GENERIC TITLES JA VOICE-OVER CUT WITH AUDIO FROM NEWS CLIPS
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I am Julian Assange.
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Editor of WikiLeaks.
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Weve exposed the worlds secrets;
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Been attacked by the powerful.
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For 500 days now I have been detained without charge, but that hasnt stopped us.
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Today we are on a quest for revolutionary ideas that can change the world tomorrow.
PROGRAMME SPECIFIC INTRO - JA VOICEOVER 00.33 01.16 From humble origins, my guest Imran Kahn became a household name as captain of Pakistans victorious cricket team. He then left sport and launched his Movement for Justice party in the most dangerous political environment on earth. For years, Kahns anti-corruption party was ignored. In 2007 US State Department cables refer to him as Pakistans one-man party. But, Pakistan is changing fast. Over the last two years, widespread anger over US drone strikes and corrupt political dynasties has driven millions to his cause. I want to know why is he now front-runner to be the next leader of Pakistan.
01.17 IK Hi Julian.
JA Imran, Im alright. I have a bit of a cold but I think that's a good thing because my voice is a bit sexier than normal and I have to compete with you!
01.30 IK I thought we were having interesting times here, but you are having a very interesting time.
01.33 JA Well, I think your interesting time is a bit more interesting than my interesting time. I saw these videos of your rallies last night... so I think this is great but I worry that you're going to get blown up. So, I hope your interesting time doesn't get any more interesting!
01.48 IK Julian, you've got to go sometime. I mean, better to go for some cause rather than just... Like I was, you know, when I set up this cancer hospital so I used to see healthy people coming in and six months later they were gone so I have a completely different attitude to life and death.
02.06 JA You're not around for long so you might as well make the most of it.
02.12 IK Yeah. You don't realise the impact your... the WikiLeaks made not just
02.22 JA Let me pause you here, Imran. Youre broken up for some reason. Weve just lost you for a minute erm ok, youre back
02.31 IK the impact it made all over the world but in Pakistan - the way they exposed all these two-faced politicians, you know, who were sucking up to the Americans and saying... in private telling them how great they were and, you know, sucking up to them, and in public giving completely opposite statements, so it was a... especially this one religious, er... this guy who's the cleric who leads this religious party, and he literally told the Americans, he said 'Look, if you back me to become the prime minister, I'll do whatever you want me to do', and he's conserv... the most anti-American politician here. So anyway, it was a great... it really exposed a lot of people here.
03.18 JA Imran, can you describe what are the big power factions in Pakistan? Is it the ICI, the Army? Is it the Supreme Court, er... the old families? How would you describe the basic power structure of Pakistan?
03.34 IK Well, the battle in Pakistan, just like in the Middle East, is of a status quo, an entrenched status quo - what you call the power structure benefited from the system, and the majority of the population wanted a change. So, what you see in the Middle East is exactly this, whereas the West looks upon Muslim societies as there's some war going on between fundamentalists and liberals, Islamic fundamentalists/liberals. Actually, this is really the dividing line in the Muslim world, which is why everyone got surprised by the Arab Spring. And Pakistan... the following I have now is the same... are the same people who are coming out in the Middle East, people wanting a change. An anti-status quo movement. Now, what is the status quo in Pakistan, we have political mafias. All the political parties have now got together against me.
04.28 JA But this is... this is a good sign isnt it, Imran? If people are gathering around to oppose you they must be scared.
04.38 IK Oh, they're petrified because the last time in Pakistan we saw rallies as big as the two I took out, one in Lahore and one in Karachi, was 40 years ago by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the father of Benazir. And when that... these sort of numbers turned out he swept the election, he just swept... and he was an underdog and all the status quo parties were blown away so that's why they've all got scared.
05.09 We researched the WikiLeaks cables from Islamabad to see what they said about you, and in 2007 the US ambassador said: 'Khan, whose PTI Party is effectively a one-man show, has little to lose. His credibility rests in his self-created role as a politician who sticks to his principles and he is popular with the Pakistani intelligence here and elements of diaspora, but Khan has never been able to turn his starring role of captain of Pakistan's only team to win the International Cricket Championship into an effective political party'. That's obviously changed now, what's happened in the last few months?
05.50 IK Well Julian, what happened was that... a media... from about 2005 onwards, we suddenly had a proliferation of independent television channels and the most... the most watched programmes became current affairs programmes, so today if you watch our television it's like having eight Jeremy Paxman at prime time. So, at 8pm you have top... these guys who become opinion-makers like Jeremy Paxman. You will have on the main - on all the channels - and at prime time, where you would, for instance, have Big Brother in England or some soap opera, here at prime time people want to watch current affairs programmes, and such is the desire, um, to understand the political situation of people's... such is the interest there that they are at prime time and they have the highest viewership.
