Mohamed Diab, Film Director HARDtalk


Mohamed Diab, Film Director

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Welcome to HARDtalk, I'm Stephen Sackur.

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Freedom of expression is severely curtailed in Egypt.

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Journalists, bloggers, civil society activists

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and political dissidents have been locked up by the thousand

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under the Sisi regime, which makes the Egyptian movie

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Eshtebak - or the Clash - all the more important.

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The much lauded film paints a remarkable picture

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of the tumult in Egypt which led to the military takeover in 2013.

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The director is my guest today, Mohamed Diab.

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What has happened to the spirit of the Tahrir revolution?

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Mohamed Diab, welcome to HARDtalk.

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Thank you.

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You are a movie-maker.

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How big, how deep a breath do you have to take before making

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a movie in today's Egypt?

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Particularly in a movie that's are about politics,

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society, culture in your country today.

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I'm going to tell you what everyone around me told me before

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making that film - don't.

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Everyone told me, even my family, everyone knew this film's going

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to explode in my face at the end.

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Making a political film, or something that has

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a political statement, it's almost suicide.

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Not just because of the government or the regime, it's

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because of everyone.

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Everyone.

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We're in the midst of a big division in Egyptian society almost amounting

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to civil war.

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The streets are not...

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People are not killing each other these days but, at

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some point, they did.

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And the hatred extends to every family member.

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So Egyptian families, the first rule of any family

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gathering is - don't talk about politics.

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So if everybody, your friends, your professional colleagues,

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everybody said don't, and you did, would it be right to characterise

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Eshtebak the movie as your sort of act of resistance?

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I was part of the Egyptian revolution and I stayed

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as an activist, traditional activist, for almost three years.

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But I think the most and the biggest positive thing I've

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ever done is Eshtebak, Clash.

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Because it's talking about why we were in the streets

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in the first place.

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It's very evident when you see the film that it's praising unity

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and it's praising...

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It's anti hysteria, anti-division.

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And there is no more message, a bigger message and more important

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message than now in today's Egypt.

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Well, it's interesting you say it's anti-division.

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Egypt today is such a polarised society.

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It's such a divided society.

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Is it possible to make a movie which portrays those tumultuous

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events of the summer of 2013 when the Morsi, Islamic Brotherhood

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government, was in essence toppled by the military?

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Is it possible to make a movie about that and not take sides?

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It depends on what film, why you're making that film.

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I'm making a film about coexistence.

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I'm making a film against hysteria and division.

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So the film is not trying to show any side as good or bad.

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It's trying to show us all the human side in us.

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But I mean, here's the thing, though - I, in the studio,

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have talked to Egyptian officials, I've talked to Egyptian human rights

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activists about what happened in 2013.

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Because of course, it matters today to make sense of why

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the military took over and why we have the government that you guys

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have in Egypt today.

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And the key question is, for many people, was it a coup

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or was it not a coup?

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Now, for you as a film director portraying those events of summer

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2013, do you have to take a view on that?

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I actually deliberately avoided talking about that in

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the film because this is...

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The question that you just asked, that's a dividing question in Egypt.

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Egyptians are, like, half...

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If you said the word 'coup', there is no conversation anymore.

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And if you said the word 'it's a revolution',

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there is no conversation anymore.

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But isn't that a copout?

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You know, you're a film-maker making a film about something deeply

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controversial that matters so much to Egypt today and you're saying -

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oh, but I just opted out of the key question.

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No, it depends on what film are you making?

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I'm making a film about coexistence.

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I'm making a film about humans.

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I'm trying to humanise the enemy.

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Everyone is seeing the other as the enemy, dehumanise the other.

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This is the first step in civil war and I'm trying to dissolve that.

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I'm trying to make a film that counters that.

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And in order to do that, I have to dehumanise everyone.

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And in order to do that, I have to humanise everyone.

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And that's what provoked the people the most, humanise the other.

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And what is remarkable about your movie is that the device

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you used to humanise the situation is so unusual.

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You filmed pretty much the whole movie from the inside of

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an eight-metre-square police truck.

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Why did you do that?

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It was a metaphor of the feeling that everyone in Egypt

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is feeling right now - we are all trapped and we

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are trapped together.

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Are we are going to get out, are we are going to continue living,

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what are we going to do?

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And I wanted people to experience the full experience of getting

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trapped inside a car like this, how brutal the situation is.

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'Experience' is the word.

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Let's give everybody watching a brief taster of the experience

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of being inside that truck.

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Let's watch a clip from the movie.

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Sure, let's do that.

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SHOUTING AND COMMOTION.

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BANGING.

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I find it riveting.

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I mean, I have some experience as a foreign correspondent

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of being in riots that have turned violent in Egypt.

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That, to me, just looks so authentic.

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But what's really striking about it is that all

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the footage taken from inside the truck, it's all chaos.

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You have no real way of knowing what the heck is going on.

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Was that deliberate?

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Maybe in those clips, it's hard to determine what's

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going on, but in the film, it was mapped out.

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How can we make the film understandable, especially

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for a foreign audience?

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So although the car has 25 main characters and outside,

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there's at least another ten, it was very important for us to make

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the film understandable for everyone and I think we did that.

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Yet to me, the film's not about only the political situation in Egypt.

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It's about the division that is sweeping the whole world.

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You're going to feel that this film could have been about Brexit.

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This film could have been about Clinton and Trump.

