Full Interview: Prince Turki Al-Faisal on 9/11, Afghanistan and America’s role in the Middle East

your royal highness thank you so much for joining me thank you ms gamble it's a pleasure to be with you i want to kick off by asking you to talk about afghanistan today we saw panic chaos and terror were you surprised by the images that we've seen over the last few weeks i was not when mr trump made the deal with the taliban before he left office it was inevitable that the government would lose its legitimacy because he was the closest ally of that government talking to the government's enemy so it was inevitable that the taliban had been selected by the united states to be the successor to this government what did surprise me though was the way that the withdrawal took place this year i don't know how to use which word to use you know whether incompetence carelessness bad management it was all a combination of those things when they've had such a long time to prepare for the withdrawal and 20 years well indeed and the experience was there but something went wrong so the that was the surprising aspect of what happened in afghanistan you've had a front row seat to america's foreign policy in the region for decades was there a sense for you watching those images of deja vu like it's happening all over again it was different and the having been 20 years in in afghanistan and having spent so much time and lives and energy on it i thought it would be different from from previous issues i remember the fall of saigon i was still a young man at that time but it's a it had vivid vivid scenes that that one remembers i i don't think it's comparable in in from that aspect but definitely it was similar in in in the effect that it had um if you remember in those days the issue of the the fall of of the rest of southeast asia to the communists and it followed the withdrawal from the domino effect yes it followed from the fall of saigon you know laos cambodia and other countries you know became affected by it today i don't know if it will have the same effect this would roll with what is happening around afghanistan because that's the question who's going to pick up the pieces well the countries that are going to be there does that include do you think saudi arabia saudi arabia had a bad history with the taliban if you remember back in the 90s i personally went to mullah umar at the direction of the king and the crown prince to try to get him to hand over biladen because of what he was doing to saudi arabia from afghanistan unfortunately mullah refused and that led to 9 11 and all of the other things that followed and since then of course during president karzai's term of office in afghanistan he asked saudi arabia to mediate with the taliban so the the kingdom when king abdullah was alive received a delegation from the from the taliban and the kingdom told them if you break with al-qaeda we would be willing to negotiate and engage with you they didn't so the kingdom did not deal with the taliban however that did not mean that the kingdom was not interested in finding a solution to the issue in afghanistan just a couple of months ago there was a meeting held in the holy city of mecca between taliban and government representatives from the religious aspect under auspices of the world muslim league to try to get some kind of understanding between them obviously that did not bear fruit yeah because what we see today is different it's all political now when you think about that with regards to the taliban itself as you say you've had a long history of dealing with them for decades negotiating with them or attempting to negotiate with them in your view was a mistake for the united states it's difficult to know the the what led the united states to negotiate with them because i don't know well they wanted to get out i said that's true but there may have been other factors as well which i am not aware of yeah but definitely it was not the way to do it to go behind the legitimate government and strike a deal and then come and inform i remember the statements that used to come out at that time mr trump's uh negotiations with the taliban um official american officials were saying when they were asked have you gone behind the back of the government they would say oh we kept the government informed that's not the same thing as having them on board yeah so that that to me was was the wrong way to do it what about what's happened in the recent days we're talking about billions of dollars of u.s made weapons everything from blackhawk helicopters to night vision goggles left behind by the afghan army and now presumably in the hands of the taliban and well i doubt that they're going to be flying the blackhawk helicopters themselves these weapons could presumably make their way outside of afghanistan end up in the hands of state and non-state actors how worried about that argument it's very worrisome yeah as much as the taliban's still standing engagement with al-qaeda which is also worrisome because you know al-qaeda targeted the kingdom first before anybody else back in 1995. the first uh terrorist attack that al-qaeda took was against the kingdom before they expanded their their their activities outside whether it was in these embassy bombings in nairobi and darussalam or subsequently in 9 11 in new york so it is very worrisome that aspect of it and now with this weaponry that the ally of taliban al-qaeda may get some their hands on yeah it's going to be even more worrisome how do you see that playing out in the sense of cleaning up the mess well saudi arabia do you think have to take a lead role in that the pakistanis are going to have to take your lead role how worried are you that there's not going to be a coordinated effort to deal with this given the chaos we've seen i think the countries that have to to to engage in that aspect are the countries that are closest to to the outer afghanistan pakistan iran russia and china they're the ones now who are still represented in afghanistan and we've seen the the russian ambassador and the chinese ambassador the iranian ambassador the