♪ >> Hello, everyone.

Here is what's coming up.

>> We don't even remember what life is like without this trauma and this horror.

>> A desperate plea from heartbroken families.

I speak to the loved ones of Americans still behind bars in Iran, and Former prisoner Jason Rezaian.

And then, putting women centerstage.

World renowned ballerina on her trailblazing career and being the first female to lead the first ballet company.

Plus, wrestling with a dark past.

Laura Trevelyan tells Michel Martin how she is making amends for her slaveholding ancestors.

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Thank you.

Christiane: Welcome to the program.

It's an image that no American, no family member wants to see.

If Ella citizen, loved one sealed in a glass cage inside the lines den.

World got a glimpse of Wall Street Journal reporter this week when he went to court in Moscow to request at his pretrial detention be under house arrest rather than jail no surprise, he was denied.

He was arrested by Russian authorities two weeks ago on charges of espionage which he denies.

The U.S. says he's wrongfully detained.

He's the latest American to be picked up and thrown behind bars by a foreign government, a trend on the rise, according to the James Foley foundation.

And it is breaking families apart.

Three Americans wrongfully detained in Iran are desperate to be freed, so much so, that one of them made the bold decision to call into this program from the prison to plead with President to help free them all.

But weeks have passed and there they remain, hostage still to the political whims.

Her brother has been working tirelessly to free him and so has Tara Tahbaz on behalf of her father who's also detained there.

They joined me, alongside Jason Rezaian, who was also imprisoned before being released in a prisoner swap.

Welcome to all of you.

Jason, can I start with you, because you of all of us three guests have been in jail.

You saw this week the development in the case of Evan of the Wall Street Journal.

What must he be going through?

He tried to get bail while they go through his hearing but that was denied.

From your memories, how do you feel he must be feeling?

Jason: a little bit desperate, confused.

I saw images of him in the current -- courthouse that was published after his appearance in his first trial session.

On Tuesday.

I think he's looking very strong and stoic.

I think that is very heartening but at the same time, having gone through a process similar to this one, you want to believe that there is some justice, some fairness to the whole proceedings as I experienced as Tara's dad experienced, as Bobak's brother experience.

These are show trials that people get put on.

I think he must be steeling himself for a long ordeal because unfortunately, that is likely what he is going to face.

Christiane: I want to play for all of you this soundbite by Evan's parents.

They had fled the Soviet Union in 1979.

They spoke to the Wall Street Journal in the aftermath of their son's arrest.

This is what they said.

>> One of the American qualities that we absorbed, be optimistic.

Believe in happy endings.

That is where we stand right now.

But, I am not stupid.

I understand what's involved.

That is what I choose to believe.

Christiane: Jason, we saw Brittney Griner released 10 months after being detained in Russia.

Paul Whelan is still locked up.

Do you think the parents optimism is justified?

There have been swaps.

Even now, the deputy foreign minister in Russia is saying there could be a prisoner swap but only after the trial.

The Russians were saying he was caught red-handed, which he and everybody else denies.

Jason: I don't put any stock in what the Russian Foreign Ministry says, but ultimately, these kinds of gambits are an effort to extract some kind of concession from the U.S. government.

We have seen it time and again in cases that you mentioned, also with Trevor Reed.

We think there is reason for that optimism.

Evan will come home.

Just like I know the hostages in Iran and other countries will come home, but it is a matter of the U.S. government coming up with the political will and making a decision.

It is a hard decision, I understand that, but these are fellow citizens that have been thrown under the bus in foreign countries.

While it is not the U.S. government's responsibility or fault that these people and myself included in this long history of hostagetaking pattern , but unfortunately, it is on our government to bring us home.

Same with the U.K., same with other European countries that are functioning democracies.

If our governments don't intervene and do what is necessary to bring people back, it is not going to happen.

Christiane: I want to turn to Tara Tahbaz because she is sitting here with me.

Your father has been in for several years.

Your father has American citizenship and British citizenship.

He was not brought back when another British citizen was brought back.

