The Documentary

Speaking together for the first time, four European hostages of so-called Islamic State talk to Lyse Doucet about their period of incarceration between March 2013 and June 2014. Aid worker Federico Motka, journalists Didier Francois and Daniel Rye, and blogger Pierre Torres were all held for between 10 and 14 months each.

Lipika Pelham travels to a remote part of south eastern Bangladesh to report on claims of human rights abuses against indigenous inhabitants of the area. The Chittagong Hill Tracts are home to thirteen indigenous groups with the Chakma, Marma, Chak and Mro mostly practicing Theravada Buddhism. Thousands were forced off their lands from the 1960s until the 1990s. An insurgency that started in the mid 1970s ended in a peace settlement in 1997 under which the army was supposed to withdraw but it continues to maintain a tight grip on the area. The resettlement of tens of thousands of Bengalis from other parts of the country has only added to tensions. Lipika is one of the few journalists from a foreign media organisation to report from there in recent years. She has returned with first-hand accounts of alleged rape and torture and hears claims that soldiers have been involved in evicting people from their homes. Her report carries details of attempts to forcibly convert young children to Islam as well as accus

The BBC's former Pakistan correspondent Owen Bennett Jones continues his exploration of South Asia’s Deobandi Muslim movement. He heads across the border to Pakistan, where Deobandi ideology has provided spiritual guidance for both militant groups like the Taliban and a strictly non-violent missionary movement. So how can a single school of thought follow such different paths? Owen explores the role the Deobandi ideology has played in shaping Pakistan's identity, and how the Pakistani state has tapped into the intolerant elements of Deobandi teachings to fuel state-sponsored jihad - be it fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan or the Indians in Kashmir. Empowered by a ready supply of cash and guns, a relatively small number of Deobandi militants have caused havoc across the country, in the form of sectarian violence, and anti-state violence, as violent groups turn their guns on their masters. Pakistan created a monster by endorsing Deobandi militancy - so how can it bring it under control? (Photo: Owen Bennett J

Valeria Perasso and Alejandro Millán travel to Colombia and witness the search for victims who vanished over the last decade in the country's 50-year-long armed conflict, and hear the voices of families looking for missing young students in Mexico - all with the help of the Equipo Argentino de Antropología Forense, or EAAF as they are best known.

Kabul-based Tolo TV has made a name for itself reporting independent news and putting on hugely popular entertainment shows. But in the last few months the network has itself become the news story. After no fewer than four extremist threats, a Taliban suicide bombing in January this year killed seven staff and injured nearly twenty more. So what is life like for those who remain? Yalda Hakim tells the story of Tolo’s precarious operation – condemned as lewd and immoral by religious extremists, and described as a legitimate military target. In helping Afghans to challenge those in power, promoting women to top appointments, and even broadcasting popular western style entertainment shows, Tolo is helping to change Afghan society. It belongs to a growing media that are giving voice to the voiceless. But in the face of such ruthless enemies, staff are leaving for their own safety and even senior management admit that the channel might one day be forced to close.

Owen Bennett Jones tells the story of India’s Deobandi school of Islam, which has inspired both a peaceful global missionary movement and the Taliban.

The Argentine Team of Forensic Anthropology and their quest for clues from victims' bones, that tell the stories of Latin America's "disappeared". Valeria Perasso and Alejandro Millán discover how the team was born. They visit their lab and and speak to the sons, daughters, mothers and brothers who have received the remains of their long-sought “disappeared” from the forensics’s hands. What do these bones mean to them?

Twenty years ago the FBI ended their longest-running domestic terrorism investigation with the arrest of the Unabomber, a notorious serial killer obsessed with technology. Between 1978 - 1995, Theodore Kaczynski lived in a remote cabin in rural Montana, from where he planned the downfall of industrial society. A brilliant academic, Kaczynski was motivated by a desire to punish anyone connected with technology.

South Africa’s President Zuma is in deep trouble. Accusations of corruption and unexplained ministerial appointments have fuelled widespread suspicions that the South African state has been “captured”. At the heart of this accusation are the Gupta brothers - a secretive family of Indian-born entrepreneurs. From modest beginnings in the 1990s, the Guptas’ South African business empire grew dramatically. Boosted, it is said, by their alleged influence over state contracts, political appointments and President Zuma himself. In this edition of Assignment, Michael Robinson tells the story of “Guptagate” - how one of the fiercest political storms since the ending of apartheid has swept South Africa and its increasingly embattled President.

