She described her experience of making the award-winning report on the World News Blog earlier this year.

Also shortlisted for the award were Channel 4’s Find me a Family, and Economy Gastronomy (BBC 2), FYI Radio (lesbian and gay youth radio station) and Pobol y Cwm (BBC Cymru).

Watch the report below:

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The State department are now advocating a new tactic – where both sides take “baby steps” toward lower level talks because they know there is no chance of getting Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to sit down with Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu for meaningful discussions anytime soon.

There has been a bit of fuss about whether Hillary Clinton made an error at the weekend when she described an Israeli offer to partially freeze settlement building as “unprecedented” even though it was far short of what the US had originally demanded – a total freeze.

But that wasn’t the real mistake. The biggest error was thinking that the new US administration could force this concession out of the Israelis just because they were asking for it.

Obama came into office determined to make progress on the Middle East and to do it early in his term when he still had fresh political capital to expend on the process. So many other US presidents don’t pay any real attention to the Middle East until they are nearly out of office and seen as lame ducks.

That was a laudable goal from Obama. But there was a level of idealism – some might say naivety – from the administration at the start of this year about how much change they could bring to the world simply because they wanted to. One American diplomat has diplomatically called it an “excess of zeal”.

The Israelis were not so mesmerised by Obama’s election that they were prepared to halt settlement activity just because he asked them to. And in fact Netanyahu has bolstered his popularity inside Israel by refusing to bow to the US demands.

But Abbas was emboldened by the tougher tone coming from Washington and publically announced he would not begin negotiations until there was total freeze. Not only has the US plan not worked – it’s prevented the re-starting of talks.

Despite this impasse President Obama has already been awarded the Nobel peace prize. The committee said it was because Obama had given the world hope for a better future.

But one year after his election it’s maybe time to ask not just if that hope was misplaced – but whether its is getting in the way of action.

It’s not just the Nobel committee who were captivated by what seemed to be the potential in an Obama presidency. Much of the rest of the world was too – along with his own team it seems.

As they say in America “they’ve been drinking the Kool-Aid” and have started believing their own hype too much. Believing that international players would do what they said simply because Obama had asked them to. That’s how they would bring about that Change they promised.

But in the real world it doesn’t work. It hasn’t worked in Iran where the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei yesterday dismissed Obama’s overtures by saying that talks with America would be “naive and perverted”.

It certainly didn’t work when both Obamas flew into Copenhagen to lobby for Chicago’s Olympic bid. The president didn’t take too much of a hit inside America when that bid failed – he got points for trying.

But what the rest of the world saw was a man (a couple) who thinks they can fix anything just by showing up. A president who thinks he can change the world just by being.

That rock hard self belief has led Obama to try ambitious things others wouldn’t dare. And that’s a good thing. But where does hope end and hubris begin? And when does it stand in the way of making progress?

On the night Obama finally clinched the Democratic nomination for President in Minnesota he promised “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal” and he was widely mocked for his arrogance at the time.

Next month he will have the chance to make good on that commitment at the Copenhagen global summit on climate change. But we wait to see how much healing action he will be able to deliver.

There is much speculation about whether Obama will go to Copenhagen in person – and whether he would make a significant difference to the chances of getting a deal.

If he does decide turn up his presence could change the dynamic at the summit. But only if the US comes with a promise of some substantial action as well. Not if Obama thinks he can heal the planet just by showing up.

And today there’s another large question mark over this eight year occupation. The United Nations have said quite openly they are pulling out all but their 400 essential staff.

That’s not too shocking a development after five of their number were gunned down in a compound over a week ago. The UN would be considered perhaps foolish to have done nothing and insist the withdrawal is temporary until they can consolidate more secure accommodation than the scattered guest houses where their staff now stay.

But the impact of the announcement is huge: it means the biggest aid worker here is effectively leaving, for now.

Every other NGO must now re-evaluate their presence – how many people they have here, where they work, what they do, who they work with?

The effect on the aid community’s nerves – if not their actions – could be significant, and this is at a time when they are being pushed ever harder to boost the “civilian surge” of development and reconstruction that sits at the heart of the new, as yet unveiled but broadly discussed, NATO strategy.

In 48 hours: the military strategy, and the civilian strategy both take significant blows. And this is before the Obama administration have even announced their new troop levels.

