i'll go through them bassett the west for ruling iraq out cynically advocating a similar approach in syria i want to discuss that i'm now joined by our last hour to critique president of the code of a foundation mr altikriti i really appreciate your being here now my first question may sound provocative but i find much of the pro-democracy and anti assateague rhetoric really similar to what we heard from george w. bush about a decade ago people like yourself who at least at some point for in support of armed rebellion argued that since assad is a dictator syria would be a better place without him and therefore all the mashers to get rid of him are somehow justified even if it is a war and to me that's the very asons of the bush's case to launch a war in iraq there are some stark differences to start off with between iraq and between syria and iraq there was no revolution in iraq there was

a war that was instigated by the push of interest strategic financial. whatever it may be at the time the lead tony blair and george w. bush to launch a war which i felt the time was one of the leaders of the end to a movement ok what's the difference. well syria was. was a revolution in the in the in the same way that egypt saw its revolution which toppled hosni mubarak in the same way that tunisia so revolution that toppled the and in the same way that the people of libya rose the people of syria as well as yemen other countries also rose at the very same time the context can't be ignored the syrian revolution for six months after it starts all it was calling for was the reform of the regime not the fall of the regime you mentioned that their way of started to was through peaceful protests and i take your point i was there on the ground are so many of those peaceful rallies but i think the protests. is that i

saw back then in damascus and in many other syrian cities have absolutely nothing in common with the armed rebels and the problem is that yourself your group and many other arab intellectuals in the west seem to you said just that you know on this particular case using violence using aren't resistance may be justified in my my argument is that it is not because in the case of george w. bush he also had some strong arguments of reading the world of saddam hussein for one percent had blood on his hands he was a dictator so president bush felt or at least articulated that you know world may be a better place without him but using violence once you start using violence you cannot control the point is actually right i agree with you once you start violence you enter into perpetual cycle of violence that you can't really control after that the party that started the violence and in fact brutal violence was the syrian regime the revolution started son and to use into your viewers who may have forgotten this

revolution started after fifteen boys young boys of ten and eleven year old were taken from their homes tortured abused raped and then returned in a shattered state to their parents in the city of daraa that's what started people in their desire in. all they wanted was to reform the regime and to bring those who brutalized and rape those young boys to justice you mentioned how these protests started in the city of daraa and i was also in the city of daraa and if you remember one of the first buildings in the city of paris that was set on fire by the protesters was they had quarters of local television after they showed the footage of. man on man present in the crowd so i do contest your point about you know the the protests and the uprising being entirely peaceful from the very beginning but i think we both missed the point here you know it's true that there. there is

a very significant grassroots support for some of the demands of the city civilly in opposition but the problem is of course is once you make this transition from peaceful protests to using violence attacking army checkpoints launching attacks from civilian howel how do you defend yourself accent i mean the question the question the protesters had was that whilst they were on the streets men women children the elderly. maybe i mean you can you can definitely say that when you have a big demonstration when you have a big protest there will be people who will you know carry knives or carry guns maybe or do something idiotic in this and have occasion as well and that's really my trust in government is no no i've always contended and said that the main the main strength of the arab spring throughout wherever it was was the peaceful nature of the arab spring that was the real and therefore i was one of the the proponents of the revolution remains peaceful however when someone's wife gets raped when

someone's kid gets raped and tortured when someone's house gets burnt it's very difficult to reason with them that they must remain peaceful despite the fact that the other party is prepared to perpetuating some of the most brutal violence that one can ever imagine of those atrocities have never been verified or have been prevented committed by either side like for example the houla massacre but once the world got a wind of what is happening in syria your own neighborhood many of the muslim neighbors of syria started providing the opposition with weapons and foreign fighters and from the very early stage that uprising was have only influenced by foreign power so if you were so strongly against foreign interference back in iraq i don't understand why you would be in favor of foreign interference in syria it is still foreign interference regardless of whether it is muslim or arab ok it once again let me for the third time try to repeat iraq is not syria and syria is not iraq there was no uprising in iraq there was an international group. war of

aggression against iraq to change the reality which only the iraqi people have the right to change for themselves the iraqi people have no say in the change that could i think can apply the same argument. i've made that clear in syria there was a resolution within the context of the arab spring so basically when the saudis or the iraqis or the or the turks or the companies when they provide the syrian that is providing for their own the the same d.n.a. their cousins who share a language who share a faith who share a cultural tradition this altikriti you just made a genetic argument but i actually think that one of the reasons why it is so easy for many of the arab intellectuals to dismiss george w. bush as war criminal i'm down condone some of the similar tactics in syria is precisely because of this tribal. reason like when you have an outsider to tell you man it's not limited to that is why else about them. mr al-tikriti but when you say that as an arab or as a muslim as a or as

