we have lines next it's a time here on r.t. with his explosive show the world famous whistleblower talks to the new president of tunisia who says securing human rights in the country is his stop priority. it is true of wiki leaks expose the world secrets these united states being attacked by the powerful united states strongly condemn going after white people illegally. five hundred days now being detained without charge but that hasn't stopped us. today. revolutionary ideas that can change the world tomorrow. during the

last year the middle east has been shaken by rebel movements and is the country where it all started. today i talked to the first president of the new tunisia. he's a medical doctor in human rights activists by training. is cut from a very different cloth to his plan boyington corrupt predecessor been only. and imprisoned under the bin only regime. is considered to have the greatest moral authority of all arab leaders but i wonder how long can it last the transformation of tunisia is far from complete and president he must now face the realities of power. mr president. can you hear me. hello. it is very nice to see you are you know i have always been you really. i think really we. i

wish you the best you know. if you never have some problems you. thank you. so you were imprisoned back in one thousand nine hundred three and i was in prison in two thousand and ten but this experience was very interesting for me how to survive solitary confinement. and i think perhaps everyone should go through this experience just once can you tell me how you survived prison. well you know i just spent spent four months sort of confinement so but i did barely which is the prime minister in tunisia spent more than ten years in sort of confinement and i always admired him i never saw i never understood how he could

you know survive to this kind of experience but because after just four months i were just talking to myself you know i really gotten that crazy i want crazy because you know when you have just to talk to yourself to be. to be alone with yourself all this time you it's a terrible experience this is why i think it's a kind of far. side psychological torture and so many people say look you have never been tortured in prison and i used to say no i was under torture but it was another kind of torture and probably one of the worst i think that more than thirty thousand people have been tortured in tunisia and was good for them you know there was angry at that for this. people. all the torture and then go back to a whole month to play with their children and listen to music and you know have a normal life and then i found it and never understood how. how can.

you know. except to do things like this and be sure that you are. that you are still a human being so. how how can you survive through this kind of experience i think when you know this when you know that you are fighting for your human rights for good values then you can have enough resistance you have to tackle the situation these people who took action against you and your friends in tunisia under the bill how the regime the former head of intelligence for example do you meet them now that you are present and what do they say do they apologize. no no they don't apologize and they all say look we are bad to all those we are just civil servants. and this for me is completely unacceptable you know because i think that everybody has to have his own will and that he has to face his own

responsibility and it's too easy to say i was just obeying orders and. i can't accept this kind of excuse you know because its size also the fact that it was people are not only called cruel but also they don't have any kind of dignity any kind of honor you know we have to accept your own responsibility and to say look i did it but sorry i was wrong but i never heard any one of them saying sorry i was wrong you said that the first victim of a dictatorship is its intelligence services what did you mean by that. i think because those people because they just accept obey the dictator they. give up everything their humanity their were harmed or and they're. just for. for being very you know for sharing the power and that they are also for.

the victims of the system and you probably know that the people you know perpetrating torture or they are always and very very sad situation some of them. become in some of them commit suicide and i think torture destroys not only the people who are submitted to torture but also the people talk trying other people so yes it's terrible things for both sides you know for the people committing torture and the people submit submitted to torture. in the united states we have the knowledge source the alleged source of the diplomatic cables which included material that came out into the news or about generally his name is bradley manning and he was in solitary confinement for ten months what do you say about the united states and its role once leading human rights now.

engaged in torture. when you have torture and the dictatorship it seems so normal you know. of course it's not normal it's horrible but when you have this kind of problems and. the state and when you face people you know coming from the government. talking about human rights and so forth it's it seems so ridiculous you know i remember two years ago. four years ago i was invited in to washington by ninjago to talk about human rights in tunisia. i was invited to to meet some important person in the white house dealing with human rights issues i said no i'm not going to meet this person because it would be ridiculous to talk with this guy knowing very well you know that he was probably implicated and want to know more problem you can talk it you can take seriously

somebody awards placated in torture in his own country that this guy is going to give you some lesson about how to promote human rights in tunisia this is why i didn't accept to meet him what is the status now the intelligence services in. your head of the armed forces your commander in chief the armed forces are you also the intelligence. it's very difficult situation because we have to take the problem very cautiously you know. we have to remove them. one by one. but the most important thing for me is to you know we are going to face some hard issues like the salafist movement you know the sixty's extreme right wing movement here in tunisia and they are really they can be a danger to democracy and we have to take the attack of the problem from the political point of view we have to discuss with them and so forth but some of them