He was not brought back in any of the latest swaps the U.S. has been involved.

Do you have hope he will come back?

Tara: the government, President Biden's administration, since the first day he was in office, they kept emphasizing how wrongly detained Americans are the top priority.

We are now 2.5 years.

I keep being told it is a top priority but you can only be told so many times and not see the action behind it.

I believe they want to bring them home and they are a top priority but I think they don't feel the urgency of how quickly we need to do it.

Christiane: Why do you think that?

Given there was a lot of urgency to bring Brittney Griner back from Russia and she had been accused of carrying illegal substances.

Yeah, she was in jail for 10 months and they got her back for a prisoner swap.

Tara: I think they say the Americans are a priority.

And my father, my mother, they are all Americans.

They are there because they hold a blue passport and they are Americans.

It is hard not to believe that they are not prioritized given they are nationals or they don't have an institution behind them whether it is Columbia University or Princeton University.

I think everything the government has done and how quickly they have moved for those is exactly what they should be doing and it is the right thing to be doing.

We just hope they will do the same for our loved ones even though they are not a celebrity and not high-profile.

Christiane: Your father is languishing in jail.

Babak, your brother, Siamak, has been languishing in jail the longest, 7.5 years.

As many people know, he did take a very courageous step in using a certain phone privilege to call me, to call this network.

It was a great risk and he did it for a reason.

I just want to play again this little excerpt from that conversation we had in early March.

>> Honestly, the other hostages and I desperately need President Biden to finally hear us out, finally hear our cry for help to bring us home.

And I suppose desperate times call for desperate measures.

So, this is a desperate measure.

I'm clearly nervous, just like it is odd for you.

It is very intimidating for me to do this.

I feel I need to be heard.

I don't know how long I have to wait until the White House understands we need action and not just be told that bringing this out is a priority.

Christiane: I can imagine it is really hard for you to hear that.

I think it is hard for all of us around this conversation to listen to that just on a basic human level.

I know there was a lot of hope from him and his fellow Americans in prison after that interview was broadcast.

Babak, there is an update, right?

How is your brother feeling?

What has he sent to you since?

Babak: It is heartbreaking for me to listen to this again.

It just underscores the level of desperation that Siamak feels to take this risk, as he mentioned.

It is even more heartbreaking when he takes such a risk and he does not get any response.

I have an update.

He's feeling even more desperate than before, more despair than before having spoken to you.

Because before, he would've anticipated no one has heard from him and maybe we are not getting the message through.

Now that he put the message through, there would be some kind of response.

So, he has a message that he gave me that I want to share with you, if I may.

Christiane: Please do.

Babak: I am quoting verbatim.

"The silence I have received from President Biden in response to my plea to him last month within the prison cell hardly gives the impression that rescuing U.S. hostages in Iran is a Biden administration priority.

Meanwhile, the plodding pace of negotiations is seriously dispiriting and unnerving to us.

Tehran and Washington both know from experience that they continue to drag out hostage talks.

Some unexcited event will eventually scuttle them.

Enough already."

Christiane: That is clearly a turn of phrase that everyone understands.

Realistically, what do you expect?

Your father, I believe, has written a letter also.

He obviously we know was in prison and then out.

He's an elderly gentleman.

What is he saying about all of this?

He is also an Iranian-American.

Babak: I am a father.

A lot of your listeners and people all around the world are fathers.

How does it feel to have your son in such desperate need of help and you can't help him?

Especially in the case of my father who is being held a few meters from Siamak and could not help him.

My father has reached out to President Biden.

He's desperately sought his help and to meet him.

If it's OK, I can also read a message from that letter.

Christiane: Yes, do.

Babak: "I hope you are able to grasp the constant torture.

I feel as I helplessly watch my child suffer from afar.

Though I would do everything in my power to bring him home, I understand his fate is now primarily depending on your discretion.

Therefore, I respectfully ask that you grant to this suffering 86-year-old man the opportunity to meet with you in person, so that I may ask to you not just as a U.S. citizen in dire need of assistance from his country's leadership, but also as one father to another."