a humanitarian you have some more entitle men to come in to syria and say to the syrian people who are still highly divided in the attitude towards assad because you know a significant proportion still supports president assad whether you like it or not so when you are common to syria and start telling those people who should be their legitimate leader and who should be not i think this is the very same argument that president bush sad because president bush based it on a humanitarian basis he said the american casual rights and responsibilities to protect the oppressed people of iraq now what you're saying is that because you're an arab because you're a muslim you for some reason have the same rights or more in title meant to protecting the syrian people but to me it sounds just as you know condescending he has the bushes claim or he is not a supposedly higher responsibility i'm not imposing no no no no no i just say respectfully you're trying to draw parallels where there are none. and therefore

you're bringing us back to the issue of iraq which i but by the way once again i repeat i was one of the most. vocal oppositions to the war in iraq and i made that clear what i'm saying is if there was a revolution today in some you know middle african country in the same way that the syrian events happened then we would be obliged to humanitarian lee to support that resolution after six months the those people said we have to defend ourselves when we go out and protest all the time with all due respect you russia and many other partners and including the west i have no standing with what i have no no trust in the position of my own government here in london or in the washington mr altikriti you just pointed out that you have no i finished here for for the west and their practices and the history of western engagement in the arab world but in this particular case in syria your position seem to be quiet aligned isn't that

a sign that maybe your side that you support now since it's also supported by the west maybe your judgment is a bit misguided here no not at all i mean i think that if there is a case that is righteous that it's remains righteous even if you know some really suspicious parties start to sympathize with that in fact if anything the position of the west makes it even clearer that the revolution in syria is on the side of the right and simply because. something that fulfills western interests believe you me we have seen a much much and a far more early intervention than we have right now can i just ask you a mansion for humanitarian concerns humanitarian issues several times now. yes since you're so kind of concerned about the humanitarian aspect of it do you think the support of the armed resistance here proclaimed fairly early in the uprising and the military support that they say resistance is getting. from the gulf

countries from turkey from some other international players this is actually how to decrease humanitarian suffering in syria because even if you take the argument that president assad was a brutal dictator which is still contested but even if i was to consider concede that point the extent of human suffering onder assad regime or worse. not comparable to what is actually happening in syria because they once again let me go back this revolution started peacefully it started peacefully it doesn't matter how astonished when talking about what is happening on the ground until it got to a stage until it got to a stage where it was no doubt it was going to be a bloodbath and massacre when people see a call for support when people. are killed in white town systematically by one of the most brutal machines in the in the region and they call for help when someone starts to help them that does not value the suffering that does not die due to their rights what do you say about simply because this uprising turned brutal that

here had to bring even more brutality there this is the point that i find extremely hard to digest because if there is here what they did at the world i don't you just have to take it you want to play you could have predicted the response early on so why then again to you these are what you're saying and so and so what you're saying is that i was hurrying you know what you're saying is this allow me to just basically explain what you just said what you just said is this if in any regressive dictatorship country anywhere in the world people rights the regime starts to brutalize to to brutally and systematically wipe them out and then creates another man saying that happen is now and there saddam quotations and then i'm going to let me just finish this what you're suggesting is that people should come to their senses and say let's leave our demands because essentially half months without some sort of very arms one is going to fly pretty this is not what i'm saying at all but i'm saying what you're saying no no no i'm telling you i'm telling you that the syrian revolution was peaceful and was armless for about six

months while i you know stayed in its ways and i said i'm asking you is that why i didn't stay this way because people. because because what well that would have been you know quite pleasurable to some i'm imagining to say that well you know now we're just counting the body count amongst the people listening something you know let me tell you this and quite frankly found that mine when i got it why was it love or a what i said moment humanitarian to raise the want to while and thrive and continue on the path off but it's already said and it's a democratic change it's not about morality it works on it if you and i were attacked you just feel think you might be having an intense ourselves but none of this is this is not this is not far off this is not far off you know you and i was sitting in our comfort zones and we're talking about this and i'm sorry but what was sort of you know pontificating about the rights and wrongs when someone is actually being threatened in every single aspect of the existence of this you know that some but i'm sorry but that's shameful well hold on to that thought where we will be back after

a short break. real damage and complexity of this oil spill is not something you can grasp just by looking at dirty birds we have between four to five million people in this directly affected area of the coast and it's pretty clear why it's not being reported because b.p. can't afford to have a reported all along the gulf coast are clean they are safe and they're open for business if b.p. is the single largest oil contributor to the pentagon the us war machine is heavily reliant upon b.p. and their oil this is a huge step backwards for democracy it's a step forward a little carex it is toxic as it looked a lot like spraying and. it was it was not

a picture that either the government or b.p. really wanted to have out there i don't want this. persons to be the agent orange all of this will still.