06.56 JA And so what's happened in the past six months? I mean, there's really been a tremendous rise. The opinion polls that I have read have your popular support it's something between 60 to 80% of the Pakistani population. But perhaps you could describe this, um, how your party has grown in size and momentum, and what's it like for you trying to manage this incredibly fast-growing organisation?
07.27 IK Well, first of all, I boycotted the elections in 2008, um, because, you know, these elections were manipulated by the Bush administration. They brokered a deal between Musharraf and Benazir, where all the corruption cases were, and not only... her other crooked politicians, they were given an amnesty by Musharraf - and this was a deal brokered by the Americans and it was called the NRO, the National Reconciliation Ordinance. So, in the name of reconciliation, the Americans got Musharraf and Benazir together - and Condoleezza Rice in her latest book triumphantly writes about it- that... how Bush gave her a pat on the back when she got them together, and so... so I, and along with a lot of other parties, boycotted the election because we felt that this was pre-poll rigging. For a while my graph went down because we stayed out of elections, and then as the governments began to mess up, because once the criminals came to power corruption broke all records in Pakistan naturally, because when you are allow crime to pay, crime multiplies and so, as they went up, people started remembering that I warned everyone when I was boycotting the election that this election is a disast... is going to be a disaster for the people of Pakistan. It's only meant for the Bush administration to have a puppet. One... remove one puppet Musharraf was struggling so he was likely to go they wanted another puppet government so they could pursue this War on Terror where our own Army was bombing our own people...
09.09 JA Yep.
IK and so... so whatever I was saying... corruption went through the roof, the War on Terror was... has been devastating for Pakistan because 40,000 Pakistanis have been killed in a war we had nothing to do with. Basically, our own Army killing our own people and them then doing suicide attacks on Pakistani civilians and the country has lost 70 billion dollars on this war. Total aid has been less than 20 billion. So, I was saying all these things and suddenly it was... it just resonated with the people, and almost two years ago my graph started going up. Now, since the big rallies, the whole political scene has changed. We have seen now politicians rushing to me. So people who are electables, realising that the vote bank now belongs to me; so people who are electables, realising that the vote bank now belongs to me, they are coming to join me.
10.05 JA I heard that even Musharraf tried to say to you: 'You PM, me President'.
10.17 IK Well, you see, Musharraf... does not understand what is happening in Pakistan because he's outside. His whole idea of politics is on the Facebook. He doesn't realise that on the ground in Pakistan the situation is... is completely different. Number one, he will be the biggest liability to get allied to, but number two, he's responsible for the mess. He's responsible for this record corruption because he's the one who gave them amnesty, the criminals. Nowhere in the world are criminals given amnesty, and then allowed to contest elections again, and then get into power. And secondly, this War on Terror - so he's responsible for both.
11.00 JA If you look at, say, the Soviet Union which also had a lot of corruption but people said 'Well, well at least a black market is a market', so you can have some kind of trading, it helps you get around regulations which are impeding business. What is the problem with corruption in Pakistan? Why is corruption bad for Pakistan?
11.24 IK Just to give you another statistic - that in our entire history of 60 years, the total debt accumulated by Pakistan is about... was 5 trillion. In just four years, the debt has gone up from 5 to 12 trillion. So we are now borrowing to service our debts. So, if out of 1.8 trillion, debt servicing is 800 billion, half of it goes to debt servicing, 600 billion goes to pay for the Army, 180 million people have 200 billion rupees to live on. So, clearly, the country's unviable. So, in the case of Russia, they could still go on; in the case of Pakistan we're looking at the abyss, we're looking at the... us going down the drain. The country is heading towards complete chaos. We don't have money to run the country and... at the moment load shedding... we don't have money to buy fuel to, er... to put in our power generation, so because we cannot buy fuel for our power generation - or the government can't - there's almost 14 hours' load shedding, there is no electricity for 14 hours a day.
12.50 JA For 14 hours a day. Amazing. And the corruption in Pakistan, the tax evasion is one thing, but the stealing of money from the Treasury - how much of that ends up back in Pakistan, ie. it's just taking from the poor or the middle class and transferring it to the rich in Pakistan, versus how much of the money is taken out of Pakistan and stashed into London banks or stashed into Swiss banks or US companies?
