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“We must understand the seriousness of this situation.”
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WASHINGTON,
September 11 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Former South African
president Nelson Mandela said, in an interview made public Tuesday,
September 10, that the United States posed a threat to world peace due
to what he sees as a series of foreign policy mistakes made over the
past several decades.
Speaking
to Newsweek magazine, Mandela said that “the United States has
made serious mistakes in the conduct of its foreign affairs, which
have had unfortunate repercussions long after the decisions were
taken,” Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
“If
you look at those matters, you will come to the conclusion that the
attitude of the United States of America is a threat to world
peace,” he said, citing, as its worst move, U.S. “sabotage” of
the U.N. decision over the withdrawal of the Soviet Union from
Afghanistan.
According
to Mandela, the U.S. decision to arm and finance the mujahedin
movement in Afghanistan following the 1979 Soviet invasion of the
country has led to the eventual rise of the Taliban regime.
He
also said that, in his view, unqualified U.S. support of the Shah of
Iran led directly to the Islamic revolution of 1979.
Mandela
said that now, by preparing for military action against Iraq, the
United States “is saying... that if you are afraid of a veto in the
Security Council, you can go outside and take action and violate the
sovereignty of other countries.”
“That
is the message they are sending to the world,” said the former South
African leader. “That must be condemned in the strongest terms.”
Mandela
said he believed Vice President Richard Cheney and Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld, who advocate taking a hard line toward Iraq, were
“misleading” President George W. Bush.
“It
is the men who around him who are dinosaurs, who do not want him to
belong to the modern age,” said the former president. “The only
man, the only person who wants to help Bush move to the modern era is
General Colin Powell, the secretary of state.”
When
asked by Newsweek if he wants to mediate as he tried to do the same in
the middle east a couple of years ago Mandela said that he would
seriously consider to do that if asked by credible organizations.
“But
a situation of this nature does not need an individual, it needs an
organization like the United Nations to mediate. We must understand
the seriousness of this situation,” he said.
Mandela
said that with regards to the allegations that Iraq is developing
weapons of mass destruction he said: “Scott Ritter, a former United
Nations arms inspector who is in Baghdad, has said that there is no
evidence whatsoever of [development of weapons of] mass destruction.
“Neither
Bush nor [British Prime Minister] Tony Blair has provided any evidence
that such weapons exist. But what we know is that Israel has weapons
of mass destruction. Nobody talks about that.
“Why
should there be one standard for one country, especially because it is
black, and another one for another country, Israel, that is white.”
He
further dwelled on the black-white issue and said: “In fact, many
people say quietly, but they don’t have the courage to stand up and
say publicly, that when there were white secretary generals you
didn’t find this question of the United States and Britain going out
of the United Nations.
“But
now that you’ve had black secretary generals like Boutros Boutros
Ghali, like Kofi Annan, they do not respect the United Nations. They
have contempt for it. This is not my view, but that is what is being
said by many people.”
He
said that the U.S. feels that they are the only superpower in the
world and that they can do what they like, reported Newsweek.
Mandela,
84, was sentenced to life in prison by South Africa white minority
regime in 1964 for advocating armed resistance to apartheid.
The
African National Congress leader was set free in 1990 to lead his
country in a transition to non-racial elections.