pakistani ambassador each of them not only remaining in in kabul but making statements about future relations with the taliban what i found most interesting in these statements is that all four countries have said that they they await the conduct of the of the taliban before they take any serious decisions about engagement with the taliban and each country has its own interests in in afghanistan before the fall of the government when the taliban were closing in to to kabul there was a statement from from an iranian spokesman who said that i think it was zarif actually the former foreign minister who said well we'll be happy to send our the afghan militias from syria to help the government against the taliban that was of course the then government of of of kabul protested that this was interesting yes so it shows you that that iran has some influence at least in there pakistan of course has been a major supporter of the taliban but they also tried to have some engagement with the with the irani government that did not go far china received a representative of the taliban before the fall of kabul as did moscow so there is something going on between the taliban and these countries about where they're going to go in the future what's the element that's of most concern to you within that the rise of china i'm concerned as i told you about the the taliban's alliance with al-qaeda another thing that really concerns me which is not getting much much much exposure if you like in the media is the suffering of the afghan people in general it's been 40 years of continuous warfare and the the the casualties and and the destruction of lives and and and opportunity and and peace has been horrendous that requires world attention and not just these four countries yeah the whole world should come together to try to find some way of getting over this terrible history of the people of afghanistan you know there are still afghan refugees in pakistan from the soviet invasion of the time of the soviet invasion and still there are afghan refugees in iran from the time of the soviet engagement that is unacceptable given that 40 years of pain for the afghan people do you have any regrets about your role in saudi arabia's role in fighting the communists not at all it's two different things when the soviets invaded the first victims of that were the afghan people the soviet invasion led to these refugees to leave afghanistan and seek shelter in pakistan and and in iran not to mention the campaigns that the russians took military campaigns against the villages and the towns inside afghanistan to fight the mujahideen they basically destroyed afghanistan at that time and you know one of the things that they did is they actually kidnapped thousands of afghani children and took them into the soviet union from the ages of six and seven and eight and nine in order to bring them up as you know perfect examples of communism that is hardly reported nowadays but the soviet invasion was a horrible invasion vis-a-vis the afghan people and the kingdom's support for the mujahideen led with the united states support and the pakistani support to ending that unacceptable soviet uh invasion the break came when the soviets left instead of the mugahidin coming together and forming a government and going on from there in peaceful ways they started fighting each other and that's when the kingdom said we're not going to give you any more support and actually stopped all support for the mujahideen and when the taliban came to power in the 90s again the kingdom told the taliban we're not going to give you money because you're still fighting you have to stop the fighting before we engage with you in development and economic support obviously there's a lot of questions about america's role within the region afghanistan the graveyard of empires the british the russians how do you see this against that sweep of history for the americans do you think that this is a watershed moment i am not comfortable with that term watershed moments um i don't have the the the historical wherewithal to to make a judgment on that i think it is still too early to to judge whether america is or is not in a watershed moment and there is a lot of talk even particularly within america itself yes about the the the waning of america the the american supremacy is disappearing china is coming up russia is is competing etc etc uh you can tell a rising from a setting sun well i'm still think it's too early to to rule out america uh and consider it as a setting sun i think america has has much within it to to to contradict that prediction uh it is still a vital society you you look around yuyani whether it is in inventiveness in in in culture in in in military abilities in uh science and and medicine and so on america is pretty much still the number one uh country in the world to to to to proclaim that that is all going to end tomorrow i think is is wrong so i don't think i will see that in my lifetime but i must tell you already my lifetime is not going to be that long okay so we've seen these images literally afghans falling from the sky desperate to get out of that country the united states now um wondering frankly what its role should be lots of questions about whether joe biden should resign over this and a lot of anger at home and even abroad at how this was mishandled do you believe that this is in the case of a president a fireable offense that's not for me to say and i i don't think i'm i'm i'm either capable or or or willing to to make a judgment on mr biden's conduct in america that's for the american people to decide however i don't want to be in his place at this moment it's just too much what has been happening and not just in in afghanistan i think particularly around our part of the world the kingdom's alliance with america goes back a long time and my view of how mr biden has treated the kingdom is is not very positive why well yeah he he prejudged while he was campaigning about the kingdom things particularly on issues of human rights and so on without giving himself the chance to see what is happening inside saudi arabia