'Queer' Wars: The claim that LGBT rights are human rights meets fierce, sometimes deadly opposition in many parts of the world. Politicians and religious leaders invoke tradition to deflect such universal claims, accusing Western activists of neo colonial interference. Laurie Taylor talks to Dennis Altman, Professorial Fellow in Human Security at La Trobe University, Melbourne, who has examined the international polarisation over sexual rights. He asks how best we can advocate for change in contexts where people face violence and imprisonment for their sexuality and gender. They're joined by Lama Abu- Odeh, Professor in Law at Georgetown University, Washington.

Also, Nigerian Beauty Pageants. Juliet Gilbert, Teaching Fellow in African Studies and Anthropology at the University of Birmingham, reflects on the popularity of such spectacles in a country where crowned winners use pageantry as a 'platform' for success, hoping to overcome the double bind of gender and generation in a deeply religious and patriarchal society.

Producer: Jayne Egerton.

The winner of the 2016 British Sociological Association & Thinking Allowed Ethnography award, Maxim Bolt, Lecturer in Anthropology and African Studies at the University of Birmingham, talks to Laurie Taylor about his groundbreaking study of insecure lives on the border farms between Zimbabwe and South Africa. How do people create homes and stability in times of mass unemployment and uncertainty? Also, transcultural sport: Max Mauro, Associate Lecturer in Sports Studies at Southampton Solent University, considers young Congolese migrants establishing a sense of belonging in a Dublin football team.

Producer: Jayne Egerton.

How did one of the world's most successful sportsmen, an inspiration to millions, end up serving a prison sentence after killing his girlfriend?

The luxury hotels in the beach resorts of Tunisia which were once packed with tourists now lie nearly empty. The slaughter on the beach at Sousse on June 26th has added Tunisia to a growing list of no-go areas for Western tourists. Tunisia is 99% Muslim but was considered an oasis of secularism in the Arab World. Its revolution in 2011 marked the beginning of The Arab Spring, bringing democratic government in place of a dictatorship. But all those hopes now appear to have turned to dust. Tunisia sends more fighters to Syria than any other Arab country, perhaps as many as 3000. Tunisia is now ruled by a coalition that includes an overtly Islamist party, called Ennahda. So what does the future hold for the country? Is it going down a radical route?

Ernie Rea is joined by Zoe Petkanas, working on a Ph.D on Gender, Law and Social Change in North Africa at Cambridge University; Dr Radwan Masmoudi, President of the Centre of the Study of Islam and Democracy in Washington D.C.; and Berny Sebe, Senior Lecturer in colonial and post colonial studies at Birmingham University.

Produced by Nija Dalal-Small.

World War One ravaged Tanzania. East Africans were recruited as carriers and fighters, and many more were affected by the destruction of crops by retreating forces. As many as a million died from starvation and sickness as well as from their wounds, yet the war is barely remembered there now. Oswald Masebo, Professor of History at the University of Dar es Salaam, explores the conundrum with an audience at the auditorium of the British Council in Tanzania.

Love, Money and HIV in Kenya. Laurie Taylor talks to Sanyu Mojola, Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado, and author of a study exploring how modern women in developing countries experience sexuality and love. Drawing on a rich variety of interview, ethnographic and survey data from her native country of Kenya, she examines how young African women, who suffer disproportionate rates of HIV infection compared to young African men, navigate their relationships, schooling, employment and financial access in the context of a devastating HIV epidemic and economic inequality.

Also, Thomas Thurnell-Read, Lecturer in Sociology at Coventry University, discusses his study of microbreweries and the revival of traditional beer in the UK.

Producer: Jayne Egerton.

This week, various authors remember a significant swimming experience:

1. Novelist Christopher Hope describes a Pretoria swimming pool of his youth, where, if things got too much, he'd happily sink to the bottom and stay there a while. Letting things pass over him...

Producer Duncan Minshull.

Grace Mugabe has been an almost silent figure at her husband, Robert Mugabe's side for almost two decades. Now she is starting to flex her own political muscles, which some are interpreting as a bid for the Presidency. But does she have the skill and the support to secure the top job and a Mugabe dynasty? In December she will head Zanu-PF's Women's League which will make her one of the most powerful people in Zimbabwe's governing party. Jo Fidgen questions how much 'soft' power she already has over her husband and whether she makes a credible political leader?

A series of five essays from writers around the Commonwealth which start on Commonwealth Day 10th March and tackle the past, present and future of this unique international organisation.

Tolu Ogunlesi, poet and author from Nigeria looks at whether young people in Lagos can relate to the Commonwealth.

Radio 3's twenty-part essay series on the Islamic Golden Age continues its exploration through this five-hundred-year period of empire, innovation, religious turmoil, scientific discovery and major advances in philosophical thought. In this evening's essay, Dr. Amira Bennison examines the creation of two great cities of learning - Baghdad and Cairo.

The medieval Middle East is the stuff of fantasy, from the windswept deserts of Arabia to the bustling bazaars of cities like Baghdad and Cairo. But what were these cities actually like? And what part did they play in creating great men (and sometimes women) of letters, science and art? Cities figured in the Muslim imagination as hubs of religion, government, commerce and culture. Medieval Muslim geographers often conceptualised their world as one of routes linking an endless series of towns and cities like stars glittering in the firmament. Although some of these cities like Jerusalem or Damascus were already ancient when the Muslims arrived in the 7th century, others, Baghdad and Cairo included, were new Muslim creations - brash, vibrant and dense with talent, the New Yorks of their age.

