Interview With Imran Firasat

Imran Firasat is a Pakistani ex-Muslim and proprietor of www.mundosinislam.com who now lives in Spain. He collaborated with pastor Terry Jones on the movie The Innocent Prophet, which was released this morning.

After being pressured by the Spanish government and threatened with deportation to Pakistan, Mr. Firasat disassociated himself from the release of the movie. Below is an interview with him that was shown on Thursday on Spanish television.

Many thanks to Hermes for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:

Transcript:

0:05		The video will be released, not by me, but by pastor Terry Jones.
0:10		From where will Pastor Jones release it?
0:13		From the USA. I told him that I cannot be part of…
0:18		I sent him emails, messages, which I showed to the judge today, that
0:24		Look, Pastor Jones, I can no longer take part in this project, not out of fear
0:30		of Muslims, and not because the (refugee) status will be revoked, but
0:34		I see that Europe is on alert, and people are worried, and
0:40		I don’t want to be remembered as someone who made violence erupt.
0:45		I hold on to my view that Islam is a danger to society, and
0:50		we must fight it, because jihad and terrorism originate from Islam.
0:56		But now I see the situation that because of my film,
1:00		all governments are in alert, and I feel bad, so
1:05		before the government talked with me, or brought me to court, I did not
1:10		know they’d do it, I went to the Belgian embassy and gave them a document
1:15		that I will postpone my film…
1:17		Did you not ponder that perhaps Pastor Terry Jones may eventually
1:22		be linked to you by the USA, and a judicial process ending in an
1:26		extradition to America might take place?
1:30		- An extradition? - Yes, for example.
1:32		No, it cannot be, firstly because I withdrew,		I sent him messages,
1:37		and if the USA wants to judge,
1:42		they will judge Terry Jones, and not me, because I’ve never been to USA,
1:47		I never spoke ill of, and neither I am doing anything against the USA.
1:52		The one to blame here is the Spanish government,
1:57		I told them about it them already in September, and in November,
2:02		when I was making the trailer, I told them about it, I have all the papers,
2:07		and they never contacted me, and I had already sent the video to
2:12		Terry Jones, but if they had contacted me, seen my film,
2:17		and told me that ‘this is not good, this has to be changed’, or anything else,
2:21		they are so many, and it’s impossible that all of them are busy. If they had contacted
2:26		me, I wouldn’t have sent it to Terry Jones, but I did, because they never contacted me.
2:32		And you told the judge that perhaps you may release it?
2:35		No, I told the judge that 4-5 days ago I told Terry Jones that I am no longer
2:40		part of this project, but if he releases it, that will be his responsibility, not mine.
2:45		Do you work alone, or are you backed by any organization?
2:50		I have links with almost
2:55		all USA bloggers dealing with this issue, (and also) in England,
3:00		France, Germany, but we do not operate like a gang,
3:05		it is not like that.
3:10		But I can publish my articles at their web pages,
3:14		and we are in contact; if I make a project, they help me to spread it.