are now not accepted to do to have any kind of political discussion and some of them are going to present a kind of threat against democracy so when i talk with the. police and the army leaders i said look we have to take this problem very cautiously but please no more torture and no more unfair trial like we have had under that and to the dictatorships we have to take this problem very seriously but to stick to human rights values they watched they watched me very. you know. wandering if i was serious and i said yes i am serious yes i am serious no more talk to him to. have you seen your intelligence files kept by only now that you were president the record of spying on you. yes i am very curious about having this fight but in fact they didn't have time. but i have you know i

have got some files about. political. up until now the system and i said i'm not going to work with this kind of card i'm not going to threaten this guy with this kind of tools you know i don't want to know about what happened i'm not interesting in threatening you know my political opponent by the same towards that was used against me. the you think the . you know as a as wiki leaks as a publisher of course we saw what happened in egypt when the egyptian secret service was looted and these files came out and started to describing what was really happening there and as someone who was following this revolution in egypt very very closely and trying to get out material about them barak and suleyman and

so on i knew he gyptian revolution had succeeded in a very important way when the archives of the m. dawa finally came out and that was the the end of the secret police or a new chapter in the secret police i'm so. it's seems to me that that is the true way to make sure that one cannot go back is to reveal the secrets of the previous regime to everyone so that everyone may take part in them even if this creates some kind of conflict in the society will you open the tunisian archives. yes the historians yes the historians because i think we have to it's it's i would you would you know to know what happened but i am not interested in having you know and knowing who are right who wrote about me and. it's useless you know it's i would like to have the general

picture of what happened exactly. what was the system but i'm not interested in you know convicting people saying you have done this and you have done that and. because it could be very very dangerous. it's important to know tory member but sometimes it's also important to not want to forget it is there is there pressure on you from other people in the government to keep these files closed no no there is no good no pressure in this market this is my shorts you know my shows to be very careful because once again we have we we have to know but we have also to forget and to forgive he said before that there are certain red lines about information sometimes truth is good sometimes truth is bad and

recently the museum internet has been censoring some web pages but in order to censor even one web page you must spy on every request that someone is making to see if you should deny. do you think that this is right that is the correct one a more you know i think censorship on the internet is useless first it's useless impossible and a constant productive. as a human rights activist i prefer the sides effect of. total freedom of expression. to the good effect from i say to the censorship so i am i always say that i am against any kind of censorship on internet or in any other way of

expression i spoke to weeks ago to her. and i asked him why was there a difference between his position for syria to museums position for syria this seems to be a switch his son is soft on syria. is soft on brain. is hard on syria and now israel is hard on bahraini and the brainy government is happening there. why is this. i mean the dictatorship that syria the syrian people is suffering from is exactly the say that in tunisia before before they were lucian and this is why

we we feel very close to the syrian people we understand that they are what they are feeling because they are fighting against corruption and tell it against. the state of fear and. we feel very very close to them because. sometimes we feel that we have also some responsibility you know because i can say that if we didn't have the revolution here in tunisia probably it wouldn't happen in syria or in egypt so we feel this kind of responsibility very close we understand. the fight for democracy for human rights is our own and we have to do to support them. and we have to forget about you know. people like him you know think that syria is because he is you know against israel they can forgive to do this dictatorship everything but we hear when we don't have this

problem we are not interested in the fire fight between israel and syria what is important for us is that. this. this people is separate from what we suffered so much from and this is why we totally support syria the syrian people against his dictatorship as well as you know we fight against our own so i cannot understand that here in tunisia yes because we have some some people here in tunisia supported the syrian dictatorship saying it's better take dictatorship and we do know that there is no better take that this is no good dictatorship that dictatorship is dictatorship corrupted. and against against his people. i can't understand the position but i can say i tell you that i was very very popular after the you know in two thousand and six because you know