13.20 IK So, two things: Number one, because we do not have money to pay for... to get furnace oil for our power generation, the country is having load shedding, there's no electricity here for 14 to 15 hours a day, 18 hours in the rural areas. That means that farmers can't run their, er, the tubers to water their crops; that means that factories and industries are closing down; that means there's massive unemployment, on top of inflation. So, that's one aspect of corruption. The second is that most of this money ends up in Swiss bank accounts. Most of our top... almost... I am the only political leader who made his money outside Pakistan, and I have everything in Pakistan and in my name. Apart from me, all political leaders, heads of political parties, they have bank accounts abroad, they've properties abroad and it's not declared, so this money, most of this money ends up outside the country.
14.24 JA Let's move on to the US. Tell me about this assassination of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan. What was the feeling in Pakistan? That the ICI was hiding Osama Bin Laden, that they are incompetent? Why was Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan?
14.45 IK Julian, what you must understand is that Osama Bin Laden was trained by the ISI and CIA, the whole al-Qaeda were trained by the CIA and the ISI about 20 years back, so this... these people were assets of the Pakistan Army. They were trained by the Pakistan Army and the ISI, financed by the CIA, but they were fighting the Soviets, and for a long time these groups had very close association with the Pakistan secret agencies. Now suddenly comes 9/11 and you do a 180 degrees turn. I mean, Musharraf does a 180 degrees turn, but it doesnt mean that all along the way that people would have accepted this. Because here were people trained for Jihad - Jihad in this case means fighting a foreign occupation - so how were you going to convince them having indoctrinated not only, er, these militant groups but also your own agencies, that they're fighting foreign occupation as a religious duty.
15.55 JA By some subset in the ICI. Some people perhaps who had dealt with him in the past who were still loyal.
16.01 IK Of course, people who would have thought that fighting another foreign occupation, which is now the US, is also religious duty, of course it's possible.
16.11 JA Is there a feeling that the US is helping clean out militants in Pakistan, or is there a feeling that it's a violation of Pakistani sovereignty?
16.20 IK This was the ultimate humiliation. Here is a country, which is... at that time had lost about 35,000 people, dead fighting Americas war, and - as I said - the country had lost far more in terms of material losses than the aid given to us, so... - and the government puts the figure to 70 billion dollars, Aid under 20 billion - so therefore here is a country that's supposed to be sacrificing for the US, and then our ally did not trust us and actually came and killed someone on our own soil. It was that, the two factors combined: a) the sacrifices, and secondly, here is an ally which - are we a friend or an enemy? - so... forget about what the government thought, I'm talking about the people of the country, who didn't really know what was going on, because, um, was the... as the Army was being accused, the Army might have kept them or...
JA Yep.
IK ...either they were incompetent or in cahoots - but what about the people? SO it... there was... if anything there was a very strong reaction born out of a feeling of humiliation.
17.35 JA And do you think... you know, that the US argue that Osama Bin Laden is a terrorist responsible for the deaths of many Americans so they have a right to go in and take him out...
17.48 IK All I'm saying is that War on Terror is not... somehow the confusion is that you win a War on Terror by bombs and, you know, killing people actually, War on Terror is won when you win hearts and minds of people. If you lose that war, there is no way this is going to end. I mean, Pakistan is more radicalised today than it was eight years back. Pakistan is more polarised today - it's a polarised society - than it was eight years back. Whatever we do, military is not a solution. We have failed for eight years, the Americans have failed for eleven years. What are we going to do now which is different? And, as Einstein said, madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. It's not going to happen, there's no military solution, the only way is a political solution. Pakistan can play a part in the political solution. We do not have politicians who are capable or credible enough, so you need elections, a credible government hopefully, us - we'll start a political dialogue, help the Americans in an exit strategy from Afghanistan. This is the only way out of this.
19.00 JA Imran, we discovered a cable in 2009 from the Islamabad Embassy. Prime Minister Gilani and Interior Minister Malik went into the embassy and offered to share NADRA - that is the voting record system for all voters in Pakistan, and a front company was set up in the United Kingdom - International Identity Services, which was hired as the consultants for NADRA to squirrel out the NADRA data for all of Pakistan. It seems to me that that is a theft of some national treasure of Pakistan, the entire Pakistani database registry of its people.