Producer: Mohini Patel.

Radio 3's twenty part essay series on the Islamic Golden Age continues its exploration through this five hundred year period of empire, innovation, religious turmoil, scientific discovery and major advances in philosophical thought. In this evening's essay, we hear about the controversial Egyptian imam-caliph, Al Hakim and his sister Sitt al-Mulk. At worst, al Hakim has a reputation as the "mad" caliph and the destoroyer of the Holy Sepulchre church in Jerusalem. At best - he's a capricious tyrant. Dr. Simonetta Calderini and Dr. Delia Cortese share their forensic academic research into these controversial siblings and the essay is read by Dr. Simonetta Calderini.

Producer: Sarah Taylor.

Adventurer and journalist Simon Reeve heads to east Africa to uncover the stories behind the nation's favourite drink. While we drink millions of cups of the stuff each day, how many of us know where our tea actually comes from? The surprising answer is that most of the leaves that go into our everyday teabags do not come from India or China but are bought from an auction in the coastal city of Mombasa in Kenya.

From here, Simon follows the tea trail through the epic landscapes of Kenya and Uganda and meets some of the millions of people who pick, pack and transport our tea. Drinking tea with everyone from Masai cattle herders to the descendants of the original white tea planters, Simon learns that the industry that supplies our everyday cuppa is not immune to the troubles of the continent - poverty, low wages and child labour.

After playing Baltimore drug boss Stringer Bell in The Wire, and Detective John Luther on British television, Idris Elba is now appearing in a very different role - Nelson Mandela in Long Walk to Freedom. Chris Bowlby profiles the British actor who some think will one day be the first black James Bond.

Producer: Smita Patel.

Melilla is a Spanish enclave on the north coast of Africa - one of Europe’s most southerly land borders with the continent. It is a town under intense pressure from migration as those seeking a different life within the European Union mass on its border with Morocco.

Linda Pressly meets the migrants who wait for months, camped on a Moroccan mountain, for an opportunity to scale the six metre high fence and enter Melilla. But the Spanish territory is also a regional trading hub. Linda also meets the 'mule’ women of Melilla - the women who transport heavy loads of merchandise across the border.

Last September, a man in his twenties was found dead in Portman Avenue, a suburban street in west London. He had suffered horrendous injuries to his head and face. He had no identity papers on him and no one had reported him missing.

Rob Walker follows the Metropolitan police investigation into who he was and how he arrived in Portman Avenue. It is a story that spans two continents and eight countries.

(Image: E-fit, issued by the Metropolitan Police. Anyone with information about the whereabouts of José Matada’s next of kin should contact the Metropolitan Police on +44 20 8247 7249)

The Harlem Shake is an internet dance craze which has been performed around the world. But in Tunisia, dancers have been attacked by religious conservatives known as Salafists. As Neal Razzell reports, it’s the latest example of growing polarisation in the birthplace of the Arab Spring. He meets young conservative women who complain that students are being allowed to dance half naked at school, while they’re banned from attending class in the veil, or niqab.

Meanwhile, liberal protesters see reaction against the dance is further evidence of the slow Islamisation of society. This debate is happening against a backdrop of political crisis following the assassination of a secular opposition leader and general fears about rising levels of violence.

(Image of Tunisian students performing the Internet craze, the 'Harlem Shake' outside their school. Credit: FETHI BELAID/AFP/Getty Images)

Every year thousands of young men and women make the treacherous journey from Eritrea to Egypt via Sudan in search of a better life. Along the route many fall victim to unscrupulous people traffickers who kidnap them and demand ransom money from their families. Some are able to pay and their loved ones are released. Others are not so lucky. Mike Thomson talks to the people caught up in this brutal trade and travels to Sinai to meet those who are trying to help them.

Escape from Sinai was produced by Nina Manwaring.

(Image: An Eritrean hostage recently released in Sinai. Credit: BBC )

The last time Kenya held a general election, voters from different ethnic groups turned on one another over a contested result. More than a thousand people were killed.

Five years on, the competition to succeed President Mwai Kibaki still centres around a number of highly contentious, unresolved issues: ethnicity, the division of resources, and access to land.

These tensions are particularly acute on Kenya’s coast. Decades of anger about land grabbing by people from other parts of Kenya has led to the rise of a separatist movement that says only independence can help coastal achieve their rights.

For Assignment, Gabriel Gatehouse asks how much of a threat the separatists will pose to the government that will take power after the elections. Are land and ethnicity the real fault-lines, or are there other factors at play?

(Image of Mealii Ali who was evicted from her home when the land was claimed by someone else. BBC Copyright)

For Assignment Justin Marozzi travels to Libya to report on whether the fractured country can come together again after its revolution in 2011.

The city of Misrata arguably suffered the most during the Libyan conflict as missiles rained down on it for months on end. By the end of the revolution though, fighters from Misrata had exacted their revenge on neighbouring towns and had been responsible for the capture of Colonel Gaddafi, as well as Gaddafi strongholds. More recently Misratan fighters have been in action against the city of Bani Walid. Many residents of Bani Walid, accused of being Gaddafi supporters, have been expelled from their homes. Misrata has, effectively, set itself up as a city state, outside the control of Libya's new government.

Writer and journalist Justin Marozzi, who has been visiting Libya over the last twenty years, including during the revolution, asks if reconciliation is possible while different armed groups continue to fight each other? The programme contains strong language and allegations of atrocities which some listeners may find disturbing.

Produced by John Murphy.

(Image of building in Libya - BBC Copyright)