Claudia Lawrence's friend Suzy Cooper speaks of missing her on New Year's Eve (From York Press)

Claudia Lawrence's friend Suzy Cooper speaks of missing her on New Year's Eve

9:08am Wednesday 30th December 2009 in

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THE best friend of vanished York chef Claudia Lawrence today said there would be “a big piece missing” from her New Year’s Eve.

Suzy Cooper’s comments came as she reiterated her belief Claudia was still alive, more than nine months after the 35-year-old was last seen, on March 18.

Suzy who would normally spend New Year’s Eve with Claudia in their local pub, the Nags Head, in Heworth Road, said: “It’s going to be very strange, I’m not quite sure how I’m going to react on the night. It’s just going to be very different this year without her there. There’ll be a big piece missing from my New Year’s Eve.” But she said she expected she would still celebrate the coming of the new year, with Claudia’s other friends in the pub. “She would certainly want us to get on with things,” she said. Police are treating Claudia’s disappearance as a suspected murder.

Asked why she thought her friend was still alive, Suzy, 45, said: “I’ve got faith in her. I need to have that hope that she’s alive.

“It’s what keeps me going. I guess my hope is that if someone’s holding her they’re treating her well. That’s the best that I can hope for in that respect at the moment.”

Suzy, who usually saw Claudia three or four times a week, believes her friend was taken by someone against her will.

“She just wouldn’t do this to people of her own accord,” she said. “It’s just not in her to hurt people like this, so I just know without a doubt in my mind someone’s done this to her and to us.”

Suzy, who has known Claudia, of Heworth, more than three years, said she hoped 2010 would be a better year for “everyone that’s been involved in this”. “That’s obviously Claudia, her family, all of her friends and all of the people that have been affected by what this person’s done,” she said. “It has been affecting an awful lot of people and I guess my hope is that 2010 is going to bring an end to that – an end to any of the suffering that’s been caused as a result of this person’s actions.”