Highly maryam vessel and who denied for many years that Human Rights Violations have taken place and whose government locked up many thousands of Political Prisoners has seen no shame for the torture of it was perpetrated and the lives that were ruined during his time in office. Welcome to conflict so thank you so much thank you for having me ethiopia has a new Prime Minister now of the who took over after you resigned last year hes now received a Nobel Peace Prize basically for doing many of the evils of your government and doing what you couldnt do within 100 days. Dont you feel something of a failure when you look at what hes done. I know that because. I have done my share to bring this change to happen. And. Promise that abby has not come from blue moon it has come from the party which i was it is a dream you have but hes begun correcting the massive human rights abuses which were a prominent feature of your time notice that is it is my party which started the reform process and we say. The process should be a deep no one to the country basically but also to the party itself so i think that is a process which yielded Prime Minister rabin. Prime minister so he continued with the process pro reform my gender that my party and his party whether this is Nobel Committee cited his achievements as lifting the countrys state of emergency granting amnesty to thousands of Political Prisoners for years you always denied there were only scrapping Media Censorship legalising outlawed opposition groups dismissing military and civilian leaders suspected of corruption all the things that you failed to do when you were in office by the way do you know that 9095 percent of the prisoners being released due to my office. Before i left office and before i signed so i think what i would be did was that remaining 5 percent which has to be released so the decision was the decision of the party. And i took that action before i resigned how many did you release almost 4000000 something. More than 3000 or so you know where there were many more than 3000 in jail yeah but its only young people whove recently been arrested have been released but the main political figures which has been adverse to been released. During my term before i resigned in may this year the attorney general. Filed criminal charges against your former intelligence chief get you as alleging human rights abuses and corruption hes gone missing that you know where he went i dont know im not in office now no information 20 other people were charged with him he had served until june 28th seen. He had served you as Prime Minister who were denying that any human rights abuses were being committed i think youre youre lucky information youre lucky you you lucky evidence it is my government and my party who admitted that there has been a human rights abuse if you start here off to hear an interview say nobodys being mistreated we have no Political Prisoners one north to the other you gave interviews sitting smiling across the billions of us say no everythings fine here you know you always forget you have to understand the way how our part to operate was the way of the state in the way you operate within islam if you like yourself let me finish 1st if thats the case then you know that we have been historically you have to understand that in the 1st place this is a party fighting left and you know us. When there is a communist mentality and when its a marxist mentality there is a centralism. You dont award after your Party Decides one issue even though you have differences in as a minority you take were going to show you just hold the line whatever it is because youre too cowardly to say anything about whats really going all i see is that its no excuse that sort of misplacing the whole thing is that we believe that in our party and the government that we need to reform our system we need to bring up. Changes that we need to democratize our country and because thats a country we number of interest is and there is an introduction of ethnic mobilized politics which is very dangerous and therefore we have we have decided that we need to go to certain deeply into forming our country for something actually been busy in washington you didnt get it id need were going to have a force do well if you had done that the Prime Minister when he came in by mr abbey wouldnt have had to condemn Police Brutality pledge to richard rein in the Security Services tackle what he called economic mismanagement corruption and rights abuses all of this spending phase you want to spin off of this is also misplaced see because. That abby has more come from a blue moon he has built another way for us and theyre with us hes cleaning up the mess isnt a no no its not hes not cleaning up these messes hes going on the mess up the mess you left behind and i think this is also misplacing and i really always say that you know correctly this is our partys admission of our collective mistake and then we has put in place properly hes told things that you failed to do by november last year dozens of Intelligence Officers and high level officials have been arrested including people from the military run the metals and Engineering Corp met tech on charges of corruption and human rights is this is your level put those charges to that speed that is this idea which i introduced new york to be finished i did it. November last year you werent in office i did it you dont have any business i did it i lunched in the studies and then completion of the 2 studies then action has been taken the attorney general said 63 people had been arrested that months november last year 27 for corruption 36. 