welcome back to worlds apart we are discussing the historic parallels between syria and iraq with adults of the creepy president of the cordoba foundation mr al-tikriti people are being women are being raped on the government side as well homes are being attacked noticed however i do know that i challenge well challenge that i'll challenge anyone to come up and said i challenge anyone to come in under any kind of incident that that's happened that is a lie son that is a lie the people want to peacefully to change things when the regime came down them with the fist of fire you are not talking about the tour i mean that that was the regime or justified in doing what they did in terms of killing young children in terms of raping women in terms of burning down the entire towns and since it happened they justified in doing that has a very quiet quite it is quite easy to verify you don't even need to go to syria you can go on you tube and you can see all those i trust that is committed by

rabble for forces through a document and i'm going to agree with york sun i'm going to agree with you the thing is i mean this is my point when i said at the very start that i had wanted the revolution i had dreamt of the revolution staying peaceful because i think that is essentially how the arab people will change their realities unfortunately after a while that same revolution becomes mondays by the presence of elements who have interests such as unfortunate going to say this again russia in its name in syria the same with these elements who have after two and a half years of the world standing by and watching and doing virtually nothing when that happens what will happen is that the revolution itself will become muddied and polluted by the presence. on for those of us that syria bear adult responsibility for the fact that their revolution was not and that indeed a rebel forces became far more radicalized the responsibility the real absolutely the responsibility lies with two parties the first being the regime which started this cycle of violence which you spoke about and the second. being the

international community the with the stood by watched and did absolutely nothing once the resolution was taken in love and love what about. what about people like yourself who empty pontificate from london whose concerns are legitimate and whose concerns are not legitimate because again in syria today there are a lot of people who still support president assad so your point earlier was that they did not just mean she was a centrist there was a recent naval poll that found that seventy percent seventy percent of people in syria still support assad maybe not support political office may well that's. the easy answer hasn't level i think let me tell you this let me tell you this but even let me let me let me do this let me let me draw the power of the you try to draw throughout the program and that is with iraq do you claim the no one iraq wanted the the western intervention does that make the western intervention ok i say they've done this there was quite a considerable people of the iraqi people who wanted the west to remove but how.

valuable is the you know does that make you after one group of people ignoring another group of people because as a again every step i think we can agree at least on a lot of points out there. you mentioned one syrians how did you arrive on the demands of the revolution how did you respond to fans of the song do you recognize our d.c. accounts of people disagreeing with you because it looks to me that you have either my way or no way at all but you seem to be a lot of the you are like george w. bush that we mentioned earlier that he had only one very righteous view that he's a vision of what's right and you didn't thought before going hundreds of thousands of people to try to implement that you're still incensed that be armed resistance was a legitimate way to go even though a hundred thousands of syrians have been killed and syria is nowhere closer to democratic aspirations that hat it's not about what you believe in but actually how you can bring about that positive change and really be in the mode of operation

that you seem to have selected. it is very counterproductive to the very cause you advocate well first of all i welcome the fact that you call the demands of the syrian people as ideal and legitimate i'm glad that you do that why it is you talk about the weaponization of the rebellion when you fail to talk about the weaponization of the regime russia is complicit in the crime against the syrian people the one hundred thousand that you talk about the one hundred per thousand victims you fail to mention that ninety eight percent of them are the rebels are the people who rose initially peacefully the united nations has just recently released latest death toll figures. putting the death toll in syria at ninety three thousand people several groups pointed out that the majority of victims actually come from the government five now i'm sure you would dispute that point but i think at least you could agree that yes you know everything we know from denature all war is that it produces atrocities on both sides i'm not arguing that there were some

atrocities committed on the government side in fact the government says they killed the no this is because i want to get on well this is a view it's not a war but a hundred thousand people have been telling you you call it about the list let's see if it looks like a war because they have the cities are destroyed once the regime starts to kill once the regime starts to send in fighter jets once the regime starts to send in people who who who who put in explosives in the path of the protests this peaceful protesters you get to a time you get to a particular position and by the way i would have much rather had this revolution remain peaceful i would have much rather that this revolution remain peaceful let me say i'm saying it as much as i could however once you because you start to be targeted in your own family when that starts to happen then you must imagine then you must support the revolutions right in defending itself you know one of the criticisms of the iraq invasion was that they were yeah because i