In Iraq, in 2007, the violence, the sense of collapse, was worse just before the surge, and the slow change in atmosphere it brought. But Afghanistan is not Iraq. It’s not got a functioning society to look back to, just 30 years of war.

Instead he was apparently tuned to a two hour long HBO documentary about how he stormed to electoral triumph this time last year.

I was watching it too – so was everyone else in the C4 Washington bureau.

We were all enjoying reminiscing about the campaign and our small part in it. Even if we didn’t learn much that we didn’t know at the time. There were very few revealing moments.

We never saw the Obama facade crack.

Either this was the most disciplined, best run and resolutely self confident political campaign in history or this was the best controlled behind the scenes access in history.

But there was one glimmer of revelation – right at the end.

Soon after Obama was declared the winner but before he’d made his acceptance speech in Grant Park in Chicago a junior aide took a call on his cell phone.

We heard him brushing off the caller saying “The President Elect is keen to talk to the Prime Minister too – but he’s a bit busy right now”.

We can only assume it was Gordon Brown on the phone. Getting his first taste of how UK – Obama relations were to proceed.

The hairy beards are still there nonetheless, and President Obama issued another appeal to them today, on the 30th anniversary of the hostage-taking at the US Embassy.

“This event helped set the United States and Iran on a path of sustained suspicion, mistrust, and confrontation,” he said. “I have made it clear that the United States of America wants to move beyond this past, and seeks a relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran based upon mutual interests and mutual respect.”

But that’s looking less and less likely. We tend to report the international dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme and the internal dispute over the elections as if they were totally separate. Analysts often point out that the opposition leaders, including Presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, would probably follow a similar, secretive nuclear programme as President Ahmadinejad.

But there is a link, and it’s the pressure the hairy beards are under from all sides. Since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to office in 2004, power has shifted away from the mullahs and to the Revolutionary Guard. They have taken control of many businesses, and are very close to the President. The day after the election in June, when they began to feel that it had been stolen, protestors started to shout “Down with the coup d’etat government!” They meant that the Revolutionary Guard were taking over, at the expense of the hairy beards.

One of the difficult issues for those who try to negotiate with the Islamic government is that there are so many overlapping centres of power, you can never be sure whether you’re dealing with the real decision-makers. The Revolutionary Guards are believed to take the hardest line on the nuclear programme, and have no interest in improving relations with the USA. That may be one reason the negotiations of recent weeks seem to be going round in circles – even if the hairy beards wanted to compromise, their room for manoeuvre is circumscribed. And they’re more divided amongst themselves than ever before.

Last week, the Supreme Leader was addressing a gathering at Sharif University when he was challenged by a maths student called Mahmoud Vahidnia, who harangued him for 20 minutes.

He complained that no-one was allowed to criticise him, that state TV and radio had misreported the demonstrations after the election, and even chastising him for the arrests and beatings protestors have suffered. The live TV broadcast was quickly cut, but the Supreme Leader had no choice but to listen.

Now today, students and others are out on the streets in great numbers, while basiij militia and Revolutionary Guard use violence to try to quell the unrest.

Are the hairy beards in control of all this? I doubt it. They can’t control what people think, and it’s not clear they control what the armed forces do.

He already knew it was going to be bad news. So today, on the anniversary of his own historic victory a year ago the Democrats are left wondering where all their voters went.

The key results that really matter are the governorships of Virginia and New Jersey. Both had been held by democrats – both are now having Republicans move into the governor’s mansion.

Republicans say it’s a clear rejection of Obama and his policies. That these results prove that voters don’t want his healthcare reforms and are angry about all the government spending that has sent the deficit sky high.

For obvious reason the White House say these votes have nothing to do with them.

Obama did gamble some of his political capital by campaigning visibly for the Democratic candidates in both New Jersey and Virginia. He even repeated some of his famous campaign slogans that we haven’t heard for a year. But all those new voters who came out for Obama in 2008 were anything but “fired up” this year – and clearly not “ready to go”. Young people, black voters and independents all stayed home.

But is it really a referendum on the president?

Yes say Republicans. No say the polls.

Most voters who did bother to turn up said their vote was not motivated by a desire to either reward or punish the occupants of the White House and that’s what the president’s staff are clinging on to.

His senior advisor David Axelrod saying, “Whatever’s driving these voters it wasn’t attitudes toward the president” adding that he doesn’t think these results portend long term trends.

