INDEPTH: IRAQ
Muqtada al-Sadr interview
CBC News Online, April 6, 2004
Edited excerpts from an exclusive interview by the CBC's Nahlah Ayed with Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr. The interview was taped in Najaf before the U.S. issued an arrest warrant for al-Sadr.
Muqtada al-Sadr |
Q: You've expressed pretty strong feelings about the Americans – why do you hate them so much?
A: Hate them? No inshallah I don't hate them. But the Americans are two parts. There is the American people, and then there is the American government. The people of America, we have no problem with, and we like them to be our friends and for us to be theirs, in good and the bad times. There are no problems there.
But the American government, with its co-operation with Israel, it's intent on dividing the Middle East, and Arabs and Muslims in particular. And this is a war on Muslims, as many clues attest to, such as declaring war on Afghanistan, and fighting Syria, and Iraq – all of these, what's do they have in common? One element, and that is what? Islam.
Q: You've said several times that the Americans are trying to wage a war against Islam to destroy Islam. Why do you think they're doing that?
A: Though I don't like to make statements on that, but essentially they know that the saviour of the human race [will be] in Islam – if the expression can be used – the saviour of human beings from terrorism, the saviour of human beings from violence, and from being taken advantage of, from occupation. He'll emerge from among the Muslims. So they want to distance this ghost from them, the ghost of Islam, the ghost of the saviour, so they imagine that they can do that by being in the areas that are likely for the appearance of the saviour, the Mahdi. So they centre themselves in those areas, the areas where he's likely to appear – and of course nothing is for sure – but the countries that he might appear in are those same countries that are occupied right now.
Q: You've said that part of the reason that they're doing this [creating discord between Shiites] is to arrest you. Why would they want to arrest you?
A: The people of Iraq are shoulder to shoulder [supportive of] with what they call the Sadr faction, and this faction has popularity. They imagine that this faction with my leadership – if the expression may be used – and I am the leader of this faction, as they claim, and as I claim, as things are so, how can they divorce the people from this faction?
By way of spreading lies and rumours, and spreading discord, and spreading matters that highlight the differences between this faction and the people. So, if I were arrested or if I were killed, then after me the issues that American fears about me wouldn't exist anymore – and I couldn't tell you what those issues are.
Q: You've said many times that your ideas of democracy and freedom are entirely different than the American version of democracy and freedom. Could you tell us a little bit about the difference between those two versions?
A: The first difference: Freedom for the Americans means for example, loosening, moral destitution, if the expression may be used. Freedom of women from the hijab, freedom of women from the binds and rules of religion, not just Islam, but also Christian or Jewish, all the religious rules. What do they call shunning those rules? Freedom.
No. For us, holding on to religious rules, and following them, and refraining from what's forbidden, and being diligent with our duties, what do we call that? That's what we call freedom.
Q: How long do you think the Americans will stay in Iraq?
I imagine that America won't leave. Because it has striven for a very long time to enter this country in particular, and it won't leave very easily.
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