there is a tremendous evolution taking place in the society in saudi arabia and in the government in saudi arabia on the issues of human rights particularly and saudi arabia today is not what it was 20 years ago not even what it was a few years ago well i have a longer perspective on that so because i think the the the the ball started rolling for for saudi arabia's progression 20 years ago and in the 90s when the late king had set the committee to set up the basic law that defined the the what is saudi arabia and the relationship between the government and the citizen that really opened the door for what is happening today and of course it has been much accelerated under king salman and crown prince mohammed bin salman to the delight if i may say of the majority of saudis there are still a few diehards who don't like kings but they exist in all societies but alhamdulillah i can i can truthfully say that the majority of saudis fully support what is happening today in saudi arabia saudi arabia didn't do itself any favors with the murder of the democracy and the riad ritz carlton and other incidents especially in recent years how would you like to see that relationship evolve because there's still a lot of pushback in washington on saudi well saudi arabia is not the only country that didn't do itself good by its activities i can cite a few examples about america's activities about other countries activities i think these are things that should be engaged in not in the public sphere but as good friends would do as you and me sitting down now talking about what these things are and how we can best get out of a bad situation and improve it and if there are mistakes done then we should be advised what they are and if we don't then improve on those things then we should be liable to criticism and sanction but to simply use images that come in the media particularly about not just saudi but any other country and and use that as a judgment on what saudi arabia is or is not i think that is unfair and your problem there for the americans is that that brutal murder of jamal khashoggi is still bigger than a big mistake for many people to get past you should see it's its effect on saudi arabia saudi arabia truly from the kingdom has considered this horrendous and and heinous crime for what it is which is an awful aggression against the life of a person as you know there is a verse in the quran that says he who kills an innocent person is as if he has killed all of humanity and this is how saudis are looking upon the death of kemal khashoggi that it was a crime unpardonable unforgivable and those who perpetrated it should get their guests deserved and the judicial system in saudi arabia did exactly that they took them to court they tried them they sentenced them and they are now under that sentence uh in in in the kingdom that but that's not enough and as the king and the crown prince said we're going to make sure that this never happens again and and that is a stigma that will stay with us forever every article you see today in any newspaper not just in america but anywhere around the world when they're talking about saudi arabia they will mention and you know in saudi arabia this uh reporter jamal khashoggi was murdered in the saudi consulate in in turkey and so on that stigma is going to be with us forever though those articles that will be written about what is happening in saudi arabia will always have that sentence in them and that is that is a stain on us that we have to bear do you believe his legacy and king salman's legacy will be um potentially rehabilitated over the long term given the enormous amount of change that's happened inside saudi arabia well if i may give examples of other places where such horrendous active acts have happened do we think for example that japan's attack in pearl harbor in 1941 would have remained as as the defining factor and what japan has become today do we think for example america's dropping of the atom bomb on on hiroshima and nagasaki with hundreds of thousands of of innocent people being destroyed and so on is it what represents america today i think it is what happens after the event that will decide what king salman and prince mohammed and salman's legacy is going to be this is where saudi arabia i think is showing that it is moving on from those uh horrible events that have taken place including if i may say uh the issue of 9 11. and i had just left my my my my job as director of intelligence i think 10 or 11 days before 9 11. but the stigma of 9 11 is still with us in saudi arabia like the khashoggi thing as i told you yes there is no article today or reference to saudi arabia without mention that 15 of the 19 perpetrators of that heinous crime as well were saudis without mentioning after that that saudi arabia itself was a victim of the same group that attacked the twin towers in in new york we were as i told you the first target of al-qaeda but that part is forgotten when saudi arabia is mentioned in the context of 9 11. so that is that will take time whether you consider it rehabilitation or or the march of history or whatever you want to call it i think saudi arabia has already gone beyond what that those two events mean or signify for saudis first and then for the rest of the world to deal with saudi arabia speaking of 11 um the families of victims are still pursuing in the u.s justice system um attempts to sue various people within saudi arabia and the saudi government for the events of 9 11. you have diplomatic immunity do you believe it's fair for those families to try to seek justice from saudi arabia for what happened i cannot put myself in the place of of the relatives of the victims of 9 11. their loss is something that i cannot even presume to to to understand or or to to share or to but i do appreciate that any loss of life has its effect on on its on on the relatives of that of that person what i do say is that saudi arabia has never hidden anything about that matter so you're not worried about anything that could come out from fbi documents redacted we've seen what happened if you remember the famous 