Christiane: It is incredibly emotional.

Have you received any response?

Babak: It has been seven years we have been waiting for responses and 27 months of this administration.

I thought I was yelling pretty loudly and doing all I can.

Siamak obviously with what he has been doing as the hostage himself has been so vocal and so desperate.

It is sad, and as I mentioned, beyond comprehension at least for my family.

How is it we have not received any response?

Again, we are not so interested in getting just a letter, a response in the sense of saying, yes, we hear you.

Obviously, we need action as other hostages do.

When you have not even the most basic effort from my family's perspective, which is to respond to a letter, even that is not coming, it makes it more difficult to really trust that everything is being done and really believe our family and the others are a priority.

Christiane: Can I ask you, Jason, and I will ask Tara as well, this idea of a meeting.

Why is it so important?

Jason, did your family, where they granted high-level meetings with the Obama administration when you are held for nearly two years?

Jason: They have the opportunity to meet with various members of President Obama's administration at one point.

Iran's Foreign Minister and Secretary of state John Kerry made an arrangement that I can have a telephone call with my mother several months into my imprisonment.

I know that Secretary Kerry called my mom after she and I had finished speaking.

My brother met President Obama at the White House correspondents dinner.

They have the opportunity to engage with members of the Obama administration.

I have watched over the last couple of years during this administration families have tried to secure meetings with President Biden.

He is known for his empathy and I think there's a lot of reason to believe in that and to believe in his dedication to the safety and security of Americans.

As we have seen with some of the hostages whose families have been able to secure meetings, some of them ended up coming home.

I think getting it up to that level of not only the news and the suffering of these fellow citizens on the president's desk but for the loved ones to be able to look him in the eye and share their anguish is very important.

Christiane: Tara, let me ask you.

Siamak's lawyer has released a press statement.

He is drawing attention to the number of wrongfully detained Americans that President Biden has met with.

Brittney Griner's wife.

The U.S. is at war with -- well, a war for Ukraine against Russia with the power that was holding Brittney Griner.

Paul Whelan's sister.

Trevor Reed's parents.

He spoke by phone to Evan Gershkovich's parents.

All of this is great because they want that feeling that it matters.

You have not had that, but you have tried to get a letter to him.

You are there.

Explain.

Tara: I think it was a fortuitous moment where we were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

She had this letter.

Christiane: The right place.

Tara: the right place at the wrong time.

She had this letter and we had to capitalize on that opportunity that we didn't know we whatever get that chance again.

Christiane: This was a reception for the Iranian new year.

Tara: correct.

She wrote this letter asking to please meet with the families and how much it means to us.

I think it is really important to be able to tell him all of our fear, our pain, our anguish firsthand.

In those first few moments of seeing him, you can see did have the empathy and compassion.

I think it was so important to feel that from him.

It is the people around him that are trying to block our families from getting to him but ultimately, President Biden will make the decision to get our loved ones home and to be able to tell him firsthand everything we are going through.

My father is 67 with cancer.

He has been hospitalized with recurring complications several times.

Very close to the fires that happened in October.

He has been left behind by two administrations.

The wrist his life having interview with you to plead.

I think for the hostages, hope is all that carries them through these days and they are living day to day.

To them, it is trying to get to tomorrow.

I think the comfort of just hearing that President Biden took five minutes to meet with their families would mean so much to them.

It would make them feel like their names are known and their country is coming to get them but right now, we are trying to do everything possible and there is still no response.

Christiane: Just briefly, what are your fears the longer this goes on?

Dear father is an elderly gentleman.

Does he worry he might not see Siamak again?

Babak: How could he not?

I was on your program previously.

Although I am grateful, it is amazing to see my dad and for him to see his grandchildren.

We don't people remember what life is like without this trauma and this horror just engulfing us completely.

Obviously, being held over seven years, being left behind three or four times, how can you keep hope?

We try.

My father literally is grasping to life as long as possible to see the day that he comes back to us as a free person.

