Kate Adie

I never desired to go into war zones. I never had any thought about it. It sort of just happened as part of the job.

My job is to get to the heart of a story, to find out what's really going on; to get it verified and, then, to get it out to as many people as possible as fast as.

Hair is also a problem. I remember once, when I was reporting from Beirut at the height of the civil war, someone wrote in to the BBC complaining about my appearance.

People always seem to assume that we have a full, back-up support team - make-up, costume and a driver - but usually, in a war zone, there's only me and the cameraman.

The better the information it has, the better democracy works. Silence and secrecy are never good for it.

But in the first Gulf war the United Kingdom was not under any threat from Iraq, and is still less so in the second one. Then there is no justification for obstructing freedom of information, particularly as nations have a right to know what their soldiers are being used for.

I don't find an advantage or disadvantage in being a woman when reporting. What little advantages there might be in some instances is cancelled out by the basic lack of lavatories round the world for women.

I was sent to a nice Church of England girls' school and at that time, after university, a woman was expected to become a teacher, a nurse or a missionary - prior to marriage.

It wasn't glamorous in my day. In the regions, reporters were seen as such low life that they didn't merit their name in the Radio Times. Now people are interested in being famous. I never gave it a thought.

I've never been one to sit around and eat my heart out. Life's too short.

When you are covering a life-or-death struggle, as British reporters were in 1940, it is legitimate and right to go along with military censorship, and in fact in situations like that there wouldn't be any press without the censorship.

On the whole, when the unexpected danger happens to you, you're thinking so fast, you're thinking so hard, every bit of you is alive to 'What should I do?' 'What can I do?' There isn't a lot of time for contemplation.