Chairman PTI Imran Khan Exclusive Interview with Piers Morgan.

Chairman PTI Imran Khan Exclusive Interview with Piers Morgan.

Welcome back to peter borough not sensible now an interview with a giant of world sport even bigger giant of world politics Imran khan was one of the finest cricketers on our planet over 10 years as captain of Pakistan he became the nation's hero and then later sensationally it's prime minister but he was deposed after losing an acrimonious confidence vote uh in April so I began by asking for his verdict on the British prime minister who of course has just about survived. 

I keep telling our people in Pakistan that this would not even have made news here you know the in time of government Covid 19 prime minister having a drinks get together after work would not even have made news here because we also unlike the rest of the world we also had to cope with government Covid 19 and all the restrictions

So you know here people can't understand what's going on but I understand and in one way this is one thing which I feel that the reason why British parliamentary system works whereas apart from non-anglo-saxon countries it doesn't work because of the very high level of moral standards you expect from your leadership so unfortunately it doesn't work in other countries where they do not have the level of moral standards that you expect from your parliamentarians right i mean

 I think that the issue here really is not about partying it's about the hypocrisy and double standard of a prime minister who himself was fined by the police for breaking his own lockdown rules and over 80 of his own downing street staff were also fined by the police and it's the brazen double standard of a group of people that were ordering the British public not to go even go and see dying relatives dying from covert in hospital they couldn't do that and at the same time the people making those very draconian rules were brazenly breaking them themselves I think that's the issue.

What stood out in Britain was that high level I repeat of moral standards you expect from your leadership in Pakistan you know the vote of no confidence against me which took place the whole country knew that the going rate to buy my parliamentarians was a million dollars so i mean if you compare the two that's why you know in my opinion and i keep telling them of my experience in British of parliament that unless we raise our level of morality to what you have in Britain parliamentary democracy will not work if you if all it takes is to buy 20 of your members of parliament to switch sides and a government falls in fact the whole concept of democracy or parliamentary democracy then gets challenged so you know from your point of view in Britain of what I know I understand that you expect from your leadership the standards you expect them to delete by example.

It's been very volatile since you were deposed you vowed to come back and fight again you think you're going to win with a bigger majority I believe but one issue that's come up in the last few days there appears to be a serious threat of assassination against you and I have to say the last leader of Pakistan I spoke to was benazir bhutto and it wasn't long after I met her that she was indeed assassinated so this is a very serious risk that you all face I think when you lead a country like Pakistan what do you know about these threats how seriously are you taking them.

Well because what happened was this was clearly a conspiracy and you know I’ve spoken about the conspiracy because you know i came to know about it about six months before I actually uh before this vote of no confidence took place and you know all the time i thought it wouldn't succeed you know for some reason i thought that it's not possible that you know the conspiracy was to replace me by the guys who for 30 years had been in power the two families and there were massive corruption cases against them 60 percent of the cabinet that has replaced me is on bail or billions of rupees of corruption cases so my mind just wouldn't accept that would it be possible to replace our government which was which had finally recovered from all the two years of crises and was on the way up I just didn't think it would be replaced by these criminals so those who sort of planned this whole thing a bit worried now because they don't want me back they didn't take me out to get me back in again so that's when i got i found out that they had uh planned this final solution.

You were known Imran as on the cricket field you were known as completely fearless no opponent ever put fear into you but when you're a political leader and you're in the situation that you're in now where there's a genuine threat against you of assassination do you feel fear?

 No you know Piers I just well when I entered politics I actually had\ conquered my fear of dying otherwise I would not have entered politics because I came in to stand up against the entire status quo I came to fight corruption today the entire political spectrum 16 parties on one side and I’m on the other side and because this was the status quo which was 60 years of our last 62 years half has been ruled by military and half by these two families so I came to fight these two families and this is really what I I’ve done and they have made so much money out of this that they obviously clearly someone like me is a threat and and that's why this foreign-backed conspiracy involving local players took place now I know that they would try to my life has had various threats over a period of time but this time I found out about this conspiracy so I went public the reason I have no fear of dying but it is it was important to let those guys were planning to let them know that I know  right it was actually in a way a form of protection.

You went to Moscow and the very day Russian leader invaded Ukraine and you know how controversial this images is if you and the Russian leader then immediately became it look like you were indorsing he was doing because you stayed in Moscow so do you regret now not just leaving immediately you heard the he invaded Ukraine?      