As Tara and Jason and others are saying, it is not so much we need to meet with officials.

We were ordinary people and this bomb went off in our lives.

We need to meet with the decision-maker.

Everyone we speak to says the president makes the decision.

That is all we ask, give us a few minutes.

Meet with us.

We work hard and it will be a brave and necessary decision by the president.

Christiane: Let me finish with you Jason because you have been through the tunnel and out of the tunnel and you know what it takes.

The president of the United States authorized your release and a prisoner exchange and actually financial exchange.

It was Iran's money, let's not quibble about that, but nonetheless.

The politics are always complicated around Iran.

What must you be feeling about Siamak and the ability of the political moment to have some kind of breakthrough for him?

Because he was left behind in your prisoner swap.

Jason: I want to say one thing very clearly.

We have seen the number of these hostage cases in Iran, China, Russia, Venezuela, a handful of other countries on the rise.

More and more members of Congress are having to deal with constituents who haven't taken Congress.

It is not a partisan issue.

It has never been more clear this is an American issue.

All of these people are being held by virtue of the fact they are American citizens.

The other thing I want to say is doing what you need to to release these people is not controversial.

The real question -- we get this all the time -- isn't this going to inspire more hostagetaking if we do deals to release people?

No.

The reality is none of the research bears that out.

What we do know is this is going to keep happening until countries like Russia, China, Iran feel as though there is something to turn them from doing it.

There's nothing standing in their way right now.

Until we come up with effective mechanisms to stop this scorch, we are going to have to do deals to get people home.

If we don't, they will die in prison and that is the reality of the situation.

I think that Siamak, Hamad, they deserve to be with their families.

Unfortunately, this has dragged on so long.

Their health is precarious.

Their circumstances are precarious.

You can see and feel the heartbreak in their families.

My family knows that very well.

We would like to see these people reunited with their loved ones as quickly and safely as possible.

I hope that happens very soon.

Christiane: Thank you so much for being here.

After that, next, we let the light shine in with the fearless and visionary artist.

Dancer Tamra Rojo has had performances on stage or putting women's work in the spotlight as the artistic director of the English National ballet.

Now, she is leaping across the Atlantic to become the first woman to lead America's oldest ballet company in San Francisco.

She spoke to me from the cities war Memorial Opera House about her upcoming debut season.

Tamara Rojo, welcome to the program.

I want to start by asking you how does it feel?

You have become the artistic director of the most prestigious.

What does it mean to you to take on this position in this time of your career?

Tamara: It is an amazing honor.

This is a company of incredible reputation that has fabulous history and dancers.

It is also a great responsibility.

I am very excited and I am very energized by San Francisco and the company.

Christiane: It is worth saying you are the first new artistic director in nearly four decades.

Your predecessor has been at the helm for 37 years.

You are very European dancer at this prestigious American theater.

Are you going to bring a bit of Europe?

How will you change things up, if at all?

Tamara: I plan to build on that legacy.

He left a legacy of excellence.

I plan to add my voice and bring in new collaborators.

In fact, my first season is inspired by San Francisco and the stories of San Francisco and the diversity of San Francisco.

I have spent some time trying to get to know the city and its history, so that the world we bring -- we are bringing works about Freda Carlo, bringing works with Latino voices.

I'm here more to bring new voices into this artform and to make it relevant to the audience of San Francisco and to make sure the work we do represents the city we are from.

Christiane: Everyone knows she's a wonderful Mexican artist who has really exploded into her own, having been over shadowed by him in their history.

It is amazing you are doing that.

I want to ask you about one of the classics.

This was a British ballet which you performed here in the U.K. with the Royal ballet.

Apparently, one of the great performances was in San Francisco by the great Margot Fontaine.

Tamara: Indeed.

I know you have already talked about in the past.

Rudolph is a very inspiring figure to me.

I think he was a revolutionary man to our artform.

Margarita is a piece that was created for them and has rarely been performed.

This will be the second time in history that it is performance by an American company.

They famously spent the summer of love here in San Francisco and left a legacy of fun.