00 on charges of Human Rights Violations that included the former head of mattick conflict dagen youre a Brigadier General over whom you did nothing you did nothing about him in that study you lucky with this i love the study i say in the group of people who study the study its charging people with human rights in norfolk in charge of every issue to. Challenge people after you started after concretely there was criminal Investigation Unit that investigation has been launched by may 3rd local media said huge sums of money were missing from this company a matter of whether the. Little let the court decide on it as Prime Minister he was supposed to look after the Public Places the military was supposed to follow your orders. And you feel seem to have failed spectacularly to make them do that since you feel any remorse at the crimes you were allowed to take place when you were Prime Minister no i think i have resigned because i was not able to you know change dramatically whatever has to come be going to week because you know i i say fiction actually i have my own history in this and i have my own weaknesses and you have to not to look into only the weaknesses but you had wanted to see the strength of this country has gone and you know you know that my country has been visited during my tenure by 6 of the 77 leaders and they all announcing that this country has been working very hard at double digit grows and the economy. Actually moves where we have its difficult to our people out of poverty the only country which has actually in. 7 out of this 8 images and now where the by the United Nations by my time so i think you have to see all those positive things we have achieved last day of the last of them. The attorney general. Said investigated her uncovered serious abuses by Security Services at secret prisons in the capital and elsewhere do you know what your Security Officers were doing in the single prisons i dont know those thieves wives and children did you ever ask i go to visit how can i do or if your intelligence doesnt give me information how can you know there were plenty of foreign reports that torture was going on which you do knowing it and youre good enough youre telling me you didnt know what was going on or i didnt say you said i also follows your denials were just proforma denials no are not going to know everything when you were in office no not at all you did you said they dont know everything you didnt you didnt know what was going on in these prisons you didnt ask you werent interested. Well you know it is or fish only we know some of the appeal of abuse this and i have taken in my time some of the actions. Of those things but i didnt know that there are you know informal prisons which has been there the attorney general said there d are people who have been blinded and held in darkness for long periods of time others have been left infertile because of blows to their genitals there are some that had limbs broke or women have been subjected to go rape and men have been sort of modest all this happened until your rule so i had to ask you and she was shame that this was going on until you were ruled no i mean it is assured that when this happened but i didnt know those things and if i knew those things i would architected them because this is a very sacred things happened well it didnt take long for this Prime Minister to find out what was going on so obviously nice looking in light lace and you do not believe you know either you didnt want to look at italian island near whom for this Prime Minister to our i struggled very hard to bring him to power and i did everything you lost your job thats why you gave up you lost control of the party lost faith in you thats why you gave up what i think you can you can say that going to be struggling to control the rest in the country because failure cases now is going out in it myself i did it intentionally because i wanted to see that this change should come so i think this is genuinely what has happened and i did my best in paving the way for this to happen so i think that has to be clearly kind of did i did i think a big clearly wriggle of it when we have been in your prisons during your term in office with being subjected to gang rape and men too so the my is ation now that you know this even if you say you didnt know that at the time. Was europe. Gene to the victims i didnt have already a permit was when i when they said when they resigned because thats the system which was open to me i meant to give you meant to the victims and apologize personally to them if there is a need to be a when you havent done so have you and i have had to get the chance and now when we have it conciliation and throws them into consideration commission stablished and ask process is what i want how do you sleep at night knowing that this was going on in your torture centers carried out by your officials when you were Prime Minister how do you sleep at night if i knew then i said to you that i was there to quote act everything in my disposal if i knew it but i did know that your meal your said to be a religious man from a family of pentecostals is that right thats the rule. How does gang rape and sodomy ization fit in with your religious values no i didnt know i say if a new it doesnt fit in in my prayers but you went on denying it denying it denouncing those born there you have read the interview that thats the report that enormously despite the reports coming early in the human Rights Groups all over the world which you just rubbished you said thats not true theyre outside as there are enemies dont listen to them everything is fine you said i think i have never said everything is fine you said there was no mystery letters i said there was no mistreatment going on there is a problem but i was saying that my report is that its not to the extent where has been said thats what they say by then any case i report which i wish i was giving to the public which which was the case a 2nd of the Detention Center gigo Central Prison otherwise known as jail regional Detention Center in the east of the country administered in public by your special police it was closed in august last year you know what was