and now it's been saying that iraq is finally and control iran has closed its border with northern iraq is kurdish region tension has been growing between the kurdish regional government and its neighbors iran and turkey since last month's secession vote. at least eighty five people have been killed in two bomb attacks in somalia's capital mogadishu a truck bomb targeted an area that has many government offices hotels and restaurants armed men that attacked a hotel and fought a gun battle with police a second blast at the city's medina district austria is voting in a snap election that could see the far right freedom party enter into government as part of a coalition the election is a year earlier after the current government fell apart in may opinion polls suggest that the conservative people's party is leading the polls which means that austria could today elect the world's youngest leader. voters in kurdistan are heading to the polls in a presidential election that none of the candidates is expected to win outright

with many analysts predicting a runoff between two former prime ministers security though has been heightened right across the country. there's the headlines i'll be back with more news for you right after talk to al-jazeera next. al jazeera is a very important source of information for many people around the world when all the cameras have gone i'm still here go into areas that nobody else is going talk to people that nobody else is talking to and bringing that story to the forefront. you. would see this as. the stages now he promised himself to get for the for his country's apartheid system and its nuclear weapons program. those were the two major goals for drink

the city for himself as he became south africa's president in one nine hundred eighty nine. after negotiations with nelson mandela apartheid was indeed dismantled other people here still dealing with its aftermath half of the population live in poverty the fear of violence is in demick and the political leadership is constantly facing corruption allegations. today on talk about former president de klerk and what happened to the lofty goals of the one nine hundred eighty. s. . but we begin with nuclear weapons today as the world is dealing with north korea and looking for a way out it may be worth remembering that south africa was the first country to voluntarily dismantle its nuclear bomb. we start by asking him what

prompted his country to develop the weapons in the first place why did you need the bomb and did you really believe that one day you might have used that bomb against who. i don't think we needed the ball but some of my pretty said it's just that i don't think it was everything to incent to use the bow they wanted to use it as a deterrent and to strengthen south africa's international position when i became at a fairly young age minister of mineral and energy affairs i was informed about this cabinet never knew about our atom bombs being made at that un dhaba so at the time it was a secret thing it would be only mean to me need to know basis people knew about

even ministers even minister us but as minister of mooing energy affairs i had to know because belin dollar fell under me and then. the year when i knew him in the richmond plant fell under me so that to inform me at that point i decided quietly in my heart if ever i'm in a position to rid itself of africa all those bombs i would do so well who's your reaction first reaction when you learned when you were informed about this i mean were you shocked i was i was quite shocked or those. rumors were flying around in your mind internationally and in south africa but i was quite shocked to know that that we've started on that project when i became president six and a half of those bombs have been made. and one of the first things i did was to call that same group on

a need to know basis together and said we're going to sign the n.p.t. . let's plan now we do it we're going to demolish those bombs and we're going to open up all our facilities for full inspection. and that is what we did south africa. was just about the only country that voluntarily gave up its nuclear weapons how do you think the world would. get countries like north korea and israel to give up the us i don't think there's any quick fix for that situation or a simple recipe what i do believe ynys a nuclear weapon free world are advocated and i've done so from many platforms in the past years those who have it

legitimately in terms of international law and agreements need to be part of the solution the basis on which for instance the usa england france and russia where now to have it and continue to have it but others not has fallen away that was how the balance of power was at the end of the second world war that balance of power have changed fundamentally so the starting point for a big review of the whole issue of. nuclear weapons lies in a new debate but not just a debate in a new round table discussion to review and revise existing agreements with a view to reach a new agreement which says all those who have legitimately and illegitimate

will get rid of it in an organized methodical way which won't disturb the balance of power they need to reach a new agreement on the nuclear ice age there has been speculation that south africa cooperated with is well on its nuclear weapons program. this is an allegation dick lick me that denies no confirms i really can't help feeling that you've got i know about the end of geisha it's that there was close cooperation i was never part of such calls but i shouldn't and i never had information which justify such allegations please but in a recent interview with south africa's former intelligence minister randy casseroles told us he's will and south africa were close partners it helped south

african apartheid create seven nuclear devices talk about they come certain of the device from iran in terms of the safety they showed nothing no compunction no come said responsibility in terms of putting nuclear devices in the hands of an apartheid monster that was threatening the very lives of all the african people of this entire region i wasn't involved in anything like that and i have never been properly informed about anything like that so i can't take it for. there have also been reports that south african israel work together to test missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons i'm not aware of any tests having mean done on south africa and so on. nuclear weapons yes i don't know to what extent is that i was involved but we did start to develop in the western cape. a