20.03 IK Julian, it's so shameful. You know, never has a country's ruling elite, for personal benefits, never have they betrayed their people as much as this elite under Musharraf and the current elite. Not only have they done this, there have been countless numbers of people who have disappeared in Pakistan on suspicion of terrorism. There were Pakistanis, or people from Pakistani soil, handed over to the Americans on mere suspicion of... of them being involved in some terrorism - and people have disappeared, people are eliminated, suspects are eliminated through drone attacks... um, and not only suspects, their wives, their children, their neighbours are eliminated. Never has there been any enquiry into were these people innocent or not. No country has ever been bombed by its own ally, as we have been bombed in this country. Um, as I said, it's the most shameful period of our history. Never has a country's ruling elite betrayed its people so much as this current ruling elite - and for personal benefits, because all of them have bank accounts abroad, they have money lying abroad and guess what? the Americans know all about the accounts. They're illegal, money siphoned off from here.
21.26 JA How would you reconfigure the Pakistan relationship with the United States? Would it be a complete severance? What would you... you would permit drone strikes? what kind of intelligence co-operation? What would you do in practice?
21.44 IK Have a relationship based on dignity/self-respect. So, it should be a relationship like the US has with India. It should not be a relationship of a client/master relationship, and even worse here, Pakistan as a hired gun, being paid to kill Americas enemies. It's not... it's a relationship that has failed. It's neither delivered to the people of Pakistan nor has it delivered to the Americans. Er, the only thing that the Americans should be told is that 'Look, there will be no terrorism from our side', but you can only do that if you are no longer perceived to be a stooge of the Americans. Only a sovereign credible government can then deal with terrorism. At the moment, the terrorists or the militants have declared Jihad against Pakistan government, so they are killing our soldiers and our police guys, saying that these are collaborators of the Americans. So the moment you pull out of this war, this Jihad goes; the moment the Jihad goes, we then can start sifting who the real enemy is within our borders, and then only can we guarantee that there will be no terrorism from our side. So therefore, number one step has to be pull out of this war, no more aid. We become a sovereign independent state and the relationship with the US should be of dignity and self-respect, no longer of a client/master relationship.
23.13 JA You give a good description of how the War on Terror in Pakistan is being counter-productive; it's created enmity towards the Pakistani government; 35,000 to 45,000 Pakistanis have lost their lives - why do you think the United States pursues its agenda, its drone strikes in Pakistan, if the US ambassador even is writing back saying that it's counter-productive? What is the driving forces from the US?
23.43 IK Well Julian, I think it is because the... because, just like us, the policy in the US is being driven by Pentagon. It's the... it's the Army people who are driving this policy, because only military people always think of military solutions. If you look at Vietnam and you listen to, I think, was it General McNamara or someone? I just remember a long time ago, I mean, them also saying way back in the late 60s that 'We've turned the corner, we're about to win the war, a few more men, a few more bombing and this will do the trick'... so generals always think like that.
24.24 JA One final question, Imran, have you met A.Q. Khan, and what do you think about the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb?
24.40 IK I have met A.Q. Khan, you know, not recently but a couple of years back, but Ive known him for 20 years because he gave the first donation to... when I started building the cancer hospital he was the one that came forward first. He is a hero... he's hero-worshipped in Pakistan because Pakistanis look upon him as someone who gave us security. In other words, the same reason given by the Israelis - that they needed the bomb because they're surrounded by hostile neighbours, it's the same in Pakistan, we fought three wars with India, which is seven times the size of Pakistan and there is a lot of insecurity in the country, and this is the guy who's supposed to have secured us - so from that point of view he is hero-worshiped in Pakistan. Um, what I think of him, I dont really know. Was he involved in this proliferation or not? There are two points of view: one, er you know, by the Americans and Musharraf, the other A.Q. Khan himself, saying that 'Look, Im ready to, er, give all evidence that I never was involved in this'. Now, I dont really know, he admitted on television that he was involved in it, but he said he was forced by Musharraf to do that, so I dont really know the truth behind it, Julian. Personally, Im anti-nuclear... Im totally, er... for a world where... which has no nuclear bombs, er... but at the moment, the way the situation is, er, people will argue here that ever since we've had wide... nuclear weapons, even though there's been a lot of tension - we've come close - but there has been no war between Pakistan and India. And before the nuclear weapon, there were three wars...
JA Yeah.
IK ... so people will argue from that point of view.
26.33 JA Ok, Imran thank you very much.
26.37 IK Thank you and I wish you all the best because I think you have done a great thing. What you did with WikiLeaks, you know, freedom of information is the most important thing because we are basically controlled by people withholding information - and this is really a power and, as I've said, Im the biggest beneficiary in this country. These mafias would have just controlled information, and people like me would never had a chance of coming to power in Pakistan, so thank you and all the best.