28 pages that president bush how do you say it excluded from from exposure when the 9 11 report came out nothing so nothing in those pages you believe will surprise you or implicate saudi arabia in any way there is absolutely nothing and i for one and i think all saudis believe as our foreign minister the late prince would said in front of the white house when he met with president bush after president bush kept those pages away from the report he said please for our sake if you're if you're if you think that this is going to help saudi arabia it's not put everything on the table so if there are still documents within u.s archives that have not been put to the public i think they should be brought out because there will be nothing in them whatsoever you know america took uh investigative efforts to find the culprits behind 9 11. saudi arabia did too after all these were saudis we wanted to know who was responsible if there was anybody responsible in saudi arabia for that and we found absolutely nothing so yes to the to the to the better exposure of the reality i hope that the u.s government releases all documents about 9 11. when you think about this legacy question you've had as we say the opportunity to view the administrations of many presidents we're talking about everyone from nixon to jimmy carter he also of course both bushes clinton president obama president trump and now president biden who do you think had the best grasp on the situation in the region as a u.s president i think for me two presidents stand out president nixon when we saw his conduct during the the ramadan war and post-ramadan war he finally put america on the side of playing a role in finding a solution to the palestinian problem officially yeah and dedicated the brilliant mr uh kissinger uh to do that and the first president bush um in his dealings with the with the with the middle east on the palestinian issue and other issues of course america's standing with saudi arabia and the other countries against saddam's aggression against kuwait was an exemplary example of what friends mean to each other and we in saudi arabia never forget that half a million americans came to saudi arabia willing to sacrifice their lives for the principle of preventing aggression from becoming the norm rather than the exception and saudi soldiers rubbed shoulders with american soldiers in that effort that is never forgettable in the in the history of saudi arabia the other thing of course that that president bush did was the convening of the madrid conference after that conflict ended which brought for the first time israelis and arabs at the same table to discuss peace in the in the middle east unfortunately he didn't last after that by losing the election yeah which brought in president clinton and you know i i i consider president clinton as a personal friend because we went to college together back in the haiti of the 1960s he also played an important role of trying to bridge this this seemingly insurmountable chasm between the arabs and the israelis by his efforts not only at camp david but also the subsequent agreement that was had uh in in the sinai between israelis and palestinians over the clinton issues parameters for for peace in the middle east unfortunately he had to leave office so so is it the length of u.s administrations or is it the in some cases incompetence um in dealing with what's happening in the region that is the sticking point in your view for america's foreign policy because it spits and starts well we've always had a problem with with these fits and starts since fdr well absolutely and fdr i remember in reading the history of his meeting with king abdullah he made promises to king abdullah which were not his to make as a president with a term limit well maybe but nonetheless he did make them yes and he went back to the united states and he didn't keep them to himself he he laid out in a speech to the congress what he had agreed to with king abdulaziz yes and tremendous president truman when he first came to office he reaffirmed those uh those agreements between fdr and king abdullah unfortunately the the palestinian-israeli issue intervened in 1947-48 and he can't get his mind he needed to get reelected he needed to get reelected well that's his prerogative but it doesn't say well for for commitment to to your word right um we've seen this with what is happening in afghanistan today yeah and so that is something i think that is part and parcel of american makeup and and we've we've had to deal with it all this time yes and they accepted that it is going to be that you know see-saw engagement with america that goes up and down up and down but we've always maintained that america is our best friend and that we will work to keep america our best friend you saw the statement by the crown prince a couple of months ago in an interview about the relationship with the united states after mr biden came to the president he said we agree with america on practically ninety percent of issues the ten percent that we don't agree with them about we will talk to them about that that is how we look upon america so you feel it's too early to say that we're seeing the twilight of american influence in the middle east but certainly there is a change definitely does this mean then that saudi arabia and other gulf arab countries in particular have to take more onus of their foreign policy have to further develop their own foreign policy and be ready to defend themselves in ways obviously that they didn't need to even a few years ago well that's already been happening yeah from the time mr obama yeah when obama declared his his direction yes with to to east asia the kingdom of course realized that things are changing and we began to to consider how we can with the help of america not counter to to america engage in such a manner that we have our own prerogatives put in place and so and america has come to our support in some of these things uh i'll just mention the the issue of yemen for example and when the the houthis rose up against the legitimate government ndm and back in 2014 i think 15 