going on there as well no i dont know why not you knew the prison existed and you know what you and i do have little during our city you have no curiosity mr high among you didnt want to know what was going on in your jails no its not the kids you know that if you tell governments have their own rights and i think the whole thing is i did my my work according to the reports they get from my intelligence and from my sources and therefore thats what what was the kids. People reported there were many of the former prison those who said they saw people dying in their cells after being tortured by officials in this god then jailers as it was called what should happen to the officials who carried out this torture. I mean what should happen to them. Theyre in prison and thats it. Just prison sentences and what should happen to you for turning a blind eye to it that depends on the legal system of the country you know either his own simply because to take all the responsibilities but what is extraordinary is that with all the abuses that were carried out when you were Prime Minister you accepted from the new Prime Minister the nations highest award for Service Without even blushing without any embarrassment whatsoever now that you know what was going on while you were Prime Minister why didnt you give back a little more. Why should i because i have a number of positive things i have because you failed to show all this is one part of it and its a charge at the incident that says you torture is when you wash your eyes water could in my in my country that doesnt explain thats not the only thing you know i have done many good things there are issues in the system which are a failure which i initiated to reform and did conduct reform because i understood that age of you know before known as admission and this too that there are something going on therefore i initiated this reform and then i have released 95 percent of the you were in if you were in office for 6 years and this new Prime Minister has come in and done more for human rights than you did in all the time you were there is because they paved the way for him billy the u. S. State department in 2016 published a catalogue of the human rights abuses taking place on the your rule which of course you deny it but then the known to be true arbitrate killings disappearances torture harsher life threatening prison conditions detention without charge you know minute whatever you want but its what they said but how are you savage you didnt know what was going on when all these reports were pointing to what was yes whenever they knew that there are things going wrong i initiated that form and the serious reform and the before and outs of the result where the Prime Minister has come into power. You said when you result in that you wanted to be part of the solution in ethiopia how can you be part of the solution when you so much part of the problem. You know i become part of the solution because in there is a problem which would result from which you are going to be created the atmosphere the permissive out in the sphere in which your Security Officials believe they could torture but it was all right to torture go on torturing disappearing people no judicial exodus no do you created the atmosphere in which that was possible no i didnt create the atmosphere so while crossfire is then the system has been established then anyone whos in a world where there is could be accounted for but i didnt create this this point this of environment for them it is a deep system which i was not able to look into because of my background and because of my you know i must say that are coming into the deep system so i put it see that when mr big came into power he couldnt wait to condemn the legacy of your government and draw a line in the old time in office could be a pro last year he said that government your government had sanctioned torture of its prisoners and said it had been guilty of state terrorism he said it said in parliament does the constitution say anyone who was sentenced by a court can be tortured put in a guard lets say doesnt thats the rule that the government was in his eyes were not only mine you were the Prime Minister i was in this order by the way he was there also the buck stopped yeah politically this a bit of a form including indian out of work the responsibility lay highly in the e. U. How do you yes you yes it is not you trying to get out of it why do you try to get out this way solution to the form thats why you should you know why im here to tell you for this here in a show you this reform you blocked every attempt by the United Nations special rapporteur that should pay you in as a girl from as sweet a tabby should come easy or at least we usually. Come up from us and the only investigated locked i release in you block them are you at least be gating was because you didnt want them to find out what was going on i did and that i initiated that if or before my eyes that mission a year will undoubtedly for me is that what the result of the pain is that im going to come to power convert so beautiful i couldnt hold it in him to power hundreds of people were killed in the your regime and you refused to have an independent investigation led by the un chief human rights official if you ask the killings the last one and a half years the number of killings side past in 6 years what happened in my town if you ask for killings look that is good that is so the whole thing is you know i initiated this there for a year or more before my dissemination and i put in there when for the new system you would have this in the bush was mean you say you are surely to reform you created a regime where people were tortured and disappeared and had their rights taken away from them consistently turns i have our sense of people are not is not needed our biases are getting our basket an apology to my people that the region has some abuses