I thought we should definitely honor that, but also bring the amazing work for the dancers of the company.

It is a piece that very few artists have the privilege of performing it.

It is career transforming, so I wanted to give that opportunity to the dancers of San Francisco Ballet.

Christiane: Explain for those who don't know about the headlines you mentioned all those years ago in the summer of love.

These two amazing ballet stars.

What happened?

Tamara: I think they had a lot of fun.

In one of those nights, there was a raid.

I think they were perhaps in the close vicinity of some illegal substances so they decided to jump over the roofs of San Francisco.

A fortunate photographer caught them as they were jumping from roof to roof.

They did end up at a police station, looking Margot very proper and Rudy very mischievous.

It is a fun story.

They actually performed when they were here.

It just felt very much appropriate.

Christiane: It is a great story.

It must be only ballet dancers who can leap across the roofs of San Francisco I not do any harm to themselves.

Let me ask you because you have spoken and it is quite extraordinary the amount of physical pressure that dancers undergo.

Tell me about the time when you arrived in Australia with a completely swollen toe.

What was all that about?

Tamara: I had an untreated infection.

I was not aware.

It was just a small injury and I thought it would be OK, but of course, the flight and all of that made it become a lot more serious.

I ended up in surgery.

I think it is a story that I hesitate to tell because I don't think the way I handled it is particularly the way I would like the dancers I work with today to handle things.

I would hope they take better care of themselves then I took care of me.

Thankfully, things have moved on since then and we are certainly investing a lot on having the appropriate support and professionals and the medical team around the dancers so that things do not get to that point.

Christiane: This was your foot.

What is a ballet dancer without a fully functioning foot?

It was really important.

It seems like you and your father came up with some development for dancers such as yourself who are on point.

Maybe it had a beneficial impact for the future.

What did you come up with?

Tamara: It did change the shape of my foot.

I could not use my point shoes.

They are very specific.

They are tailor-made for each ballerina.

Having to go through the process of having them redone was really not something I wanted to do because the shoes were perfect except for one area which is the bunion area.

I found out that all of ballerinas were struggling and my father did create a device to expand the shoes without changing the actual shape other than that area.

It has helped many ballerinas being able to share that.

Christiane: You once also kept dancing even though you had an attack of appendicitis.

You really are disciplined and able to push through the pain.

I did want to ask you since you are the first female artistic director and you have talked about the inordinate pressure on dancers, especially women.

One of the principal dancers said our art is so hard on the body.

In my generation, we didn't have a lot of help but in this generation, it is better.

Principal dancers must talk about it.

Has that pressure, particularly on appearance and weight and thinness, are we at a different time regarding that?

Tamara: I think a lot has changed over the last decade.

There is work to do always and making sure that the way we work is healthy and the dancers are athletes.

They need to be treated as such.

Professional athletes that have endurance and a healthy, functioning body.

Certainly for me, it is not about what it looks like but what it can do.

What that body can do.

That body needs to be strong and resilient and jump and turn and be at the best of its capacity.

For that, you need the support system around you, you need psychologists, you need special training.

To ensure that also the dancers have the longest possible career.

Certainly, I think in the case of my leadership, my motivation is to have healthy, happy dancers on the stage.

Christiane: Let's talk a little bit about some of the performances and pieces that you will rollout as part of your debut season.

I believe Swan Lake is one of them.

You know there is controversy right now about Russian music given Russia's savage and illegal war on Ukraine.

Tell me what you think about that man how you chose to do this and what is the dance corps thinking about that?

Tamara: I was saying there is complete support from San Francisco ballet, for myself, for the Ukrainian people and the terrible war they are in at the moment and all the families that are suffering all over the world because of it.

I think there's a different context for a composer like him who died so many years ago and who unquestionably would not have fit into the current Russian regime.

I think there's a way we can still honor the legacy of creators and composers and choreographers of the past of the Russian history while also opposing the current Russian regime.

Christiane: I want to talk about women because you have talked about much more diversity in your time as artistic director.