Obviously Democrats have to hope that they don’t predict the future. Otherwise Democrats could be in a lot of trouble come the mid term elections this time next year.

Just remember how Bill Clinton won a great victory for the White House but after stunning mid term losses just two years later found it almost impossible to get anything passed through congress.

That’s a fate Obama will have to work hard to avoid. And obviously his Democratic colleagues in the House of Representatives who will all be up for re-election next year will be watching last nights results too with the same thought in mind.

And that might be where these results really do hurt Obama’s agenda. Among members of his own party who just got a little bit more nervous about their own re-election prospects.

Representatives who saw that having the president on your side doesn’t guarantee you re-election and may now play it very cautiously for the next 12 months.

Any Democrats with small majorities are now much less likely to vote for a controversial health care bill if they think their constituents might punish them for it. And much less likely to vote for “cap and trade” climate change legislation that their own voters might not like it.

And so Obama might try to tell himself these results aren’t a judgement on policies – but they will none the less significantly affect his agenda.

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But the way in which it happened is even more damaging. The five British men and three Afghans were shot dead by an Afghan policeman. The Afghan National Police (ANP), together with the Afghan National Army (ANA), are the exit strategy. The way out. The people NATO hand security over to.

The last thing NATO strategy needs at this delicate moment of reassessment is a broad wave of distrust sweeping NATO troops towards their Afghan counterparts.

This is, as far as the British army will say for now, what happened: at 15.15 hrs yesterday British troops and Afghan police were in a debrief after a foot patrol. They live together in a compound near a checkpoint in Shin Kalay, that’s 400 metres from the British base in Nad-e-Ali (incidentally another compound where they live alongside the ANA).

Fourteen British soldiers protect 2 British police mentors, who teach 15 Afghan police. There were no barriers, we understand, between the Brits and Afghans – they lived side by side, part of the NATO bid to win the trust of the Afghan men they fight alongside, and hope to leave the fighting to.

No-one knows why, but one of the Afghan police opened fire. He is said to have taken everyone by surprise and then fled.

The UK military have a photo of him, and know his name. Local sources say, unsurprisingly, he’s now joined the Taliban, with his AK47.

There will be questions as to how he managed – savagely – to kill 8 armed men and wound 6 other Britons without, it seems, being shot dead himself. That’s for the investigation to work out.

But another question remains, a more serious one: what will this do to the confidence of British troops working in that area? And the relations between the part of Afghan society NATO needs most – its troops and soldiers?

Will the Taliban claim this attack as one of their own and claim they’ve infiltrated the police? Or will this rogue policeman be caught and both sides hope it will never happen again?

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Tomorrow, November 4th, marks the first anniversary of his election. And today Americans are at the polls again. So it’s perhaps inevitable that some people are saying today’s vote is referendum on Obama’s first year in office.

Those people are mostly Republicans who think they are about to have a good day and will be able to claim it shows that the president is failing. Not surprisingly the White House, who don’t expect they will have much to celebrate tonight, are saying that these elections have nothing to do with Obama at all – even though he has been pretty visible in helping to campaign for some of the Democratic candidates

The real mid terms happen next year when all of the House of Representatives and one third of the Senate will be up for re-election, along with dozens of governors and mayors This year – an “off year” in the jargon – sees just a few key ballots but they will be watched very carefully anyway.

There are three races its worth checking the results of when you wake up tomorrow:

New Jersey
If Governor John Corzine wins re-election in New Jersey the Democrats will be very relieved.

He’s been struggling against a heavyweight Republican opponent who had a double digit lead in the polls until Corzine started spending large amounts money on TV ads making fun of his opponent’s rather large waistline with lines like “Christopher Christie. He’s been throwing his weight around”.

Corzine has spent over $100m of his own money on this campaign so losing would really hurt – but his wealth just reminds voters that he got rich as a former Chief Exec of Goldman Sachs and no one likes Wall Street these days.

Virginia
Virginia is the most likely to deliver bad news for Obama. It was big news a year ago when he became the first Democratic nominee to win that state in a Presidential election since Lyndon Johnson in 1964. But it doesn’t look like the Dems will be able to win the governorship this year.

