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Apr 28, 2011 27 min

What happened next?

from Crossing Continents Hosted by BBC Radio 4

Lucy Ash revisits some of the significant stories covered in recent years and discovers what has changed since our initial reports. In some instances, there have been attempts to bring suspects to justice. In 2009 Crossing Continents uncovered disturbing evidence of alleged atrocities by the Kosovo Liberation Army during the Kosovo War ten years ago. Since then a trial has opened in the capital Pristina and two former KLA leaders are being prosecuted for war crimes. The case began in March 2011, just a few months after Dick Marty, Special Rapporteur of the Council of Europe, released an explosive report claiming that the KLA summarily executed prisoners and harvested their kidneys to sell for organ transplants. Also in 2009 Crossing Continents looked at claims that Rwandans in France and Germany were controlling a deadly African militia in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Reporter Peter Greste tracked down Callixte Mbarushimana to a Paris cafe. The elegantly dressed rebel Hutu leader flatly denied his group was responsible for attacks against civilians. But then, last October, Mbarushimana was arrested and sent to the International Criminal Court in the the Hague accused of 11 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes, including rape and murder. Bereaved families and victims in Congo have long complained about a climate of impunity - could that be about to change? There appears to be a disheartening lack of change in Turkmenistan. Lucy Ash travelled there undercover in 2005 to find out what ordinary life was like for the citizens of one of the world's most repressive dictatorships. Despite the gold and marble clad buildings in the capital Ashgabat, she found people deprived not only of all rights and freedoms, but also of basic necessities such as healthcare. At that time the country was ruled by a man who renamed the month of April after his mother, outlawed ballet and banned gold teeth. The current president, ex dentist Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov is less flamboyant but his promised reforms have failed to materialise. Doctors Without Borders, the last international nongovernmental organisation operating in the country recently left because the government refused to allow a programme to treat drug-resistant tuberculosis. This special edition also catches up with an American policeman who created a cult following for his "Street Story" podcasts, vivid vignettes of his work for the Tulsa Police Department. And now that India has decriminalised homosexuality, what has happened to the Gay Prince of Rajpipla, once shunned by his family and his community?

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This episode was published on April 28, 2011.

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