[12:49:56.13] JA: Thank you, Imran. Good luck.
27.10 END CREDITS
PROGRAMME SPECIFIC INTRO - JA VOICEOVER 00.33 01.16 From humble origins, my guest Imran Kahn became a household name as captain of Pakistans victorious cricket team. He then left sport and launched his Movement for Justice party in the most dangerous political environment on earth. For years, Kahns anti-corruption party was ignored. In 2007 US State Department cables refer to him as Pakistans one-man party. But, Pakistan is changing fast. Over the last two years, widespread anger over US drone strikes and corrupt political dynasties has driven millions to his cause. I want to know why is he now front-runner to be the next leader of Pakistan.
01.17 IK Hi Julian.
JA Imran, Im alright. I have a bit of a cold but I think that's a good thing because my voice is a bit sexier than normal and I have to compete with you!
01.30 IK I thought we were having interesting times here, but you are having a very interesting time.
01.33 JA Well, I think your interesting time is a bit more interesting than my interesting time. I saw these videos of your rallies last night... so I think this is great but I worry that you're going to get blown up. So, I hope your interesting time doesn't get any more interesting!
01.48 IK Julian, you've got to go sometime. I mean, better to go for some cause rather than just... Like I was, you know, when I set up this cancer hospital so I used to see healthy people coming in and six months later they were gone so I have a completely different attitude to life and death.
02.06 JA You're not around for long so you might as well make the most of it.
02.12 IK Yeah. You don't realise the impact your... the WikiLeaks made not just
02.22 JA Let me pause you here, Imran. Youre broken up for some reason. Weve just lost you for a minute erm ok, youre back
02.31 IK the impact it made all over the world but in Pakistan - the way they exposed all these two-faced politicians, you know, who were sucking up to the Americans and saying... in private telling them how great they were and, you know, sucking up to them, and in public giving completely opposite statements, so it was a... especially this one religious, er... this guy who's the cleric who leads this religious party, and he literally told the Americans, he said 'Look, if you back me to become the prime minister, I'll do whatever you want me to do', and he's conserv... the most anti-American politician here. So anyway, it was a great... it really exposed a lot of people here.
03.18 JA Imran, can you describe what are the big power factions in Pakistan? Is it the ICI, the Army? Is it the Supreme Court, er... the old families? How would you describe the basic power structure of Pakistan?
03.34 IK Well, the battle in Pakistan, just like in the Middle East, is of a status quo, an entrenched status quo - what you call the power structure benefited from the system, and the majority of the population wanted a change. So, what you see in the Middle East is exactly this, whereas the West looks upon Muslim societies as there's some war going on between fundamentalists and liberals, Islamic fundamentalists/liberals. Actually, this is really the dividing line in the Muslim world, which is why everyone got surprised by the Arab Spring. And Pakistan... the following I have now is the same... are the same people who are coming out in the Middle East, people wanting a change. An anti-status quo movement. Now, what is the status quo in Pakistan, we have political mafias. All the political parties have now got together against me.
04.28 JA But this is... this is a good sign isnt it, Imran? If people are gathering around to oppose you they must be scared.
04.38 IK Oh, they're petrified because the last time in Pakistan we saw rallies as big as the two I took out, one in Lahore and one in Karachi, was 40 years ago by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the father of Benazir. And when that... these sort of numbers turned out he swept the election, he just swept... and he was an underdog and all the status quo parties were blown away so that's why they've all got scared.
05.09 We researched the WikiLeaks cables from Islamabad to see what they said about you, and in 2007 the US ambassador said: 'Khan, whose PTI Party is effectively a one-man show, has little to lose. His credibility rests in his self-created role as a politician who sticks to his principles and he is popular with the Pakistani intelligence here and elements of diaspora, but Khan has never been able to turn his starring role of captain of Pakistan's only team to win the International Cricket Championship into an effective political party'. That's obviously changed now, what's happened in the last few months?
05.50 IK Well Julian, what happened was that... a media... from about 2005 onwards, we suddenly had a proliferation of independent television channels and the most... the most watched programmes became current affairs programmes, so today if you watch our television it's like having eight Jeremy Paxman at prime time. So, at 8pm you have top... these guys who become opinion-makers like Jeremy Paxman. You will have on the main - on all the channels - and at prime time, where you would, for instance, have Big Brother in England or some soap opera, here at prime time people want to watch current affairs programmes, and such is the desire, um, to understand the political situation of people's... such is the interest there that they are at prime time and they have the highest viewership.
