Why a South Korean church bought a village in Paraguay

In a Cambodian hospital, a group of terrified new mothers nurse tiny babies under the watch of police guards. They're surrogates, desperately poor women promised $10,000 to bear children for parents in China. But they were arrested under new anti-trafficking rules, and now they face an agonising choice: either they agree to keep children they didn't want and can't easily afford to bring up, children who aren't genetically theirs - or they honour their surrogacy contracts, and face up to 20 years in jail. Tim Whewell reports on the suffering as country after country in Asia cracks down on commercial surrogacy - and asks whether the detained mothers are criminals - or victims.(Image: Former Cambodian surrogate Va-Tei: "I feel really sad that I had to give the baby away." Credit: BBC)

29 Nov 201826min

Kim Tserkezie explores how migrants have used their entrepreneurial skills to become part of British communities, and finds out whether the experiences of successful businesses accrued over generations still resonate with migrants arriving today. Kim begins her journey by the golden sands of England’s North East coast, where we hear the Italian family history of England’s ice cream champions. Michael Minchella shares the experiences and struggles of generations of his family setting up and running their seaside business. Some 75 years later, Michael now leads their much loved ice cream empire. We then head to North Yorkshire to meet one of the 8000 Syrian refugees who have arrived in the UK in recent years. Razan, a pharmacist from Syria, explains how she is making a new life as a traditional Yorkshire cheese maker. Kim also travels over the border to Edinburgh to meet Talal and Nour, two Syrians who met for the first time in Edinburgh and went on to recreate a facsimile of the baker’s shop that Noor was forced to leave behind when fleeing Aleppo.

28 Nov 201827min

In Canada many women volunteer to give birth to a stranger's child and do not get paid in return. Under Canadian laws, gestational surrogates receive only expenses in exchange for getting pregnant and carrying a baby for nine months. But, why do they do it? We meet the surrogate women to find out. We follow them as they navigate the emotional challenges of giving life to a baby that they will say goodbye to after birth, and we meet the families who will welcome home these special babies.

27 Nov 201827min

Women make up roughly 50% of the world but is the media reporting the issues that matter to them? Do women want to hear more debate around taboo subjects like abortion and domestic violence or do they want to hear more success stories about women in the media? How could the media’s reporting of rape cases be improved? And, as news sources become more diverse, how can the mainstream media reflect the stories being discussed by women on social media?

25 Nov 201849min

Narrated by Bristol’s first poet laureate Miles Chambers, from costumes to sound systems this tale looks at the history of the St Pauls Carnival, meets the family of four generations who all have a stake in it, and follows the new organisation grappling to appease a fractured community in order to put this year’s event on. Failure to do so “will spell the end of carnival forever.”

24 Nov 201850min

Nigerian patients held in hospital because they can’t pay their medical bills.In March 2016, a young woman went into labour. She was rushed to a local, private hospital in south-east Nigeria where she gave birth by caesarean section. But when the hospital discovered this teenage mother didn’t have the money to pay for her treatment, she and her son were unable to leave. They remained there for 16 months – until the police arrived and released them.This is not an isolated case. In Nigeria, very few health services are free of charge, and campaigners estimate that thousands have been detained in hospitals for failing to pay their bills. It’s become an increasingly high-profile issue – one couple have been awarded compensation after going through the courts. For Assignment, Linda Pressly explores a widespread abuse – meeting victims, and the hospital managers attempting to manage their budgets in a health system under enormous pressure, where only 5% of Nigerians are covered by health insurance. Producer: Josephine Casserly (Photo: Ngozi Osegbo was awarded compensation by a court after she and her husband were detained in a hospital because they couldn't pay their medical bills. BBC PHOTO)

22 Nov 201827min

We follow a unique group of Sahrawi women working alongside the world’s longest minefield, the 2,700km sand wall or berm built by Morocco across the region. Baba, Minetou, Nora and the team work in temperatures exceeding 42°c (107°f), hundreds of miles from even rudimentary medical care, risking their lives in Western Sahara’s so-called “Liberated Territories” east of the Berm, clearing some of the seven million landmines and unexploded bombs left over from the still unresolved conflict between Morocco and the ethnic Sahrawi liberation movement, the Polisario Front.

21 Nov 201827min

Argentina is on the brink of a female-led revolution, and in Buenos Aires women are fighting for an equal footing everywhere from the institutions of government to the Tango hall. Since 2015 political pressure around women’s rights has peaked, following a string of horrifying femicides. It spawned a social media movement #NiUnaMenos, and continent wide strikes and protests. Katy Watson speaks to the activists who started this latest feminist wave and how tango is being re-interpreted with equality in mind.

20 Nov 201827min