the kingdom took the stand that it wants to help the legitimate government in the yemen this was during mr obama's time mr obama supported that and we engaged with america on how we can best do that and that continued when mr biden now came to to to to to office in america he had a different view and considered that that american support for saudi arabia was not uh legitimate or if you like was not in the interest of the united states and declared so but he did it while consulting with the with the kingdom and we reached understandings with america on what kind of support we will get from america and the naming of a special representative mr linderking who i have much respect for uh was a sign that that mr obama was not abandoning the issue of yemen but that he wanted to engage in a different manner and we came along with that and the kingdom out subsequently proposed a peaceful solution to the to the to the yemen which the united states has supported so we're in the middle of that at the moment and that is just an example of how the relationship has has come about with different uh different directions taken by both countries but coming together to understand that each of us has a responsibility and and contributing factor to how we can achieve peace in the yemen saudi arabia's the biggest economy it's the leader if you say of the gcc for example um and in so many elements of the more broad gulf arab policy for saudi arabia what do you believe this foreign policy is going to look like post what we've seen in afghanistan do you think that saudi arabia is going to take an even greater role in the region i think saudi arabia's position is is based on on not only its uh economic capabilities you say it's the largest economy and so on it's the leader of the of the gcc etc but it also has another role to play which is leadership in the islamic world the two holy mosques of muslims that millions of muslims billions of muslims turn towards every day five times a day are mecca and medina and they are in saudi arabia and and from that context it has always been saudi arabia's role not only to protect these holy praises but to make sure that they they they become a focal point for the welfare not just of muslims but of humanity you know muslims make up something like one-fifth or one a bit more than that of of world population so there is much to be expected from their role towards humanity and this is where saudi arabia also has has a distinct role from other countries no other country in the muslim world has these two holy places the birthplace of islam and the birthplace of the prophet of islam but also the the the places where muslims come together to perform their ultimate duty to god which is the pilgrimage so this puts a great responsibility on saudi arabia and we have to make sure that our conduct toward these two places brings muslims together rather than keeps them apart what about oil because the history of saudi arabia at least in the 20th and 21st century has been very much intertwined with energy and you once told me that the energy market the oil market binds the world together but while no doubt oil will remain a huge part of that energy dynamic in years to come the world is changing and saudi arabia's place in the world no doubt will change with it how do you see that evolving you know ms gamble if i may i i would like to ask you that question that's not fair because you probably know more about that than i do not just from your own interest but from all the people that you have interviewed uh since the issue came i came up you know when you started working in in in your job but let me let me just say this the kingdom is is is is is is a partner with the rest of the world and finding the best uh usage for energy resources god blessed us with very cheap fossil fuels he also blessed us with very cheap solar energy um i think among the world's countries we have probably the best uh the or the highest receptivity of sunlight anywhere in the world and that also helps us in in providing us with alternatives to the fossil fuels and the world is not going to to to give up the the the benefits of fossil fuels uh for my lifetime at least if not for longer than that so but that doesn't mean that we're going to stick to that and and refuse any other developments so in that transition you don't see saudi arabia being left behind no i don't think so i think we're going to be in in the forefront of countries that produce new energy clean energy hydrogen for example you've seen the statements that have come out and the actual investments that the kingdom has put into producing hydrogen as with other countries you know the uae is doing the same thing i think gutter is going into that and other oil producing countries are equally interested in that what about opec because a few years ago under donald trump we would see a tweet come out from the white house and it could move the price of oil now the situation is quite different and it seems as if to some uh the policies coming from the biden white house have reinvigorated opec and of course saudi arabia plays a major role as the i think his royal highness said the custodian of the global energy markets you've seen opec's influence gain and wane for decades how do you see their position today you know over the years since the the energy uh crisis in the 70s there have been what your father started well not just my father you know and kuwait and the other countries uh the opec and and and opec actually uh which is the arab uh version of of opec were the ones who placed the embargo on the united states and i think holland and and portugal for supporting israel in the ramadan war but before that opec got together and and said that the price of oil was much too low and that oil companies were taking advantage of us as producers and they decided to to bring up the price of oil using production as a means of doing that finally the oil companies came along and instead of beginning adversaries they became partners in in [Music] enlarging the the the agreement over prices and production and so on and giving the producers