I promise you I had no idea I arrived the night before I was only there for one night next morning when I wake up I discovered that this Ukraine adventure had started now it was we discussed amongst ourselves we realized that it was very poor timing but at the same time we realized that we really it was extremely important for the 220 million people of Pakistan that we actually get this I mean.

I understand that I understand I completely understand that you didn't know before you made the trip I guess the criticism which may be legitimate is that once you knew what he'd done to then stay there and still go through with the meetings that you had planned sent the world a message that you were not that upset by what he was doing in Ukraine?

Countries like us you know who have huge populations and we have 100 million people who are vulnerable right now so we should actually make policies have be have relationship with everyone but make policies that benefit our people I understand that that's the way that India is doing.

 I understand what I would say back to that is we talked earlier about the higher morality standards in the UK when it comes to holding leaders to account I simply would say I don't criticize you for having planned a trip to Moscow but I think there is legitimate criticism that once you knew what he had done it illegally invaded a sovereign democratic country did your moral instinct not tell you that it would be wrong to stay there that you should have just got straight out of there?

Yes I am against all military operations I am I March with those two million people in London against Iraq war I constantly was against the Afghanistan war that there was no military solution I do not believe what Putin has done of trying to find a military solution in Ukraine I always believe these are miscalculations they cause a lot of hardship and I did give a statement in when I was in Moscow that military is not the military actions are not a solution unfortunately we were left at it at the time was either we then and by the way the meeting was more or less an hour before when we discovered that the they had invaded Ukraine it was a question of one hour in between to decide whether we abandoned the trip or have the meeting with Putin and so eventually we decided that look at this stage we will fall between two stools with Russia we will break all relationship leaving at this juncture and at the same time you know is it going to make any difference if we if Pakistan decides to sort of show condemn Russian invasion by leaving there.  

Imran are you in a position now to see what Putin has done in Ukraine and emphatically publicly denounce it?

Any conflict and especially which where you go and any conflict creates bloodshed but you know just like in Iraq in Afghanistan god knows how many people died there and similarly in Ukraine going into Ukraine the sort of uh what we are saying right now I am sure that uh if president Putin realized what was happening right now he wouldn't have uh started this.

Do you personally condemn the war in Ukraine now… knowing what you've seen in the last three months?

Let me just say one thing I you know I am basically anti against all operations so if you if you want to uh ask me a question do I condemn what is happening in what happened in Iraq I thought it was wrong and I would condemn that I have Afghanistan US going in and then staying okay once they once they got decimated al-qaeda in the first year what was the purpose of staying there for the next 19 years so it was a useless war and yes if you know if I would advising president Putin I would not have gone there and yes a war that creates bloodshed and which is which it is and collateral damage and civilians yes.

Let me ask you about Afghanistan because from the moment the Americans led the rather dramatic and chaotic and many think disastrous overnight pull-out from Afghanistan and its forces it seems the Taliban have basically wrestled back control of the country at record speed and are now going back to running the country how the Taliban did before notably with severe oppression of women in Afghanistan what is your view of that because you've been broadly supportive i think of the Taliban being able to run the country again but are you supportive of the way they treat women there?

Let the people of Afghanistan decide which way they will go they're strong people i found women are strong in my opinion given a chance you will see them asserting their rights but the last thing we should do is try to interfere in people of the with the afghan government they're very proud people I know from experience that at any hint of outside interference in their any country interfering in their way of life they will they're very defensive about it.

I want to take you back to the late 70s the early 80s to the genteel world of cricket where you're a champion cricketer you were a handsome playboy on the British social scene with a number of girlfriends to make all of us jealous life was a lot easier for you then a lot more fun a lot more carefree you've become a very powerful very divisive in some ways uh political figure now in Pakistan do you ever have any regrets do you ever wish you hadn't gone down the political path?

For me you know life is not about I feel that uh you know people who find the easy way of life easy way of life for me a purposeless existence means nothing to me I have you know I have everything I’ve ever wanted in life so for me the challenge is to actually go back make Pakistan a welfare state and rule of law critical thing is what you're seeing in Britain is basically rule of law which is one thing I learned most of all when I went to England as an 18 year old.

Imam Khan it's great to talk to you again it's been well nearly 50 years since I last talked to you last time I was steaming at you in the next hove county cricket ground so it's great to catch up with you again and I wish you all the very best thank you very much.

 My pleasure