think. well i mean there are many parallels and you may not see them but i think it's very important that first those countries are neighbors immediate neighbors so the floor of arms goes between the two countries their floor fight there so there are many things that come into play here so one of the criticisms of the west western invasion of iraq was the lack of strategic planning that washington and london didn't really consider what is going to happen after wars they just assume that iraq will become democracy binocs day and that you know neighboring countries will follow suit and i think you know some of the critics of the western governments including yourself are guilty of the same naivete you assume that you know once these peaceful uprising or now militarized uprising is given a chance to realize itself democracy will come there and this is not what we have seen in the neighboring countries here you mentioned arab spring as some of their

other arab countries like egypt likely be or others countries anywhere closer to democratic ideals than they were before those uprisings even though there are there was no war and now that we have the revolution becoming the kind of violence carnage that we are seeing and the entrance of elements on both sides. so that you see here i'm agreeing with you on both sides that have solid and made this you know almost out of control and that is when by the way the united states and britain the such have decided to step in. not out of once again not out of interest for the syrian people or the such but out of their interest regional and such. as a result of this new syria once the regime falls and there is no question that you know the regime is unsustainable it's just fighting you know the end game basically and it looks like that's not actually now because that forces. dancing all across

syria they took control of corsair they're now mounting an offense and. the only the only recent victory that they achieved as it was the only way that's not my area of military street it certainly has said that. but anyway what i'm what i'm saying is well this is the rest i'll tell you something that looks on one thing that we've learned from the arab spring is that ultimately you can't fight the tight of the change that is demanded by the people we saw this happen in egypt we do so this happened in tunisia we saw it happen in a different form and manner in libya and we saw it happen and we're seeing it happen in syria that's something that the regime now contends with its now fighting a struggle for survival for its own survival the family itself and those surrounding it but one coming back to this there is going to be a huge a huge effort in order to rebuild the country and there will be times that are extremely dark maybe something akin to iraq maybe something akin to other countries

of the ascent of the such maybe a year earlier alluded to the to this tide of revolutions and russia i think has a unique vantage point here because we have been through more revolutions than any other country and we also attempted this extremely difficult transition from authoritarianism to democracy and let me tell you it has it wasn't easy it's still not easy and one of the main problems with this transition is that authoritarianism is not just about the leader is authoritarian habits authoritarianism runs extremely deeply in the society itself so when people get rid of one authoritarian leader they still expect somebody else to come in and do their job for them to fix the society and you know put the house in order but the problem is of course is that democracy is not just about having an opportunity to vote a new leader into office every four years it's about civic engagement it's about personal responsibility for your country and so far up what we have seen them live

. bear it in tunisia they said i can gauge him and hasn't really materialized and my question to you how do you go from this initial stab of encouraging public protests we've seen a lot of bad and the middle east to actually working and taking responsibility for your society with all due respect i resent the tone of the question the arab people have been subjugated for more than six seven eight possibly ten they can say almost a century they've been subjugated with the assistance of either the west or the east from time to time by proxy rulers who have never held the best interests of their people it's hard but rather carried out the interests of foreign powers as i said west as well as east over the over the past century and as a result forbid any kind of space for free thinking free expression free exercise and what you're talking about civilian gauge ment's arab countries particularly let me concentrate on the arab world particularly the rose against its rulers that that

that region of the world saw the total eradication of any kind of society there is no n.g.o.s sector there is no you know middle class the can think there is no. area from from it's not actually gonna know what i'm going to let me finish because you've made assertions that are entirely wrong what i what i'm trying to get out is the people don't rise and give from what they are the most precious to them i.e. their life and limb for nothing just for again just you know because they didn't have anything better to do believe you me when they rise they rise simply because they have had enough and for far too long for far too long the arab people have been ruled by dictators who have suffocated the oxygen have taken suck the oxygen out of their air and therefore to says suggest that well maybe rather than you know revolt or maybe a prize you know maybe they could do better for themselves it's their fault ultimately it's the old adage i think is it is absolutely my point but maybe

because. we have only a minute left let me let me tell you what exactly i'm mad i'm mad that the revolution is never a good method of changing a society because if you look historically it's all no bit and it's a last resort to us if you're right. you're absolutely right it is the last resort and it's the last resort simply because it is so expensive and that is why i contend that the people of egypt the people of libya the people of tunisia and the people of syria have nots resorted to the very last resort only after they have exhausted everything else let me just add that unlike people of egypt people of tunisia people of syria have actually taken up arms and this is ultimately the main factor that is responsible for the total destruction to receive the crime by the government leadership tries to also respond to the crimes of the regime so please join us again same place same time here on the part.

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be you're flying but on to the believe and president is just as diverse have grounded and such to announce dubbed by latin american leaders as i could not name under humiliation for the entire continent. revolution a redux does the army overthrows the country's fast democratically elected leader mohamed will say create exploded in celebration but elsewhere violent clashes lead to more deaths. sidecar is a big news major financial figures from the world of big business looking for i don't want to say the traditional kind.