Like day labourers, working construction, the mariachis of Boyle Heights, East LA, hang around on Mariachi Plaza to pick up work. You’ll see them most days in their dark suits, embroidered jackets, silver buttons running up the sides of their pants. Writer, Evangeline Ordaz a night out in the Latino suburbs with the mariachis of Boyle Heights, East LA.

Journalist and BBC presenter Akwasi Sarpong heads to Ghana to hear the stories of rural women at the bottom of the pyramid of a multi-million dollar confectionery, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics industry relying on shea butter from Africa.

Twenty-five years ago, thousands of Iraqi Kurds lost their lives as they fled the forces of Saddam Hussein into the Zagros and Taurus mountains of northern Iraq, towards Iran and Turkey. Massively outgunned, many were killed by the helicopter gunship fire and tanks at the command of Saddam’s well trained and brutal troops. BBC Middle East correspondent Jim Muir revisits the exodus.

Illegal miners have invaded three Ghanaian gold mines in recent months. We visit the largest where some locals are claiming that the land is rightfully theirs. The multinational owners disagree, and are demanding the military force them off their concession. For its part, the government has remained largely silent, until now. Ed Butler visits the mine and speaks to all sides in a dispute that could have big implications for Ghana's economy and security.

The dancer, Dane Hurst, has bought a former Rambert Company dance floor (deep, protective, roll out vinyl) to take back to his home in South Africa, for under-privileged kids to dance on. Modern Dance is like a magic carpet. It transported young Dane out of the volatility, violence and poverty of his childhood in segregated Port Elizabeth, to life as a Rambert student and dancer in London. He believes it can transport other young people.

On the last days of the civil war in Sri Lanka, in 2009, surviving in a bunker with what was left of his family, the only thing Santhan wanted to do was to sing. He lost his son and daughter in a shell attack. The other son was arrested. All was lost including his music. Priyath Liyanage tells Santhan's story on one man determined to keep singing despite the tragic consequences of war.

As the political atmosphere grows more hostile to the refugees who Angela Merkel famously welcomed in autumn 2015, five families continue with their attempts to settle in Berlin. Presenter Amy Zayed, follows their struggles with German bureaucracy.

Dave Edmonds travels to the mid-western city of St Louis (location for the musical 'Meet Me In St Louis', starring Judy Garland) for the US chess championships. The city has become a world centre for the game of chess. Its status has partly been achieved by funding from a controversial multi-millionaire, whose childhood included time in an orphanage. Rex Sinquefield is well known for his fascination with the game and his enthusiasm is shared by many others. There is a thriving chess centre, elite tournaments which attract some of the top players, a Chess Hall of Fame and chess lessons in local schools.St Louis is one of America's most violent cities and has most recently been in the news for race riots which erupted when an unarmed black man was shot by police. Can the game of chess serve to lessen racial tension and unite its citizens across the board?Producer: Mark Savage

The Eurovision Song Contest is the most watched entertainment show on the planet with 200 million people tuning in to see singers compete under their national flags. But backstage, it is as much about politics as pop. Ahead of this year’s competition in Stockholm, the Swedish Ambassador to London, Nicola Clase, explains why diplomats take it seriously.

For some Rudolf Kastner is a hero, for others a traitor. Mark Lawson explores the cultural retellings of a story that began in Nazi occupied Hungary in 1944. At the time Kastner, a lawyer and a journalist, was deputy chairman of the Relief and Rescue Committee. He negotiated with Adolf Eichmann to save Jewish lives but did he pay for them with other Jewish lives? In this programme, Mark Lawson talks to those within Israel - including the playwright Motti Lerner, the Chief Historian of Yad Vashem Professor Dina Porat, and the literary critic Professor Dan Laor - who have all wrestled with Kastner's story and the issues it raises. Image: A Hungarian woman looks for her relatives names on the Hungarian Jewish holocaust victims memorial wall in Budapest, Credit AFP/Getty Images

Human rights may aspire to be universal - they should belong to everyone, everywhere - but there has been resistance to them on philosophical or theological grounds by powerful states and world religions. Lawyer Helena Kennedy looks at these issues and the rise of the human rights movement since 1948.