Suzanne Mubarak, First Lady of Egypt tells CNN International ‘’I don’t know if the international community will have the courage to come up and say ‘yes’ Israel you were wrong. ‘Yes’ these were war crimes. ‘Yes’ you used weapons you shouldn’t have used. ‘Yes’ this was un-proportional use of force. We have to wait and see’’ in an EXCLUSIVE interview with John Defterios.
The interview will air in full on Friday, 6th March at 13.15
** CNN International
Marketplace Middle East Interview with Suzanne Mubarak, First Lady of Egypt
SM: Suzanne Mubarak
JD: John Defterios
PART 1
SM – We need Palestinian unity first. I tell you why, once we have unity there, then it will be easy passage for the borders. And once Israel accepts to open the 5 or 6 borders that are between Egypt and Israel, they will have no problem.
JD – It doesn’t seem very promising to get unity in Israel and unity between Hamas and Fatah at this juncture. So, is there more frustration going forward?
SM – It is a critical juncture, I think a difficult one. But I don’t think we have any other option. There has to be unity. I mean I don’t see it, any progress taking place on any, whether it’s the construction phase of economic re-building of Gaza, without the unity on both sides.
JD – When I was looking back at some of the economic numbers and the Palestinian Territories. And the economy there has fallen 13% since 2000. Can you actually have an economy grow with a blockade in place? That’s another vital feature of what we’re talking about.
SM – Well the blockade has to be lifted, for sure. I think this goes along with the construction faze. You can’t rebuild Gaza if you have a blockade. How are you going to get all the material for re-building. So the blockade is definitely, I think going to be lifted very soon.
JD – As you know, your husband, President Mubarak has come under intense pressure for not being seen to be doing enough for the Palestinian people. That must be incredibly frustrating from your vantage point.
SM – It’s not fair, but when you literally see every day on your television, screams, you know Gaza being bombed, children being killed, women being widowed, young men being. All you see is just bodies and corpses scattered all over the place, You can’t have, I don’t think you can have any sympathy for any government, even the government of Egypt, from Egyptians themselves. Because you always feel, I mean, even sitting at home. We feel, we have to do more, what more can we do? How can we stop this massacre? Something has to be done, and this is why, I think we had so much criticism at home regardless of what Egypt was doing. But now I think people have come to realise, that the role of Egypt from day one was a positive role and Egypt was on the right path and continues to be a stronghold in the area. I think we are seeing more and more of this and more people acknowledging Egypt’s role.
JD – What should be the follow up with Israel? At one point you were saying that the International Tribunal might be the path to charge them with war crimes. Do you still believe that?
SM – I don’t know if the international community will have the courage to come up and say ‘yes’ Israel you were wrong. ‘Yes’ these were war crimes. ‘Yes’ you used weapons you shouldn’t have used. ‘Yes’ this was un-proportional use of force. We’ll have to wait and see.
PART 2
SM – As you know John now, trafficking is an extremely complex problem, extremely complex, multi-layered and no country is really immune from it. Whether it is regarded as a country of origin, transit or destination. It exists in all societies. The more personally I cam to realise what an insidious crime this was and how it was just really built on profit. On not only low morals, no morals at all. And just built on making, You know when you look at the figures, 38 billion dollar profit yearly on trafficking of women and children in particular. And I believe that as a movement we would never be able to solve the problem. But we wanted to be partners, wanted to be part of this process. To whatever we did, however little we did, we just wanted to try and make a difference in people’s lives.
JD – Your approach has been to engage the business community internationally, but at the very top level. For them to take responsibility, then open their eyes to the problem itself. And is to what? Sign on the dotted line to say ‘I will not employ trafficked labour ever’?
SM – Rather than repeating what has been done, that we should start working from the top, working with the business community, who have the resources, who have the expertise, who have the technical capabilities of helping us to do something about this scourge of human trafficking.
JD – I was looking at the numbers of the 800 people that are trafficked, on average there’s only 1 prosecution. The penalty doesn’t seem to be strong enough for the crime. Would you agree with that?
SM – Oh definitely we have a long, long way to go yet, because the traffickers are not caught. This is an organised crime that is working you know, underground.
JD – But even if they are caught the penalty doesn’t even seem that great?
SM – Because we need, we need still to amend our laws, we need to draft new anti-trafficking laws.
The interview will air in full on Friday, 6th March at 13.15 (UAE) on Marketplace Middle East.
CNN International.
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