of you know who my doubts and the deficit and democracy and that has happened i am and i still feel love and sort of for that but i can dish it out so much will come thats not much of an apology as it really isnt a half hearted apology no it is not a new night we are not the reason we know it without the commute was the last as many this year because you didnt want to spare you lost the faith or not i havent lost that Security Forces havent was the army theyre all going to have a rest for their rest and they should know by that they should have been investigated under your time when they were only one to continue eyes of the tartarus you know i could have missed everything of the. Lost of might that if you want you know more serious particular ship yet you always claim that democracy took time you always said this is a fledgling democracy it takes time and this isnt this is what every dictator says act the way they draw somalia to give up all the book yourself in europe you pass through a number of signal wars before you can use to see what a person read to you tedious says its not targeting a possibility and thats on her a nice basis while they show even you hope United States everywhere in the western countries you democracy has taken time and it has not come in one short and one day and one week and 1000000 it has taken you too much and that is true and that will continue democracy is building them up and the culture here doesnt exist is everything to slow it down the spine of maariv never shied away from associations or friendships either with indicted or convicted war criminals do they hold some special fascination for you and these people which runs like mr r. By sheer the former president of the bill in august you posted a controversial picture on facebook of you smiling next to ethiopia as exiled marxist leader Mengistu Haile mariam and then you took it out when there was a huge outcry because this man of course was found guilty and obscenity act of genocide by the way i met him incidentally when i was there in some buy when he was in the president s office when i was there in the president s office when i made him and i talked to him so thats what happened in any case and you posted a comment saying i wish to see more former heads of government and states in my country contributing their parts in different capacity of the peaceful transition of political will of the doctors not me it is the officers there who did it and they say this is wrong. Certainly you dont want mr mingus to with his conviction for genocide to play a part in the new ethiopia i think if we go through a true isnt it a Conciliation Commission and if he is on some given chance to lean over to apologize and then anything what the through Senate Conservation commission bleeds into it i then that leads the country in its a conciliation i have a deep belief that we needed conciliation what mother says well some of the past even the future is worse of the possible answers that genocide is than something you just you just heard there see by just feeling the way we really did it was delusional dr may come to explain to me please how a conviction for one of the most serious crimes on the planet would qualify mr mengistu to contribute to the well being of your country i would i would imagine with a qualification like that i think it depends on how that one conviction for the side of genocide for the most serious crime in us you are entirely this is south africa as if you can say. Apart it isnt genocide with the whole mind that for you its not just a few times it is more than generous where is your truth and reConciliation Commission it is that has been established and we see that is that for you years of our time is not before us cities so youre quite happy for convicted war criminals to come back to your country and play their part good old boy is good old most efficient procedure i love that yes if not then no how should future generations in africa protect themselves from people like you they should democrat that is their countrys greatest dictators like yo. I think living media is wrong is wrong this is use is not my my people so i think the easiest misplacing again this is a group from your side. I learned. Thank you very much for being the culprits and some of. The be. The best. The book. The big. Earth. Home to millions of species. Saving. Global ideas tell stories of creative people and innovative projects around the world ideas that could take the climate boost Clean Energy Solutions and reforestation the be using interactive content to inspire people to take action global audience the series of global 3000. 00 on t. W. And online. A duel with words. Where i come from you dont want to weigh from a confrontation. When i was 5 years old my father took me to his friends and i was hooked on the sport of. A sport that you learned so early and to see all so. Fencing as a language and a good swordfight is a conversation. Must please your opponent understand that thinking middle of the main to get close otherwise you can score a hit. Its not unlike a tough interview really when interviewing politicians all corporate c. E. O. s you have to wait for the right moment you have to get around that defensiveness then make your own knowledge fit. Yes and take risks to get results. Im going to tell this and i work at the deli. Instead rule. Book travel now im a true type. This is d. W. News live from berlin nato grapples with turkeys incursion into Northern Syria the Alliance Meets today to hammer out a unified response as nato member turkey conducts conducts operations with Russian Troops and its self declared safe zone insert. Also coming up russian president Vladimir Putins welcomes African Leaders for their 1st ever summit focused on trade moscow is looking to expand its influence on the continent well tell you what is at stake for. The European Unions human rights prize goes to jail