Much more focused on women as well.

Not just on stage but choreographers and the like.

I want to talk about age because you are in your late 40's.

Your hero danced until she was 60.

It is ballet friendly to the older woman?

I ask you because I was just in Spain, incredible.

These women who are older women, amazingly energetic and in command.

It just goes to show that you don't have to and your career at 25 or 30.

Tamara: I agree.

I danced until last year.

I am 48.

I definitely don't think you need to stop in your 20's or 30's.

I also feel -- it has been my experience that women become better dancers and artists after they become mothers.

All the principal ballerinas under my tenure were mothers.

I think there is certainly a space for the progression, the artistic progression and maturity of all the dancers.

At the same time, classical ballet itself has a physical demand.

There is a point where perhaps your body cannot continue to that level of excellence but it does not mean you have to continue to dance.

There such a wide variety of work.

Narrative work and dramatic work and work created specifically for dancers of a different generation.

I think it is more a question of choosing what you dance, rather than stopping because you can no longer.

Christiane: Presumably, those audience members in San Francisco will see you dance on the stage as well?

Tamara: No, I am very happy in my dancing retirement I have no intention of getting back on the bar.

I don't miss it at all.

I had an amazing career but now I am focusing on enabling other people to achieve their aspirations.

Christiane: Everyone is waiting for your debut season.

Tamara Rojo, thank you.

Next, we turn to history and its aftermath.

Nearly two centuries after its abolition, reparations are long overdue for the descendants of the slave trade.

An historic move, former BBC journalist Laura Trevelyan and her family have recently publicly apologized for their ancestral ownership of over 1000 slaves on the Caribbean island of Grenada.

She says she will make a 100,000 pound donation and is now a full-time advocate for reparative justice.

Most recently she has requested apologies from the new King of England Charles and the British government for their ties to slavery.

Here she is with Michel Martin.

Michel: Thank you for talking with us.

Laura: It is a pleasure.

Thank you for the opportunity.

Michel: Your story is actually more common that I think a lot of people would like to admit.

The difference is that you are facing this story squarely and directly and talking about it publicly.

Let's start at the beginning of how you learned that your family had enslaved what, like 1000 people in Grenada?

Someplace you have never been.

How did you learn this?

Laura: Far more than 1000 over the years.

In 2013 in Britain, University College of London published a database which showed of the compensation which was paid to all of the people who owned slaves when slavery was abolished in Britain in 1833.

Why did the owners of the enslaved get compensation and not the enslaved?

The answer is that it was the only way Britain could get abolition through parliament, where there were many lawmakers who were themselves plantation owners in the West Indies.

This database of the 46,000 individuals who were paid compensation in 1834, immediately the database crashed.

It could not stand the volume and about 2016, someone in my family who had idly typed Trevelyan into the database emailed me.

I was supposedly the family historian, which had nothing of this and it because I didn't know.

This cousin emailed and said you wouldn't believe it.

Did you know that it says in the database that the Trevelyans got compensation from six different plantations and we owned more than 1000 slaves at the time of abolition?

Did you know that?

I said, I had no idea.

This cousin says this has changed our whole vision of my family.

What do you think?

Michel: What went through your mind?

Frankly, I would not be surprised if at the moment it was not very much at all.

It just is not the kind of thing that you pick up the phone and expect to hear.

Do you remember what went through your mind in the moment and subsequently?

Laura: I'm embarrassed to admit it was not anything mobile at all.

It was first of all, how embarrassing.

I wrote this book in 2006 and does not have it in it.

I would have to write it again.

Then, I thought this is shocking, it is appalling.

I thought that is a real story there.

All life is copied.

So, I thought this is a story that someday I have to look at it and think about it.

And then came 2020, that summer, living here in New York City, covering black lives matter, so many protests were in Brooklyn where I live and then I was forced to think that if the legacy of slavery in America is police violence towards black men, then what does this mean that my family, my ancestors were slaveowners in Grenada?

Not that far from where I am now.

Michel: Do you remember how that thought occurred to you?

