living Gods that need to return home.

With exclusive access to Ukraine's winning entry, Our World follows Kalush Orchestra from the war-torn outskirts of Kyiv to their triumph in Turin. Reporter Viktoriia Zhuhan tells the inside story of how the band's song Stefania struck a chord with viewers across Europe and brought the Eurovision trophy home.

On the 24th of February, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a military invasion of neighbouring Ukraine, triggering the largest refugee crisis in Europe since the Second World War. Almost 6 million Ukrainians have fled the country, half of whom have fled to next door Poland. During a week in April, Our World follows Warsaw's Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski - as well as refugees and volunteers living through the crisis. How have the people of Warsaw dealt with such a sudden increase in the city's population - and what is the long term plan for all the new arrivals?

Last year anti-government protests took place across Iran. They were triggered by a severe water shortage in the south of the country, in a province called Khuzestan. Once lush and green, now rivers are running dry, crops are failing, and tap water is scarce. So, where has the water gone? BBC Persian's Siavash Ardalan investigates what is behind the shortage.

Our World has spent the last year with journalists and protestors as they live through the most turbulent period in Hong Kong's recent history. When the British government transferred sovereignty to China 25 years ago, it promised to protect freedom of speech, but new laws have silenced all criticism. Street protests have all but stopped, pro-democracy lawmakers have been replaced by Beijing loyalists, and Hong Kong's new Chief Executive is its former Security Chief, who led the crackdown. Reporter Danny Vincent has been following those who have lived through the street protest movement, both as activists and reporters, many of whom are now imprisoned.

In March this year, the town of Bucha was occupied by a shock invasion of Russian troops trying to reach Kyiv. What followed was a massacre that shocked the world.
But what happens when - against all odds - somebody survives to tell the story? In this compelling film, the sole survivor of a terrible crime in Ukraine joins the wives and mothers of his dead comrades to tell an extraordinary story. While the executions were meant to dehumanise and wipe the victims' presence from the world, this is a powerful account of love in the face of terror.

When the Taliban took over Afghanistan in August 2021, they assured citizens that they had changed since their regime in the 1990s and said they would protect women's rights. Eight months ago, Alia Azizi, a 45-year-old policewoman from Herat, disappeared. Her family has not heard from her since. Yalda Hakim travels to Afghanistan to investigate the case. She speaks with female activists and protestors who have been scared into silence, asking the Taliban why they are not doing more to investigate the disappearance of women like Alia.

In recent weeks, tens of millions of people in China have again been confined to their homes in coronavirus lockdowns. This is not without political risk, especially in the run up to the twice a decade Communist Party Congress. BBC China Correspondent Stephen McDonell travels across the country and meets people struggling to stay afloat with their country showing no signs of abandoning its "zero-covid" policy.

In 1972, Idi Amin publicly condemned Ugandan Asians as the enemy, enforcing a brutal policy that ordered them to leave the country within 90 days. Estimates of up to 70,000 South Asians left Uganda in fear for their lives. On the 50th anniversary of the expulsion, BBC reporter Reha Kansara follows her mum and aunt as they return to Uganda together for the first time. Setting off from the English suburbs, they journey to the sugar plantations of Kakira and the home in Jinja they were forced to leave in a hurry. They reunite with old friends and discover how the expulsion changed the country they left behind.

In July 2022, former Iranian official Hamid Nouri was convicted by a Swedish court of murder and war crimes and sentenced to life imprisonment. His offenses were committed in Iran's prisons in 1988 when an estimated 5000 political prisoners were killed. For the survivors and the families of those who died, it was a crucial breakthrough in their long campaign for justice. BBC Persian's Omid Montazeri, whose own father was killed for his communist beliefs in the massacres, follows the trial for Our World and tells the story of how a killer was caught.

TV Rain, Russia's last remaining opposition TV station, was forced off air in March 2022 following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Now the channel's senior presenters, husband and wife Tikhon Dzyadko and Katya Kotrikadze, spearhead an ambitious plan to relaunch TV Rain from exile. Our World follows them on a journey through Georgia and Latvia to reconnect with their audiences and to deliver the truth to the many Russians under the influence of the Kremlin's pervasive propaganda.

Our World travels to the fastest-warming place on earth: Svalbard. Deep inside the Arctic Circle, it is home to the world's northernmost settlement, Longyearbyen, which is estimated to be heating at six times the global average. People living here have a front-row seat for the climate crisis - melting glaciers, rising sea levels, avalanches, and landslides. Add to this an energy crisis in Europe fuelled by the war in Ukraine, which many experts believe is now undermining the fight against climate change. Nick Beake finds out what is being done to try to save Svalbard as we know it.

For many Russian oligarchs, their superyachts are their most prized assets. But when Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, those superyachts soon became targets for an unprecedented set of sanctions coordinated by the U.S., E.U., and U.K. authorities. Some yachts were seized or detained, others tried to escape quickly, and some simply disappeared. With an exclusive interview with Andrew Adams, the head of the U.S. KleptoCapture Task Force, Our World tells the inside story of the game of cat and mouse between some of the world's most powerful nations and some of Russia's wealthiest men.