a say in how oil was produced and made anyway we see president biden's uh policy as being declared to stop the use of of of harmful carbon-based energy sources but at the same time he's telling us as producers of these harmful carbon-based fossil fuels we want you to expand production because the price of oil is going up in the united states and it shouldn't be that way does it seem to you they didn't think this one through well for me it's a bit confusing yeah which is it you you want to be against the the fossil fuels or you wanna you want us to produce more so that people can and your country can have lower prices of of energy and this is i think the the the the the problem with with with people who adopt that kind of of policy towards fossil fuels by by saying that we must reject them yeah they ignore the fact that today at least and for the next foreseeable future there is a need for these fuels and and if you if you stop using them the price will go up but the need will still be there so you'll be harming yourself rather than helping yourself by that policy and the same is true for for the for other consumers you know whether in europe or who have decided now we've seen in germany in france and so on they have declared that they will have zero emissions by 2040 i think or 2050 and so on well if you're going to stop all your consumption of oil you're going to have to pay a hell of a lot of more money to do that than is worth it at the moment so it's for them to decide on that but we will be there to produce oil for whoever wants it and we will be there to initiate research and and and activity to improve the quality of the oil consumption but also to provide new energy sources like i mentioned like hydrogen and solar and wind his royal highness of principal aziz has said that saudi arabia will drill to the last drop do you think that that will happen in your lifetime well i don't know if it will happen in my lifetime but we still have a lot of oil underground yeah you know america tapped the the the shale oil when 10 15 years ago we still haven't tapped that we're still in in in in the process of extracting what is there under the under the ground so there is much oil still to be had from from saudi geography a few years ago when osama bin laden was killed you said in an interview that that was the perfect time for the united states to declare victory and withdraw do you still hold by that i hold by by several things on afghanistan one is that when america retaliated for september 11th and was chasing biladin in tora bora with as we see from reports from people who participated in that within any a day or two behind him before capturing him america simply said stop and we're going to go attack iraq and they took all of those resources that were at that time deployed against biladin and put them against saddam saddam hussein that was the biggest mistake in my view in america's engagement with afghanistan because let's remember as president biden said america was there to get biladin and al-qarda and that's how america should have stayed not as an enemy or as a an opponent of the taliban you know one factor that many people don't remember or don't recollect or mention is that in in 2001 before september 11th there was a taliban delegation in the united states negotiating with the united nations first to get the seat of afghanistan at the united nations because the u.n hadn't recognized the taliban government then and during that time they were holding talks with the bush administration it's still not clear whether these talks were about energy the pipeline coming from turkmenistan to go through afghanistan and go through pakistan to the arabian sea or the delivery of osama bin laden because you tried to make that deal with omar well he refused but the taliban had sent a delegation to the u.s to discuss these things so that indicated that they were still willing to negotiate over that issue but september 11th of course blew that up all over the place and and i think biladin obviously behind the back of the taliban was doing these things as he did against saudi arabia with the taliban so what in your view then was the greatest mistake on the part of the americans post 9 11. that i think was was the biggest mistake not not getting diverting resources to iraq yeah of course what as i mentioned and as you referred to when billadin was killed i thought that would be the the declaration of victory for the united states over the terrorists of of al-qaeda and that's when i think it was president obama who achieved that issue should have declared that our mission is accomplished and prepared the way for withdrawal of american troops from from afghanistan but that didn't happen so this is why we are in this situation now what would you say then is something that the region needs to see today from the united states well that's that's a tall uh question that requires a tall answer um i think we need to be reassured about american commitment what does that look like that looks like for example not withdrawing patriot missiles from saudi arabia at the time when saudi arabia is the victim of missile attacks and drone attacks not just from the yemen but from iran i think that was not indicative of america's declared intention to help saudi arabia defend itself against outside enemies that is what i would expect america hopefully to come back and and tell us that yes we are committed to you and we will deploy whatever is needed for that um you know the kingdom had to to to seek other support in that to to bolster our air defenses against these attacks from iran and from from the the houthis in yemen we would have preferred that that it would be america who would be doing that than than others and that is something i think that the administration has to to to consider seriously now especially after afghanistan and what happened and what is happening in in kabul and it's not just saudi arabia it's the other gulf states or equally vulnerable we've seen attacks on tankers in in the gulf uh by iran and yet nothing comes in response from from from america now whether the