Following are excerpts
from an address by Libyan leader Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi, which aired on
Al-Jazeera TV on January 14, 2011:
Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi:
Wikileaks, which people call "Kleenex," makes fun of you,
and publishes information written by ambassadors who are liars, in order
to pit peoples against one another and cause confusion. We have some
of them here.
We will place the ambassadors
who wrote this on trial. We will take them to court, either as witnesses
or as the accused. They should prove the truth of what they wrote to
Washington about Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, or France. We will place them
on trial.
First, we will treat
them as witnesses. Prove to us that such corruption exits. If
you wrote that such-and-such a company exists in such-and-such a place,
you should prove that such a company exists. If it doesn't exist, it
means you lied, and you become an accused.
Why shouldn't the US
ambassador be placed on trial? They place heads of state on trial. They
order to bring [Omar] Al-Bashir to court, the Liberian president to
court, and the president of Yugoslavia to court. Yet a US ambassador
cannot be placed on trial?! He will be placed on trial, if he lied.
[...]
Even you, my Tunisian
brothers, may have read nonsense by this Kleenex on the Internet. Any
drunken idiot can write whatever he likes on the Internet, and people
believe him. The Internet is like a garbage bin. Any dimwit, any dog,
any liar, any drunk, any opium addict can say whatever he likes on the
Internet, and you read it and believe him. Talking is free. Should we
become victims of Facebook, of Kleenex, and of Youtube?
[...]
You call this a revolution,
but is there any respectable revolution in which people go the prisons
and free the worst criminals and murderers? You let them roam the streets
at night, with their knives, to terrorize Tunisian families. You call
this a revolution?! Dozens of wretched people are killed in prison...
Tunisia, I'm sad to say,
is entering a state of anarchy, the end of which is unknown. Tomorrow,
the entire Tunisian people might enter Libya. That's why what happens
in Tunisia is of great interest to me.
[...]
The Tunisians are a cultured
people, respected and esteemed by all. Is it like in Romania, in the
days of Ceauşescu, or like in Kenya? It matters to me, for Tunisia
is an Arab country. You have brought shame upon the Arab peoples with
what you have done.
[...]
Zine [Al-Abidine Ben
Ali] is the best leader for Tunisia. That is truth. He brought Tunisia
to where it is today. I don't care if you are for or against him, if
you love him or hate him. I am telling you the truth. Zine hasn't given
me money, glory, or anything in return. But I am telling you the truth.
[...]
