00:00A very special guest who's joining me. Pakistan's worst-kept secret of sponsoring terror was exposed
00:06in an interview that Yalda Hakim, lead world news presenter at Sky News, did with Pakistan's
00:13Defence Minister Khwaja Asif. I am joined by Yalda. I appreciate your joining us here. Yalda,
00:19they're from London. Thank you very much. The horrific Baisaran terror attack exposing Pakistan's
00:25role once again in fomenting, sponsoring terror against India, especially in the Kashmir
00:29Valley. It's been one of the world's worst-kept secrets admitted on camera by Pakistan's Defence
00:35Minister in a recent interview to you, Yalda. In that interview, the Defence Minister going
00:42on camera saying, yes, Pakistan did sponsor finance terror over the years. His exact statement
00:48is, we've been doing this dirty work for the United States for about three decades in the
00:53West, including Britain, in response to your question about Pakistan's long history of
00:58backing, supporting, training, funding terror groups. How do you look at, what was your first
01:03response when you heard the Defence Minister of a country of Pakistan make that candid admission
01:08to you?
01:11Well, Rajdeep, thank you so much for having me on your programme. As you say, I mean, it is
01:18something that has been more or less a sort of a well-known and well-documented, and yet
01:27a situation where, over the decades, Pakistan has never really admitted it publicly, in different
01:34points and at different times. You know, whether it was General Parvez Musharraf or Benazir Bhutto,
01:40or different ISI chiefs who have come out at different intervals in Pakistan's history and felt the need
01:46to make an admission and accept that perhaps they do fund and back terror groups and use them as
01:54proxies. Still, I didn't expect that in this heated moment, when there is this escalation between
02:02Pakistan and India over the horrendous and heinous crime that took place, the terrorist attack in
02:09Kashmir, I didn't expect that so blatantly he would come out and admit this. I mean, we, over the
02:16years, have interviewed different Pakistani ministers and leaders, and they've often talked about the fact that
02:22Pakistan, too, has been a victim of terrorism. But they haven't come out and so openly said this in a
02:30television interview at a time when things are so heated. So, just to answer your question, my first reaction
02:37perhaps was slightly jaw-dropping. I mean, if you watch the interview, you see me almost take a breath, a pause.
02:44I sort of want him to elaborate, so I sort of take in what he says and give him a moment of pause to
02:53either recollect his thoughts, because I thought maybe he made a mistake, maybe he didn't fully
03:00comprehend or understand what I was saying. And then he goes on to clarify, to say, no, we are doing that,
03:07we did do for decades of the dirty work of the West. And then he, you know, goes on to sort of say,
03:13but that isn't the case now. Lashkar Tabor doesn't exist as an organization. We don't know who the
03:19resistance front is and what you're talking about. But we used to do this. We don't do this now.
03:26You know, it's interesting what you're saying, because the truth of the matter,
03:29Yala, is that Pakistan has always lived by this deniability. They've always tried to deny
03:36every terror attack, especially those aimed at India. You will recall even after Mumbai 26-11,
03:42there was initially this denial. Then when terrorist Kassab was caught red-handed, the Pakistanis could
03:47not deny it any further. In that sense, it was important for us to hear a functionary at the level
03:53of a defense minister admitting to Pakistan's role in sponsoring terror, and then trying to
03:58suddenly backtrack by saying that's in the past, not in the present. Is there a sense you got from
04:03this response to the interview that that's gone viral, that the world also no longer believes
04:09Pakistan's deniability, that when Pakistan now says that we are not involved in terror,
04:14as it kept saying in the past, the world no longer trusts Pakistan anymore.
04:19Yes, Rajdeep, I think that that was what made the interview go viral. Not only were we hearing
04:29an ambition like this from a minister at that level, at a time where things are so tense between
04:37the two nations and just a few days after the terrorist attack in Kashmir, but also for him to
04:44so blatantly accept Pakistan's history of funding, aiding, giving sanctuaries. I mean, as you know,
04:54for the two decades or so of the Afghan war, not only was Pakistan getting billions of dollars from
05:02the United States, they were constantly accused of playing a double game. In 2018, the then-President
05:09Trump during his first administration, one of the things he did, I remember it was January 1 in 2018,
05:15one of the first things he came out and did was say that we are going to cut all military aid
05:20to Pakistan because our troops are dying on the ground, NATO forces are dying on the ground in
05:26Afghanistan, and Pakistan is taking our money. But at the same time, they are backing, supporting and
05:32giving sanctuary to these terrorist groups that are going back into Afghanistan and launching these
05:37attacks, large-scale attacks on our troops and on innocent civilians and prolonging this conflict
05:43and making it even more bloody and violent. And as you said, the 2008 Mumbai attack, Pakistan had the
05:51same reaction. So in this moment, for him to come out and make this admission, I think is what
05:57actually shocked the world. And then to sort of distance themselves, only a few days after,
06:01I interviewed Bilawal Bhutto, the former foreign minister of Pakistan, and he admitted, he said,
06:09yes, you know, my family have been victims of terrorism, we as a nation, but it is also part of our history.
06:17Terrorism and funding these proxy groups are part of our history. So that, I think, is what left the world
06:24shocked. And as you say, this acceptance and realization that perhaps Pakistan itself will no
06:30longer deny the brutality of funding these terrorist organizations and using it as a policy.
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