program. which never really fully got off the ground. it was built on the on the south coast of the western cape. while there are free. i know because i used it in the past that way which contained a boeing seven hundred seven and the like but not being involved i can't give any details information about that. the code word for the nuclear program was blamed on them as with the word that means end of the story or the final is a word that could also be used to capture the end of the apartheid system. when did you realize that it was time of linda and of the story for the whole

apartheid system the regime itself that it was time for it to go i did not have a sudden moment where i had one night went to bed and thought separate development as we preferred united on to call apartheid is that i policy and the next morning i woke up and said it was all wrong by eighty six i was convinced in my heart that we need to undertake far reaching and very fundamental steps to change this situation that process taught that that based on moral grounds or was it just for programmatic reasons that you realise that it was that there's no way there was no way to win that war i think against the majority of the most of us it was a model. in the end i realized that the

old system has failed to bring justice to all the people of south africa in my younger days i believe separate development nation states. some forming something like the european union a south african union could bring justice to everybody when i at mit the to myself it has failed to do so i came to the conclusion one cannot continue with a policy which you knew leads to injustice to a majority of all the people in the country and therefore that we had to stop trying to make separate development apart take more acceptable sulfa ning a.d.n. and softening it then we had to abandon the whole concept of the vision. and in its place put a new concept of inclusive it. and that was the vision which was developed within

the national party in nineteen eighty six nine hundred eighty seven we then went to the white electorate in eighty seven was an election asking for in broad terms every form mandate then i became a leader of the national party in one thousand nine hundred ninety i no longer had to look for a new vision i've already embraced a new vision of one united south africa with all south africans having a vote of equal value but a new south africa in which they would be known the racialism a new south africa in which no one group would be able to dominate and suppress another group a new south africa with a strong constitution which could prevent the misuse of power by any future

government it is with that vision that i ended the presidency in one thousand nine . and i saw my challenge and accepted that chapman's that that vision needs to be implemented in practice within one of office within five years. when i first met the civil years ago he looked forward to a brighter. today south africa is facing one political corruption scandal after another often involving the country's leadership. the fear of violence is widespread so is xenophobia and many poor blacks are still living in shantytowns what went wrong since the time we met when you were sold to this think about the future of south africa well let me start out by saying i'm very concerned

about the present state of affairs but i haven't lost all my optimism i still believe that the damage which has been done in the past ten fifteen years can be the path it will take quite a number of yes but we have not been damaged beyond anything you ask what went wrong what doing to wrong is firstly that in the field of economic policy making we have diverted from very good well balanced economic policies which resulted in five percent even up to five percent and real good of you in the early two thousand send in late ninety nine. and we have the stuff. and undermined investor confidence we no longer getting the

new investments would be quiet to maintain economic growth without economic growth we can begin to address the problem of extremely high unemployment. what went wrong is we had a new political leadership in the person of president zuma and under him corruption i flourished and k. does have been drawn together. in the beaching themselves a small elite are all being the state institutions like the electricity supply commission like the south african airways and other that are state. in directly or not at your money through going up transactions and. sort of. tend procedures which are not being followed so

bad leadership. has led us to a point where the president of the country as the last piece credibility. with those who don't support the a.n.c. i think is fully lost. but within the ruling party the african national congress there's been more than one motion of no confidence. in him from his own people the a.n.c. being torn apart by faction fighting at the moment and we don't have clear well balanced credible and morally sound political leadership in south africa it's tragic but it might change. a political prisoner cook and now boiling in south africa that says an explosion

can be avoided but only if the a.n.c. as we know it is radically changed. what i think will happen is the a.n.c. will split because you having the same party. through red communists you have people committed to free enterprise. you have people with totally different ideological and policy principles in which they believe too many contradictions within the same party absolutely and that cannot last so i see how we talk like us and i think that will be healthy for south and within the ends within the sea itself apart from the communist party apart from. so when that split us it will put south africa in the position that it can

normalize its politics away from the racially based polity. dogs principle but he says for politics away from ethnically diverse in politics towards policy driven politics where people who believe in the same things irrespective of racial color can take cans and work together because they believe in the same things it will be around for a ride to get to that point quite around for a year but i believe that is when we will be breakthrough to come or want us and when south africa will get on course again to fulfill its tremendous potential how do you interpret you know things like black life matters black lives matter in the united states and are we seeing the same thing in south africa differently well

