Fighting forced marriage in war
In 2009 a war crimes trial in Sierra Leone ruled that forced marriage was a crime against humanity. It was the first time a court had recognised that charge. The ruling came in a trial of three rebel leaders for crimes committed during Sierra Leone's civil war. The legal turning point came largely as a result of the testimonies of the women who had been victims. The prosecution argued that forced marriage should be considered a crime against humanity distinct from other forms of sexual violence. Farhana Haider has been speaking to the former chief prosecutor Stephen Rapp about the trials.Photo: Sierra Leone, repatriated refugees reaching Freetown January 2001 Credit: Ullstein Bild/Getty Images
21 Touko 202111min
Saving the world's wetlands
Iran hosted a meeting to save the world's wetlands in 1971. The Ramsar Convention - named after the village on the Caspian Sea where it was originally signed - is seen as the first of the modem global intergovernmental treaties on the sustainable use of natural resources. Claire Bowes has been speaking to the Belgian representative, Eckhart Kuijken, about the battle by conservationists to interest people and governments in the value of wetlands. He describes how his home country had no planning laws protecting natural landscapes until 1962 - so that many were lost to industry and agriculture.Photo: Hawizeh Marsh in Iran. Credit: courtesy of the Convention on Wetlands
20 Touko 20219min
Striking in South Korea in 1980
There were strikes and student protests across South Korea in May 1980. The military government responded with a brutal crackdown in the city of Gwangju and elsewhere striking workers faced arrest and even torture. Heongjun Park has been hearing from one of those strikers, Bae Ok Byoung, who worked in a factory making wigs in Seoul. She, and the other female employees had gone on strike demanding better working conditions, but after the industrial action ended she was jailed, tortured and then blacklisted for decades. This is a 2 Degrees West production. Photo: Labour activist Bae Ok Byoung talking to some of the workers at the wig factory in Seoul where she worked in 1980.
18 Touko 20219min
When Ariel Sharon visited the Al-Aqsa compound
The controversial Israeli opposition leader visited the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jersualem's old city in 2000. His appearance was followed by an upsurge in violence between Palestinians and Israelis. Mike Lanchin spoke to an Israeli, and a Palestinian who were there that day.This programme is a rebroadcast.(Photo: Ariel Sharon at the compound. Credit: AFP/Getty Images.)
17 Touko 20218min
China's Democracy Wall
How a brick wall in Beijing became a beacon for those calling for change. But when Wei Jingsheng posted an essay demanding democracy in 1978, he was arrested and imprisoned for 18 years. He's been telling Rebecca Kesby why he thinks it was worth it.(PHOTO: BEIJING, CHINA: China's prominent dissident Wei Jingsheng (R) laughs as he talks to reporters at his Beijing apartment 20 September 1993. Wei was arrested again shortly after this and eventually released from prison on medical grounds in 1997. He currently lives in the USA. (credit MANUEL CENETA/AFP via Getty Images)
14 Touko 202112min
The trial of South Africa’s 'Dr Death'
The trial of a South African doctor accused of multiple murders under the Apartheid regime. Wouter Basson, nicknamed 'Dr Death' by the country’s media, was alleged to have run a secret chemical and biological weapons project in the 1980s to eliminate perceived enemies of the government. But after the country’s longest and most expensive trial and despite evidence from 150 witnesses, in 2002 a judge found him not guilty on all 46 charges. Bob Howard talks to Dr Marjorie Jobson, the national director of Khulumani, a group which campaigns for justice on behalf of the victims of apartheid.
13 Touko 20219min
The Jewish exodus from Iraq
In the summer of 1971 around 2,000 Iraqi Jews were forced to flee the country following persistent threats and persecution. The Jewish community in Iraq dated back to the Babylonian times, but by the mid 1950s numbered less than eight thousand. Mike Lanchin has been speaking to Edwin Shuker, who was just 16 years old when he and his family were smuggled over the mountains to safety in neighbouring Iran by members of Iraq’s Kurdish minority. Edwin and his family eventually settled in the UK.Photo: Edwin Shuker and his parents and grandmother at home in Baghdad before they left in 1971 (courtesy of Edwin Shuker)
12 Touko 20218min
Legalising contraception in Ireland
Contraception wasn't easily accessible in Ireland until 1985. Activists spent years fighting for the right to control their fertility but faced opposition from the Roman Catholic church which traditionally played a central role in Irish society. Paul Moss has been hearing from Betty Purcell who was a teenager when she first started campaigning.Photo: a woman holding up a condom and some contraceptive pills. Credit: Getty Images.
11 Touko 20218min