body and administration will come through with that i have no idea but it is something i think that they should consider just to reassure us that we can rely on the united states what about failed states in the region like lebanon well not just lebanon you have lebanon you have syria you have libya i have yemen uh iraq is is is is is coming out of that consideration i think in the next few days there's going to be there's a peace conference sorry or a regional dialogue regional dialogue friends of iraq dialogue not just regional i think they've invited others as well i think the us will be present i think some european countries will be present but failed states will have to be dealt with and one of the things about syria for example was it was the first time that we actually saw america reneg on a declared intent the red line the red line over over the uh the chemical attack on on on syrian citizens and mr obama will have to live with that i think for the rest of his life we've had to live with it obviously in our part of the world lebanon is is i think the world community and not just saudi arabia has a responsibility and not just france and and america yeah i've seen the issue of lebanon being left simply say for the americans and the french and the saudis to deal with no and that's a mistake in your view well i think everybody should be collected to to help lebanon and and primarily by meeting the challenge of the extra territorial ambitions of iran in the area they are the cause of what is happening in lebanon not the financial crisis well the financial crisis is is a result of that it is not the cause of the iranian intervention the iranian intervention has been going on you know since 2000 and since when was it um uh 2002 i think when when israel withdrew from from shabbat from from lebanon uh etc so uh it is a result of that that we have the economic crisis of course the politicians in lebanon they're the main responsibility for allowing hezbollah to be in that position but they have a choice no and and this is where i say the world is has a responsibility as well because after the tithe agreement in 1989 i think if if i remember correctly when all of the fighters in the civil war in lebanon agreed to stop the fighting and one of the main conditions of that agreement was the the giving up of weapons by militias all the militias gave up their weapons except hezbollah and they were allowed to keep them by the world when it should have been a direct intervention by the world community through the united nations to strip hezbollah of its weapons at that time they didn't and hezbollah became what it is so this is something i think that reflects on what the world responsibility uh is in towards liberal but the politicians are equally responsible in lebanon they've accepted this this factor and and tried to to play the game uh with hezbollah not knowing or not considering or perhaps not realizing that it was hezbollah that was playing with them rather than they were playing with hezbollah and this is what we see today and who is paying the price the lebanese people for the first time in lebanon people are starving to death they're they're dying because of lack of medicine and medical care when lebanon used to be the the the five-star health care center in the middle east this is uh tragic so that is something to to be taken into account by the world community and not just america france and saudi arabia what about iran we've made it through almost an entire interview without focusing specifically on iran do you still believe that they are the region's most malign actor absolutely and and i don't say that lightly i say it from from from what i see happening everywhere yeah if you look at yemen for example who is supplying the houses with the missiles and the drones and the experts to to fire those missiles and drones at saudi arabia it is iran contrary to united nations security council resolution 2216 which specified that there should be no weapons supplied to the houthis particularly and yet iran is not sanctioned by the united nations because of that in syria it is iranian militias that supported bashar al-assad when he was rampaging against his own people and killing them left right and center and when he was about to be defeated by the opposition there iran came to the rescue first by sending hezbollah then by recruiting shia militias from iraq from afghanistan and from pakistan to come to his help of course russia's position there was equally terrible in my view they came to the support of of of bashar al-assad against their declared policy which was they were there to fight the terrorists and how they could not define bashar assad as a terrorist boggles my mind because he was the biggest terrorist whatever uh isis did in syria or or or al-qaeda or whatever bashar al-assad did in in multiple times 100 times worse than isis or or al-qaeda just to mention the the chemical attacks on on his own people and yet russia stands by by bashar al-assad they declare that they are not there to to help i said but rather to fight the terrorists and i would respectfully tell them that he is the biggest terrorist in syria and yet many arab governments are now starting to talk to him again that is to me understandable i don't understand that a mistake i i don't understand the the the the reason seeing what is happening in syria there is still a war going on in syria there are still innocent victims of that war perpetrated molly by the the bashar al-assad regime against its own people so that is something that has to be fixed i don't know who can fix it but it is also a responsibility of the world community when you think about all of the things that we've discussed what is the greatest concern to you iran's activities in the region the potential waning of american influence in the middle east what role saudi arabia will need to play in the coming years what is the greatest area of concern for you i think all of these are important and and grave um i can't separate in terms of of of a range of or value of importance between these things america's position is important