All those new voters in Virginia’s Northern suburbs who registered to vote for Obama last year simply aren’t motivated to come out and vote for the Democratic candidate Creigh Deeds. He hasn’t run a very good campaign and the advance spin from Democrats in DC seems to be that if he’d listened more to White House advice he might be in better shape. That’s one way to explain why they couldn’t hold onto Virginia for even a year.

New York 23rd District
But however bad the news is from Virginia Democrat are already sniggering about what’s happening in the race for a House of Representatives seat in upstate New York.

The Republicans had chosen a very moderate candidate to run in the 23rd District. Dede Scozzafava was exactly the kind of pro-abortion, pro-gay rights reformer that Republican party bosses think is required to win back all those swing voters who swung to Obama last year.

But she was called a RINO (Republican In Name Only) by so many in her district that a Conservative Independent candidate, supported by Sarah Palin, was polling better than her.

At the weekend Scozzafava not only suddenly dropped out, she even endorsed her democratic opponent.

The far-right are delighted. They say it proves there is no point in compromising their ideals to accommodate moderate candidates.

While the Democrats are convinced that if only the Republican party do cede control to the Sarah Palin/ Glenn Beck/ Rush Limbaugh wing of the party then a second term in the White House for Obama is all but guaranteed

He’d cooperated with President Obiang’s investigators. He’d pointed the finger at those he claimed were behind the coup plot and the countries he claimed had backed their plan.

The attorney general had said in court that their star prisoner should be commended for his openness. And why wouldn’t he? Mann knew the only chance he had now was a “get out of jail free” card.

I got into Black Beach the day after the verdict to talk to Mann. It was one of my most bizarre days as a reporter. Myself and my cameraman Soren Munk were driven past the dust courtyard full of bedraggled inmates looking bored and very skinny, and into a pristine, purpose-built courtroom.

It had been built for the trial but deemed not secure enough should someone decide to silence Mann before he confessed. The security minister had escorted us to meet Mann. He wanted to show us how well the westerner was being treated. We were told he had a step machine in his cell for exercise, and books were provided for entertainment.

But the real killer was the buffet lunch the minister had laid on for us. In prison. Not just any prison. This was one of Africa’s most notorious jails. Stories of torture and death in custody were common here. And there we were, being offered croquettes and a glass of Merlot in close proximity to the torture cells.

Mann shuffled in, his ankles shackled, his hernia still distressing him. He wouldn’t be drawn on the chances of a pardon. If he’d been promised early release, he wasn’t saying.

He was still angry. Years in incarceration in Harare and months of interrogation in Malabo hadn’t dimmed his fury that his co-conspirators had left him to take the heat for all of them. If he ever got out he was going to go after them, make no mistake.

He was far from a broken man. Maybe his hefty sentence hadn’t quite sunk in, maybe his SAS training was still ingrained, or maybe he believed the Equatorial Guineans would stay true to their word and reward him for spilling the beans.

The rumour mill out of EG has been rife for over a month that President Obiang was about to release his most famous prisoner on compassionate grounds. Mann has had two hernia operations since his trial. His health is said to be good, but the last thing the president wants is for his condition to deteriorate whilst in prison.

Just before his trial the president had assured us that Equatorial Guinea had turned a corner. He was no longer the tyrannical leader who pocketed vast personal wealth for him and his family from the country’s huge oil reserves whilst his people lived without electricity and running water. He boasted how Mann’s trial was to be witnessed by a free press and claimed that human rights had improved.

A pardon is the president’s last roll of the dice concerning this coup plotter. He wants to show how he’s a benevolent leader who feels compassion for this 57-year-old former soldier who has repented.

After sentencing him to 34 years the chief judge had told Mann he was also forbidden from returning to Equatorial Guinea.

Then the challenger drops out. Why would he stay in? He won’t win, and prefers a principled withdrawal to an unruly defeat.

So now the West tries to bend Karzai’s arm into cancelling the election…

Granted, you’d get no legitimacy from a one-candidate vote, held in a warzone. But you get none from cancelling the vote and letting Kabuls elite muddle their way through finding a rubber stamp.

Five months of mayhem couldn’t really have ended any more chaotically or with a worse example of democracy in action. The people aren’t part of this process. They’re not even courted: there’s no campaigning, just backroom deals.

This is not what democracy looks like, fledgling or not, and NATO now lacks the “credible partner” it badly needs.

We’re pushing through Kabul’s traffic now to the electoral commission’s press conference. More soon….