06.56 JA And so what's happened in the past six months? I mean, there's really been a tremendous rise. The opinion polls that I have read have your popular support it's something between 60 to 80% of the Pakistani population. But perhaps you could describe this, um, how your party has grown in size and momentum, and what's it like for you trying to manage this incredibly fast-growing organisation?
07.27 IK Well, first of all, I boycotted the elections in 2008, um, because, you know, these elections were manipulated by the Bush administration. They brokered a deal between Musharraf and Benazir, where all the corruption cases were, and not only... her other crooked politicians, they were given an amnesty by Musharraf - and this was a deal brokered by the Americans and it was called the NRO, the National Reconciliation Ordinance. So, in the name of reconciliation, the Americans got Musharraf and Benazir together - and Condoleezza Rice in her latest book triumphantly writes about it- that... how Bush gave her a pat on the back when she got them together, and so... so I, and along with a lot of other parties, boycotted the election because we felt that this was pre-poll rigging. For a while my graph went down because we stayed out of elections, and then as the governments began to mess up, because once the criminals came to power corruption broke all records in Pakistan naturally, because when you are allow crime to pay, crime multiplies and so, as they went up, people started remembering that I warned everyone when I was boycotting the election that this election is a disast... is going to be a disaster for the people of Pakistan. It's only meant for the Bush administration to have a puppet. One... remove one puppet Musharraf was struggling so he was likely to go they wanted another puppet government so they could pursue this War on Terror where our own Army was bombing our own people...
09.09 JA Yep.
IK and so... so whatever I was saying... corruption went through the roof, the War on Terror was... has been devastating for Pakistan because 40,000 Pakistanis have been killed in a war we had nothing to do with. Basically, our own Army killing our own people and them then doing suicide attacks on Pakistani civilians and the country has lost 70 billion dollars on this war. Total aid has been less than 20 billion. So, I was saying all these things and suddenly it was... it just resonated with the people, and almost two years ago my graph started going up. Now, since the big rallies, the whole political scene has changed. We have seen now politicians rushing to me. So people who are electables, realising that the vote bank now belongs to me; so people who are electables, realising that the vote bank now belongs to me, they are coming to join me.
10.05 JA I heard that even Musharraf tried to say to you: 'You PM, me President'.
10.17 IK Well, you see, Musharraf... does not understand what is happening in Pakistan because he's outside. His whole idea of politics is on the Facebook. He doesn't realise that on the ground in Pakistan the situation is... is completely different. Number one, he will be the biggest liability to get allied to, but number two, he's responsible for the mess. He's responsible for this record corruption because he's the one who gave them amnesty, the criminals. Nowhere in the world are criminals given amnesty, and then allowed to contest elections again, and then get into power. And secondly, this War on Terror - so he's responsible for both.
11.00 JA If you look at, say, the Soviet Union which also had a lot of corruption but people said 'Well, well at least a black market is a market', so you can have some kind of trading, it helps you get around regulations which are impeding business. What is the problem with corruption in Pakistan? Why is corruption bad for Pakistan?
11.24 IK Just to give you another statistic - that in our entire history of 60 years, the total debt accumulated by Pakistan is about... was 5 trillion. In just four years, the debt has gone up from 5 to 12 trillion. So we are now borrowing to service our debts. So, if out of 1.8 trillion, debt servicing is 800 billion, half of it goes to debt servicing, 600 billion goes to pay for the Army, 180 million people have 200 billion rupees to live on. So, clearly, the country's unviable. So, in the case of Russia, they could still go on; in the case of Pakistan we're looking at the abyss, we're looking at the... us going down the drain. The country is heading towards complete chaos. We don't have money to run the country and... at the moment load shedding... we don't have money to buy fuel to, er... to put in our power generation, so because we cannot buy fuel for our power generation - or the government can't - there's almost 14 hours' load shedding, there is no electricity for 14 hours a day.
12.50 JA For 14 hours a day. Amazing. And the corruption in Pakistan, the tax evasion is one thing, but the stealing of money from the Treasury - how much of that ends up back in Pakistan, ie. it's just taking from the poor or the middle class and transferring it to the rich in Pakistan, versus how much of the money is taken out of Pakistan and stashed into London banks or stashed into Swiss banks or US companies?