racism is a problem in south africa it didn't disappear with the agreements which we reached with our new constitution which is committed to non racialism it exists on all sides there is white racism and there is black racism. and in that sense of the word yes it's a problem like it is you know america stuff but like it is in europe and other parts of the world too and racism is not unique it just manifests itself in a different way in different countries south africa. copied many ideas from the united states after the end of the racism system like the affirmative action when do you think we would see an end to these code. system based on color and based on

race when are we coming to see employment employing. somebody just for them a fact that he or she a good solution let me first say they ease the need and the room for affirmative action and black economic empowerment in south africa that need is acknowledged in the constitution which we need go sharing and the constitution as it stands at the moment says a balance need to be struck between merit education training experience on the one hand and the issue of black economic empowerment and black affirmative action. that balance has not been struck in south africa why because the powers that be are

developing policies which is you know the specter of man it blacks must be appointed and the seven percent each reach it way in each state department must be achieved even though properly trained available people from a particular group are not available. if a country has only so many engineers. they'd say sixty percent of the engineers are white and forty percent off color then you can say seventy five percent of the jobs must be for engineers of color in only twenty five percent of all whites they aren't sufficient lead trained people of color to full the posts so in an unbalanced way affirmative action has led to that service the liberty has led to bad management has led to

losses has led to. maladministration of budgets not because the people involved are people of color but because they haven't been turned sufficiently for that job so that's not a point that they're not specialists but they are put into specialist positions we can just carry on and carry on for ever on that basis there needs to be an organized in the meantime we are experiencing a brain drain not only of white south africans emigrating but also of black and colored and indian and south africans immigrate because they feel that they are not given sufficient opportunity within the economy and the industry of south africa itself being a president and commander in chief certain operations both military and

intelligence have to be authorized from use what with the the toughest and the most painful places that you had to authorize yet you had to you did authorize them well the saddest one was i had from both the defense force and the police it a few to bull evidence according to them. that house in the old brown sky since sky was being used as a cache and that arms from that house have been used in deeds of terror on the basis of that evidence i wanted to cross border offensive to clear up that house but i said it must go and the man with minimum

violence and we must prevent people being killed if at all possible what you said this was around about ninety ninety two i can't remember the exact. and what happened they went in they killed some youths who were there were trained soldiers. and to this day people are holding it against me i did it on the basis of objective evidence and it is the project which went totally wrong i apologized for it and we saw it to eat that there were some. that the families of the people were somehow or another helped along. but i in my time we started with their owing from where we were. we started demilitarizing the whole situation in south africa

in my time i wasn't involved in major operations outside to inside our borders which i had to authorize i had to normalize their own of police and normalize not only of the army in no longer playing a political role whatsoever but in just doing what their main tasks are the police to protect all south africans. their safety and their property and their security the army to protect our borders and to assist wherever necessary in my job but i say what kept you up at lights when you were president i could fall asleep wake up the next morning fresh for the new challenges but what did get me up now and then was the going rate that he sponsibility and realize ation that in many big issues there are no easy choices and that whatever the choice you

might well also have apart from positive consequence some negative consequence and one needs to live with that president thank you so much for talking to all these heroes. and age old parts of spanish culture i know what i can stop thinking about the bullies in my life others are explored and assemble a central government by one time we shouldn't carry on something that goes against the morals of comes along the sides he has of the catalan nationalist perspective the believes the present banished culture minister in the catalonia fight this time on al-jazeera wild. training starts lightly but the pace picks up

quickly as these grannies work out a long lifetime of frustration. at eighty five years old intombi sword what trains as hard as anyone and. i feel so good i feel fresh i punch this side and decide like this and like that i really love this i don't like things like soccer because i will brink these ladies are tough and i take their training very seriously. will be through a. more energetic i like. my provocative is it alison whether online we were in hurricane winds for almost like thirty six hours these are the things that has to address or if you join us on sect a member of a complex one but. a relationship this is a dialogue tweet us with hostile a.j.

stream and one of your pitches might make the next show join the global conversation at this time on al-jazeera. al-jazeera. where every. the death toll at a truck bombing in mogadishu rises to at least eighty people the search for survivors is underway.