as i said before i think america should give reassurances now uh to the rest of us about its commitments iran's influence has to be challenged in the area and i think the jcpoa as it is being handled nowadays is not doing that america says we will negotiate and go the nuclear deal first and then we're going to go and talk about regional and and missile issues and iran's malign policy in the area well once the the the iranians get the nuclear deal why should they negotiate on any anything else that is something i think that america has to reconsider i think development in in its biggest headlines uh is a concern for me because the the world is not stopping in its place uh and in saudi arabia for example our population is increasing uh at high levels of birth rate and all of these young people who are coming to to the fore um they need to have a future that they can look look at as being bright this is what the government and and the leadership is trying to do with vision 2030 is to give them this this vision and this hope that when they come to seek a job or find a livelihood that they will find it it's it's difficult and we've seen examples where everywhere yeah um it's difficult to to bring that about but it is a challenge that we're trying to achieve um around us of course if you look at egypt if you look at east africa if you look on the other side pakistan india india we see what is going on there and further east bangladesh all of these areas development has to be protected and and enhanced rather than threatened by either internal strife or external intervention and finally don't you have a book that's coming out soon i do tell me about it well uh in in in hopefully on on september 22nd i will be launching the book it's a book about my experience and saudi arabia's experience in afghanistan it's called the the afghanistan file and it deals with the from the beginning of the soviet invasion in afghanistan uh i can't say until today because the book was written a few years back and developed over time and coming out i stopped writing it a few months ago and we've seen how developments have developed a friend of mine when i invited him to come to to to the launching uh a month ago just sent me an email saying well you have to write a new case a new forward anyway amazing so that is that it's going to tell saudi arabia's role about afghanistan because you've seen others talking about saudi arabia's role without saudi arabia doing that and i think it was time that everybody knew what saudi arabia did and did not do when it was engaged with afghanistan is there anything within that context that you wish that the kingdom had pushed for that might have changed what's happened to afghanistan today absolutely anya i think when when uh when the two things when the the soviets withdrew basically the the world community turned its back to afghanistan we remained we tried to bring um the the the the the mujahideen who were fighting each other to a peace day uh table and and we actually made a peace proposal back in 1995 i think it was and i remember i was delegated by the king and the crown prince to go to various countries to prom to make and promote this this peace proposal talked with the americans i talked to the russians i talked to the iranians at the time because we were on talking terms uh with the pakistanis of course and with the with the mujahideen the taliban had not yet come come about it was still hikmatia rabbani uh sayaf and and others like that unfortunately that peace proposal did not get the the support of the of the other countries i think they turned to other things you know america russia short attention span short attention span well not just sure i think that well for example america at that time under under president clinton had other issues to consider not only internal issues but also issues in in the in the in the baltics etc etc and i think pakistan afghanistan became secondary to them so they didn't get much attention pakistan went through upheavals at the time change of governments assassinations etc so they were preoccupied russia was just coming out of its communist background and so on and he was engaged in in in detection chechnya uh et cetera et cetera iran of course was equally engaged in other issues at that time and didn't pay much attention the basic proposal for that piece and i think it might still be able to work if the countries agree to it is that the borders of afghanistan should be should be locked up against arms smuggling already there is too much too much weaponry inside afghanistan more than even we knew right but i think if that happens knowing that the taliban will not be able to use much of that weaponry because of its sophistication there should not be russian advisors hired by the taliban to come and operate helicopters or or chinese or iranian or pakistani and so on these countries have to decide that there should be a blockade of arms to to afghanistan but being realistic and i don't think it's going to happen so that's one thing i think that saudi arabia should have pressed more strongly at that time back in 1995 which we didn't um the other thing of course i think is is when i went to to get biladin from from mullahama and not succeeding in that i think we should have pressed other countries as well more strongly to to come to that pakistan importantly number one but also the united states russia and china and so on so you would have been willing to go back to him if you'd had that international support absolutely to get this guy absolutely yeah well we'll look forward to reading the book well i look forward to seeing the interview on on cnbc through highness thank you so much for joining me thank you very much mrs campbell

Channel: CNBC International TV

Views: 145,069

Keywords: CNBC international, CNBC International TV, 9/11, nine eleven, afghanistan, middle east, iran, saudi arabia, lebanon crisis, iraq war, iraq, bush, bidedn, usama bin laden, president biden, al qaeda, chemical weapons

Id: YVQ2iffcu90

Length: 65min 45sec (3945 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 08 2021