I'm wondering if you think it was like the pilot light in the furnace, something that was on but you don't think about until you have to.

Laura: I think that is a good analogy, the pilot light.

The match lit a flame in 2016 and then it burned slowly.

I think in that summer of 2020, the flame began to burn a lot more brightly.

You know how it was that summer.

Those journalists being confronted with this reckoning in America.

It is not like I have not covered police brutality towards black men in the years since I lived in the states but it was the intensity of that summer and the way of which all aspects of American life and racism were being confronted.

And then I thought, here is the skeleton in the closet that I need to think about.

I began the process of asking BBC commissioning editors, could you commission a documentary?

Would you send me to Grenada?

Could this be part of the wider story?

In Britain, we are taught that the British abolished slavery in 1833, not that we were major participants in the slave trade.

The reckoning was happening in Britain just as it was in the U.S. and across the world.

It took a while to persuade everybody that this was something that was worth doing.

My commissioning editor at the BBC said if you go, you have to ask the question should I pay reparations?

You cannot go unless you ask that question of everyone you meet in Grenada.

I got to go with a fantastic young Haitian-American producer, herself a descendant of the enslaved in Haiti.

We went on this journey together to Grenada last year.

Michel: What was it like when you landed?

What went through your mind?

Laura: Really extraordinary.

The first thing we did was land and go to one of the largest former sugarcane plantations on the item -- on the island.

Beautiful location with a huge plantation house.

It is not the original house but it looks like something from the movies, what you would think I sugarcane plantation would look like.

These sloping hills, ancient buildings where the sugarcane factories were.

I looked at this place which was so beautiful and so terrible.

I felt a shiver going down my spine and you can just imagine the picture with the slave master and the big house with the enslaved at the bottom of the slopes.

It was so hot.

Just thinking of people toiling away and the machetes.

I met a Grenadian historian there.

He said, think of it, here we are.

Me a descendant of the slaves and you a descendant of slaveowners.

Think of that.

The weight of the moment just really hit both of us under that blue Caribbean sky and that hot sun.

It was like we were back up 200 years.

Michel: But you weren't, though.

I'm wondering what that was.

Did it make you feel what?

Complicit?

Did it make you feel guilty?

Laura: Not guilty because it was not me but the sense that this is part of Britain's past and part of Britain's wealth that was accumulated here in these sugarcane plantations of the Caribbean and that it is unacknowledged really.

That is what hit me.

So few British people are taught the extent of the slave trade and the legacy of it as well.

The fact this was a system of wealth extraction.

That is what we talked about, how the enslaved got absolutely nothing when slavery ended apart from working from free -- working for free.

That was part of the deal in Britain's Parliament.

Not only did the slaveowners get compensation but their workforce had to work for them for free for another few years.

The Caribbean is left with this legacy of illiteracy, poverty, a emancipation.

There was so much that I learned when I was there about how the past doesn't form the present.

Michel: The question was put to you, not just now that you know about this, the other question is what are you going to do about it?

You are in fact doing something about it.

You and your family, mainly you, are in fact paying reparations.

Tell me about that.

Laura: Yeah, so, the chair of the reparations commission and the author of "Britain's Black Debt."

He is one of the authors of the 10 point reparations plan.

That plan begins with -- this is a request to the former colonial powers.

It is not a request to individual families but we used it as a guide.

Point number one is an apology.

The importance of an apology.

And then the plan calls for debt relief, investment in health and regulations because with the wealth, it is extraction, there was no chance to invest in health or education.

The Caribbean has been playing catch-up forever.

We use this as a bit of a guide for ourselves and we worked with Grenada's national reparations committee.

The Vice Chair of that committee , I worked closely with her to figure out what was the best thing to do and talk to many family members and tried -- you can imagine what that is like.

104 family members signed our letter of apology that we delivered.

Not all family members had very much money or were in a position to give.

People are giving what they can.

I am giving 100,000 pounds.

We settled on education and the University of the West Indies has a fund in Grenada for mature students.