the battle against the. right but now. you know that his popularity is completely. finished here in tunisia and the whole arab world you have offered the rule of syria. asylum in tunisia but is that really credible of you know what's important for us is. the bloodshed in syria this is the most important thing this is why i said look we have the yemeni scenario it could be good solution for. syrian people they say why these guys. go to russia and the russians said we are not interesting and having a journalist asked me would you be interested in having this man and i said of course if this would be a sort of should but i know probably you'll know also that i said would never ask. so it's it's not credible question and not

a good. position of course. he would probably flee talk to russia or to any other country but never in tunisia you hold this conference recently. the friends of syria which included in coming to that was hillary clinton and many other powerful people from the west and from the region information that we released recently. showed that. the u.s. security sector is all the belief that there are u.s. special forces already in syria that money flow into syria to the syrian resistance. you have said that you do not believe in foreign intervention in syria and you do not believe the news you should supply arms to the syrian resistance but what about intelligence support what about training. weapons training within

syria museo also offer but offer a base to the syrian opposition. as a told you we are not supporting any kind of foreign intervention in syria i do believe that giving weapons to syrians would lead to civil war i think it's it's not a good choice i still believe that the only solution must be political and that we have to find a common. coming down between opposition and the regime i still believe that the only solution is the yemeni scenario this is my position this is the position of tunisia and of course we are against any kind of intimidation whether it comes from your party received eight point seven percent of the vote during the two news you know election and the. more islamic party have received thirty seven percent of the vote during that election. but

you personally have sixty percent approval by the chinese in public what percent of power do you think think you have. let me let me tell you first that in the west people think that. the political islam is prevailing on democracy and is it exactly the contrary i think that we here in tunisia. the center of spark the separate part of the spectrum islamist. the central part of the spectrum islam is suspect. is now part of the democratic system of the game so i can say that democracy prevails on. islamic movement because it's became

democrats and we did it as a secular we didn't become. islamist so. there is a oughtn't because i'm very surprised that the way that western people are looking to tunisia or egypt saying look. now established are you know in the government they have the majority in the parliament yes they have the majority in the parliament but in the democratic party meant they were elected by democratic elections and now they are playing the part of the democratic game this is why i can say that democracy prevailed after their pollution and that the movement even if they were elected more than the secular government this very very important. as far as i'm concerned you know. i think the most important thing. our i have is

a symbolic one because here in tunisia i'm supposed to be the president of all tunisians. and i'm trying to play this game and this role of being the president of tunisia having discussion with or particular parties you know to get people closer and this is very very important and this is not. this is not even knowing that this is the most important function that i have. so i imagine this is very hard for you the way i see things and the leaders that i have dealt with and in my own position also. there's so many forces that one has to suffer when one is forced by a situation or limited ability to act in a certain way even though your conscience wants to act in another way were you surprised by the lack of power in becoming president the lack of ability to

push the program you wanted to push the compromises you had to me yes i think you know i'm discovering that the fact to be the head of state doesn't mean that you have all the power and. the press creation is now probably the most important feeling that i have every day i can just give you one example you know we are tackling a huge problem. you know he's in tunisia. having under strike because he's asking for for his release but i can't release him because libya is asking for him and we have a lot of common interest with libya but you know giving back this man to libya means that he could kill he could be he could have an unfair trial and i told my friend that. my honor as a human rights activist. i can't just you know give this man to this to libya.

but you know facing huge pressure from from outside and inside the country to get this man to libya and that i have every day to say no no we have to stick to our position and it's very difficult you know to have to conciliate the human rights activist opinions and the head of state what else has changed for you. well our i don't think i'm still the same person you know i'm still human rights activist i still believe in my and my values and i try to be faithful to all those values so i think i'm not going to change i will stick to my opinions of course it's sometimes very difficult because you have to. i have to remember that i am head of state and that i have been very careful when i talk around this this is sometimes very painful but i. am still you know as i told you are

i am convinced that i have to be faithful to my values and people are expecting me to be. to be the same person and. i would try your great to be. the head of state of delusion but also the human rights activist i was all. thank you very much mr president. as i told you i am very grateful to all what you have done for promoting human rights groups and i don't support your efforts and please i wish you all the best that i hope you will i hope to see one cent in asia if you can come you will be want to come here in this new democratic country thank you. thank you for the crew. for arranging this. good luck thank you. so good bye and good luck.

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