13.20 IK So, two things: Number one, because we do not have money to pay for... to get furnace oil for our power generation, the country is having load shedding, there's no electricity here for 14 to 15 hours a day, 18 hours in the rural areas. That means that farmers can't run their, er, the tubers to water their crops; that means that factories and industries are closing down; that means there's massive unemployment, on top of inflation. So, that's one aspect of corruption. The second is that most of this money ends up in Swiss bank accounts. Most of our top... almost... I am the only political leader who made his money outside Pakistan, and I have everything in Pakistan and in my name. Apart from me, all political leaders, heads of political parties, they have bank accounts abroad, they've properties abroad and it's not declared, so this money, most of this money ends up outside the country.
14.24 JA Let's move on to the US. Tell me about this assassination of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan. What was the feeling in Pakistan? That the ICI was hiding Osama Bin Laden, that they are incompetent? Why was Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan?
14.45 IK Julian, what you must understand is that Osama Bin Laden was trained by the ISI and CIA, the whole al-Qaeda were trained by the CIA and the ISI about 20 years back, so this... these people were assets of the Pakistan Army. They were trained by the Pakistan Army and the ISI, financed by the CIA, but they were fighting the Soviets, and for a long time these groups had very close association with the Pakistan secret agencies. Now suddenly comes 9/11 and you do a 180 degrees turn. I mean, Musharraf does a 180 degrees turn, but it doesnt mean that all along the way that people would have accepted this. Because here were people trained for Jihad - Jihad in this case means fighting a foreign occupation - so how were you going to convince them having indoctrinated not only, er, these militant groups but also your own agencies, that they're fighting foreign occupation as a religious duty.
15.55 JA By some subset in the ICI. Some people perhaps who had dealt with him in the past who were still loyal.
16.01 IK Of course, people who would have thought that fighting another foreign occupation, which is now the US, is also religious duty, of course it's possible.
16.11 JA Is there a feeling that the US is helping clean out militants in Pakistan, or is there a feeling that it's a violation of Pakistani sovereignty?
16.20 IK This was the ultimate humiliation. Here is a country, which is... at that time had lost about 35,000 people, dead fighting Americas war, and - as I said - the country had lost far more in terms of material losses than the aid given to us, so... - and the government puts the figure to 70 billion dollars, Aid under 20 billion - so therefore here is a country that's supposed to be sacrificing for the US, and then our ally did not trust us and actually came and killed someone on our own soil. It was that, the two factors combined: a) the sacrifices, and secondly, here is an ally which - are we a friend or an enemy? - so... forget about what the government thought, I'm talking about the people of the country, who didn't really know what was going on, because, um, was the... as the Army was being accused, the Army might have kept them or...
JA Yep.
IK ...either they were incompetent or in cahoots - but what about the people? SO it... there was... if anything there was a very strong reaction born out of a feeling of humiliation.
17.35 JA And do you think... you know, that the US argue that Osama Bin Laden is a terrorist responsible for the deaths of many Americans so they have a right to go in and take him out...
17.48 IK All I'm saying is that War on Terror is not... somehow the confusion is that you win a War on Terror by bombs and, you know, killing people actually, War on Terror is won when you win hearts and minds of people. If you lose that war, there is no way this is going to end. I mean, Pakistan is more radicalised today than it was eight years back. Pakistan is more polarised today - it's a polarised society - than it was eight years back. Whatever we do, military is not a solution. We have failed for eight years, the Americans have failed for eleven years. What are we going to do now which is different? And, as Einstein said, madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. It's not going to happen, there's no military solution, the only way is a political solution. Pakistan can play a part in the political solution. We do not have politicians who are capable or credible enough, so you need elections, a credible government hopefully, us - we'll start a political dialogue, help the Americans in an exit strategy from Afghanistan. This is the only way out of this.
19.00 JA Imran, we discovered a cable in 2009 from the Islamabad Embassy. Prime Minister Gilani and Interior Minister Malik went into the embassy and offered to share NADRA - that is the voting record system for all voters in Pakistan, and a front company was set up in the United Kingdom - International Identity Services, which was hired as the consultants for NADRA to squirrel out the NADRA data for all of Pakistan. It seems to me that that is a theft of some national treasure of Pakistan, the entire Pakistani database registry of its people.
