The rights of LGBT people are on the chopping block across the world, with new countries criminalizing same-sex practices and banning representation of queer relationships in 2025. However, the landscape for LGBT rights has also shifted tremendously towards progress over the past decades. What gives? 

This week, we explore the texture of progress for LGBT rights. As Indonesia prepares for a new Criminal Code that will outlaw same-sex relations, prominent local advocate Dédé Oetomo charts the trajectory of LGBT rights from cultural openness to increasing repression. Indonesia’s path illustrates a pattern of both forward movement and backtracking on the rights of LGBT people across the globe.  

Dédé Oetomo: Scholar and activist 

Kyle Knight: Associate Director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch 

Phillip Ayoub: Professor in the Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy at University College London 

Since April 2023, more than a half-million people have been displaced in Sudan due to fighting between two armed forces who were once aligned. The story of how the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese Armed Forces turned on each other, with devastating consequences for Sudan’s civilians, can be traced back to 2013 when a group of dissidents were told by their interrogators to ride a bicycle drawn with chalk on the wall of a Sudanese jail.  

Detained for providing legal support to torture survivors, Human Rights Watch researcher Mohamed “Mo” Osman was introduced to the power structures that have shaped today’s conflict. In “The Chalk Bicycle,” host Ngofeen Mputubwele takes listeners through a decade that began with conflict, then saw the ousting of a dictator and great hopes for democracy only to be plunged back into conflict again.  

Mohamed Osman: Researcher, Africa Division at Human Rights Watch 

Christopher Tounsel: Associate Professor of History, Director of Graduate Studies and Director of African Studies Program at the University of Washington 

In the early aughts, a campaign to “Save Sudan” became the bipartisan issue of the time. Celebrities and politicians alike implored a global audience to pay attention to and advocate against Suan’s human rights crisis.  

As interventions waned, so did the attention of many global onlookers. But, since the Sudan Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces began fighting in April 2023, over 500,000 Sudanese civilians have been displaced. What has happened in Sudan since the world stopped paying attention?  

It’s been a year since our first episodes on Sudan. Since then, it has been the largest humanitarian crisis in the world. And things are only getting worse. Yet despite the scale of the onslaught on civilians, global mobilization has been missing. 

Mohamed Osman: Researcher, Africa Division at Human Rights Watch  

Christopher Tounsel: Associate Professor of History, Director of Graduate Studies and Director of African Studies Program at the University of Washington 

When Harpinder Chauhan walked into his probation officer’s office in Florida, he thought it was just another check-in. Minutes later, he was in handcuffs and detained by ICE. In this episode of Rights and Wrongs, host Ngofeen Mputubwele talks to Harpinder about what it’s really like inside U.S. immigration detention— his days spent shackled, sleeping on concrete, and pleading for basic medical care. And he also speaks to an immigration lawyer about the profits and policies that are the driving force behind this cruel and inhumane system. 

Harpinder Chauhan: ICE detainee 

Katie Blankenship: Co-founder of Sanctuary of the South 

In 1977, American Nazis fought for the right to march in Skokie, Illinois—a town filled with Holocaust survivors—and won. Nearly fifty years later, late-night host Jimmy Kimmel was suspended for jokes the government says went too far. What connects these moments? Host Ngofeen Mputubwele talks with Aryeh Neier—Holocaust survivor, former ACLU director, and Human Rights Watch co-founder—about why he once defended Nazis’ right to march, and what that case reveals about protecting free speech and democracy today.  

Aryeh Neier: Co-founder of Human Rights Watch 

What’s the scariest sound in a war zone? In Kherson, Ukraine, it isn’t artillery or fighter jets—it’s the faint buzz of a $200 quadcopter drone. In this episode of Rights & Wrongs, host Ngofeen Mputubwele takes us inside Russia’s use of drones to stalk and attack civilians on the front line. Survivors describe the terror of being hunted from above, and Human Rights Watch’s Belkis Wille explains how drones are being misused to commit war crimes, what it could mean for civilians in future conflicts —and why we should be responding now. 

Belkis Wille: Associate Director of Crisis & Conflict division at Human Rights Watch. 

Roger and Daniela arrived in the U.S. in January, conditionally approved as refugees. Hours later, she was deported. Roger  vanished. When Rights & Wrongs first aired this story in May, it traced how a Venezuelan millennial with no criminal record ended up detained in El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act—a centuries-old wartime law now repurposed for mass deportations. 

In a stunning twist two months later, the Trump administration brokered a deal: 10 Americans held in Venezuela were exchanged for 252 Venezuelans imprisoned in El Salvador, including Roger. 

In this update, host Ngofeen Mputubwele recaps Roger’s journey and  speaks with him about what really happened inside El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. 

Roger Eduardo Molina Acevedo : Venezuelan citizen expelled to El Salvador 

Juan Pappier: Deputy Director of Americas at Human Rights Watch  

In 2012, a Ugandan TV host asked trans activist Pepe Julian Onziema a now-infamous question: “Why are you gay?” The clip went viral, spawning internet fodder around the world – but behind the memes lies a chilling reality. In this episode of Rights & Wrongs, host Ngofeen Mputubwele looks at Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act, a 2023 law that punishes same-sex intimacy with life in prison or even death. He speaks with “Emmanuel,” a young man in Kampala whose Grindr date turned into a violent police sting. Human Rights Watch researcher Oryem Nyeko explains how the law has fueled mob violence, extortion, and fear. But amid the repression, mothers of queer children are speaking up, leading the resistance in one of the world’s harshest anti-LGBT climates. 

Oryem Nyeko: Senior researcher in the Africa Division at Human Rights Watch 

Last year, we told the story of how President Nayib Bukele came to power in El Salvador on a promise of ending gang violence. He succeeded, turning a state that was the world’s murder capital into one with one of the lowest homicide rates in the Western Hemisphere. But in the process, he systematically dismantled democratic checks and balances and arbitrarily detained tens of thousands of people, including children. El Salvador now has the highest rate of incarceration in the world.  

This year, the story took a darker turn. The Trump administration deported over 200 Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador, where they were locked up in a maximum-security prison with no way to challenge their detention. We’re re-airing this episode with a chilling update on the dangerous deal between Trump and Bukele— and how it signals Trump’s growing alliance with authoritarian leaders to advance his hardline agenda. 

Juanita Goebertus Estrada: Director of Human Rights Watch’s Americas Division   

José Miguel Cruz: Director of Research at Florida International University's Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center 

Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte took office with a vow to eliminate illegal drugs. His “war on drugs” resulted in the brutal killing of between 12,000 and 30,000 people. Despite the international outcry and extensive media coverage of the deaths and their impact, Duterte remained popular—and untouchable – until recently.  In March, he was arrested on an International Criminal Court warrant for crimes against humanity and is now sitting in a jail cell in The Hague. 

Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa, whose fearless reporting helped expose Duterte’s brutal drug war, was targeted by Duterte – accused of everything from tax evasion to libel. In this episode of Rights & Wrongs, host Ngofeen Mputubwele speaks with Ressa and Human Rights Watch researchers about Duterte’s bloody legacy, the importance of standing up to dictators, and what his arrest means for other leaders indicted by the ICC.  

Maria Ressa: CEO of Rappler and Nobel Peace Prize winner 

Carlos Conde: Senior researcher at the Asia division of Human Rights Watch 

Maria Elena Vignoli: Senior counsel in the International Justice Program of Human Rights Watch