That is something we are giving money to.

Also, a rural charity for schoolchildren in Grenada which comes with the cost of getting to school, school buses, and school supplies.

They seemed like very practical things.

One of the legacies was illiteracy and the education cap.

-- gap.

This seemed like it was important to fund.

Michel: I can imagine there are people on both sides.

There are some who would say you are crazy.

That is your pension.

You have earned that.

What are you doing?

I imagine there are other people who would say that is never enough and it is purely performative and therefore, meaningless.

I don't know if you engage with either of those perspectives but if you do, what do you think about it?

Laura: For sure.

When we went to Grenada, that question was asked a lot.

This is not very much a lot of money, is it?

Your ancestors got 3 million pounds when slavery was abolished and who knows how much of the sale of sugarcane?

The answer is that no amount of money can possibly be enough for the horror to compensate.

Enslavement in the Caribbean resulted in the population dropping.

The number of people, there was no natural population growth.

There was a population decline because of the brutality and hideous conditions.

Money can't make up for that but what I hope -- yes, you are right, the attack comes from the left and right.

The right is when will this end?

Going to apologize for everything forever?

Then, the left goes this is meaningless, pr, etc.

Hilary persuaded us that if we became the first British family whose ancestors were slaveowners to publicly apologize, you will set an example, you will encourage others to follow and you will help a little bit to fill that void that we have in the Caribbean where we don't know our history all we know is our ancestors were kidnapped from Africa and dumped in the Caribbean.

You are actually part of our history and it has been a deafening silence from descendants of slaveowners for obvious reasons.

People are scared of the reaction.

But, it will be part of the healing process.

Even though it will be painful and turbulent, it is important to do it.

I've been contacted by a number of families since our apology, whose ancestors were slaveowners in Jamaica, Barbados, who have said how did you do this?

How can we do this?

We want to acknowledge this painful past but we don't know how.

Can you help?

I have said what we did.

In a way, the Caribbean is straightforward.

These are these reparations committees on the islands.

Our people you can talk to who want to talk to you about it.

Michel: What other observations do you have between the conversation in the U.K. and the conversation in the U.S.?

As a person who has been a reporter in both the U.K. and U.S. for some time, what do you notice about the difference in the way these things are discussed?

Laura: One of the things that nobody really says which are true, is that American slavery was British slavery.

Until America was independent, the enslaved were brought here by the British.

America was a British colony.

There was no distinction between American slavery and British slavery so that is one thing.

I was taught in school that the British abolished slavery way before those terrible Americans.

Those terrible Americans were actually us before they were independent.

There is that.

We have just seen now the Guardian newspaper uncovering the fact that the royal family profited from it, which you would expect.

The Duke of York ran the Royal African company and later became king of England.

There's as long and deep link.

Rinse Harry in his book makes a passing reference to the fact the wealth of the world -- royal family is partly built on the backs of the enslaved.

Only now are we seeing them acknowledge this with the death of the Queen, a new generation.

King Charles who is King of the Commonwealth and confirmed the royal family is supporting academic research.

It is long overdue but it is important and significant.

It is part of this long-overdue process we are talking about of acknowledgment which is only the beginning.

Michel: Drawing upon your long experience in the U.S., what do you make of this argument that this makes white people feel bad?

And that these kinds of conversations cannot be had because they make white people feel bad, especially white children?

This is something that we have been hearing in these very raucous school board meetings where people are demanding the removal of certain books and ideas and courses from the curricula.

It induces guilt and therefore it is bad.

What do you say to people who say that?

Laura: I think it is important to acknowledge the pain of the past.

And to be honest about it.

It is painful but you don't want to make white children feel guilty for what their ancestors did and nor should that be the aim or do I think it is the aim for many of these programs.

It is hard to talk about difficult issues honestly.

It is really important to do it.

Think it is a question of the tone that you use really.

Michel: Laura Trevelyan, thank you for speaking with us today.

Laura: Thank you so much.

Christiane: That is quite a story.

That is it for a program tonight.

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