20.03 IK Julian, it's so shameful. You know, never has a country's ruling elite, for personal benefits, never have they betrayed their people as much as this elite under Musharraf and the current elite. Not only have they done this, there have been countless numbers of people who have disappeared in Pakistan on suspicion of terrorism. There were Pakistanis, or people from Pakistani soil, handed over to the Americans on mere suspicion of... of them being involved in some terrorism - and people have disappeared, people are eliminated, suspects are eliminated through drone attacks... um, and not only suspects, their wives, their children, their neighbours are eliminated. Never has there been any enquiry into were these people innocent or not. No country has ever been bombed by its own ally, as we have been bombed in this country. Um, as I said, it's the most shameful period of our history. Never has a country's ruling elite betrayed its people so much as this current ruling elite - and for personal benefits, because all of them have bank accounts abroad, they have money lying abroad and guess what? the Americans know all about the accounts. They're illegal, money siphoned off from here.
21.26 JA How would you reconfigure the Pakistan relationship with the United States? Would it be a complete severance? What would you... you would permit drone strikes? what kind of intelligence co-operation? What would you do in practice?
21.44 IK Have a relationship based on dignity/self-respect. So, it should be a relationship like the US has with India. It should not be a relationship of a client/master relationship, and even worse here, Pakistan as a hired gun, being paid to kill Americas enemies. It's not... it's a relationship that has failed. It's neither delivered to the people of Pakistan nor has it delivered to the Americans. Er, the only thing that the Americans should be told is that 'Look, there will be no terrorism from our side', but you can only do that if you are no longer perceived to be a stooge of the Americans. Only a sovereign credible government can then deal with terrorism. At the moment, the terrorists or the militants have declared Jihad against Pakistan government, so they are killing our soldiers and our police guys, saying that these are collaborators of the Americans. So the moment you pull out of this war, this Jihad goes; the moment the Jihad goes, we then can start sifting who the real enemy is within our borders, and then only can we guarantee that there will be no terrorism from our side. So therefore, number one step has to be pull out of this war, no more aid. We become a sovereign independent state and the relationship with the US should be of dignity and self-respect, no longer of a client/master relationship.
23.13 JA You give a good description of how the War on Terror in Pakistan is being counter-productive; it's created enmity towards the Pakistani government; 35,000 to 45,000 Pakistanis have lost their lives - why do you think the United States pursues its agenda, its drone strikes in Pakistan, if the US ambassador even is writing back saying that it's counter-productive? What is the driving forces from the US?
23.43 IK Well Julian, I think it is because the... because, just like us, the policy in the US is being driven by Pentagon. It's the... it's the Army people who are driving this policy, because only military people always think of military solutions. If you look at Vietnam and you listen to, I think, was it General McNamara or someone? I just remember a long time ago, I mean, them also saying way back in the late 60s that 'We've turned the corner, we're about to win the war, a few more men, a few more bombing and this will do the trick'... so generals always think like that.
24.24 JA One final question, Imran, have you met A.Q. Khan, and what do you think about the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb?
24.40 IK I have met A.Q. Khan, you know, not recently but a couple of years back, but Ive known him for 20 years because he gave the first donation to... when I started building the cancer hospital he was the one that came forward first. He is a hero... he's hero-worshipped in Pakistan because Pakistanis look upon him as someone who gave us security. In other words, the same reason given by the Israelis - that they needed the bomb because they're surrounded by hostile neighbours, it's the same in Pakistan, we fought three wars with India, which is seven times the size of Pakistan and there is a lot of insecurity in the country, and this is the guy who's supposed to have secured us - so from that point of view he is hero-worshiped in Pakistan. Um, what I think of him, I dont really know. Was he involved in this proliferation or not? There are two points of view: one, er you know, by the Americans and Musharraf, the other A.Q. Khan himself, saying that 'Look, Im ready to, er, give all evidence that I never was involved in this'. Now, I dont really know, he admitted on television that he was involved in it, but he said he was forced by Musharraf to do that, so I dont really know the truth behind it, Julian. Personally, Im anti-nuclear... Im totally, er... for a world where... which has no nuclear bombs, er... but at the moment, the way the situation is, er, people will argue here that ever since we've had wide... nuclear weapons, even though there's been a lot of tension - we've come close - but there has been no war between Pakistan and India. And before the nuclear weapon, there were three wars...
JA Yeah.
IK ... so people will argue from that point of view.
26.33 JA Ok, Imran thank you very much.
26.37 IK Thank you and I wish you all the best because I think you have done a great thing. What you did with WikiLeaks, you know, freedom of information is the most important thing because we are basically controlled by people withholding information - and this is really a power and, as I've said, Im the biggest beneficiary in this country. These mafias would have just controlled information, and people like me would never had a chance of coming to power in Pakistan, so thank you and all the best.
[12:49:56.13] JA: Thank you, Imran. Good luck.
27.10 END CREDITS