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It doesn't matter.

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And in the film, there is no political conversation of, like,

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everybody is explaining his side.

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It's just - there is a division between three sides, or two sides,

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and that's what the core of the film is about.

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It forces people who've been raised to regard the other as the enemy

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to actually deal with each other as human beings.

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Because there they all are stuck in the back of this police truck.

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Whether they happen to be Muslim Brotherhood, Islamists,

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or whether they happen to be supporters of the military,

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whether they're young students, whether they're secular

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or religious, they're all in this mess together.

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Exactly.

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And the film is just trying to remind us all we don't have

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to agree on everything to coexist.

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And unfortunately, right now in a crazy situation,

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people think we have to agree fully in order to exist,

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and that's completely wrong.

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But one thing you do which I think is very difficult

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to do in Egypt today, you humanise the Islamist.

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They come in all shapes and sizes, literally.

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There's the young girl, the teenager, who brings her father

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along and she's inclined to support the Brotherhood.

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There's the die-hard political activist from the Brotherhood.

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There's those who were Brotherhood, but now have doubts about it.

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But the point is, you humanise them.

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You say to Egyptians and the people all over the world, don't regard

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these folks as just terrorists or as people that have one

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set of beliefs.

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They're complicated, they're mixed, they're just like the rest of us.

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That's actually the most important thing about this film to do this.

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This film, this has been big research.

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This is like a research study when you see that film.

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It's the first time you see the difference between

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the Muslim Brotherhood and the way they are,

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the organisation from the inside.

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You see the difference between a Muslim Brotherhood member

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and just a supporter.

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You see the difference between a Jihadi and a Salafi.

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Those things, you need to understand in order to talk about, like...

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At the end of the film...

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I don't want to just say everything, but at the end of the film,

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some people turn into Isis.

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This film took place just before the rise of Isis.

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So you need to understand, how did we reach that point?

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Most of us in the West, most of the people in the West think

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Isis grow on trees or something.

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You need to understand, how did they reach that point?

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And by the way, most of them - just like any heinous criminal

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in the world - at the beginning, they were normal people.

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The other thing that you do is, you portray the state in the form

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of the security police who are obviously manning the van

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and they're going out and grabbing people,

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arresting them and chucking them into the back of the van.

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And on one level, you're inviting us to take a pretty negative view

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of the state as the heavy hand of authoritarianism that's depriving

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people of their freedom, but you also humanise

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some of the police.

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You know, they're facing real dilemmas.

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There's a girl who wants to go to the toilet.

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Does the policeman let her or not?

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Is that humane or inhumane?

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And you suggest that even the police are complicated, that there

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are divisions within them.

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That there are some that are very humane and some who are not.

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Some people in Egypt will say right now, the state is simply repressive,

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and you haven't portrayed it as entirely oppressive.

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It's the same argument I said about Islamists

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or the Muslim Brotherhood.

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How I portrayed them in the film is the same argument to answer

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the police argument.

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You think you don't have any friends who became police officers?

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Were they really tough at the beginning?

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Have things changed them?

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Have they become more violent?

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If someone killed a friend of theirs or a police officer.

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There's a vicious circle of violence.

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You need to understand where people are coming from.

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And to portray people as just cartoonish characters who are just

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evil, who just do bad things with no motives,

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that is the most superficial portrayal of human beings and it's

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not benefiting anyone.

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Well, let's not talk about the state as fictionalised in your movie,

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let's talk about the state as you have to deal

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with it as a film-maker.

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Let's talk about censorship.

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You know, as I understand it, you're required as part of the deal

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to get distribution and licence in Egypt to show the movie

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in your home country, you're required to put some captions

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at the beginning which read, "After the events of the June 30th

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revolution, bloody clashes took place led by the Muslim Brotherhood,

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which was seeking to stop the peaceful transition of power."

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Now, that would strike many as state propaganda

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against the Muslim Brotherhood, why did you agree to that?

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It's 100% state propaganda and I didn't agree to it.

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But it's on the movie and it's seen by Egyptians.

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It's on the movie.

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I don't have control over the movie in Egypt, as the producer.

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And from day one, at the premiere of the film, I went on TV

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and on every TV channel, I said, "People, this is wrong.

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I'm completely against it."

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Because the film is actually about coexistence.

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It's not about propaganda to any side, so discard this.

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But the producer had feel the ultimatum - either put this,

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or there's no film.

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I disagreed, he didn't.

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Would you have pulled the film?

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Um...

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It's a very...

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Obviously, not internationally, but would you have...

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I'm going to tell you why we made the film in the first place.

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We made the film in this time because this is the time when people

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are fighting and killing each other.

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It's the right time to tell them, don't do that.

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I would have made the film ten years later with no problem.

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People would have welcomed the film.

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So to me as a film-maker, I was dreaming of the day that this

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film gets released because it's not about cinema anymore,

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it's about life and death.

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So it's a hard choice.

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Thank God I didn't have the final say in it.

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But for me, from day one, I said, I denounce that,

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I'm completely against it, and it's against the message

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of the film.

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Did you - and do you even today - feel intimidated by

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the atmosphere in Egypt?

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An atmosphere which sees impositions placed upon your creativity,

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as we've just discussed.

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But also - frankly, thank goodness - you're here in the HARDtalk studio,

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but many dissident voices in Egypt today are locked up,

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thousands of them.

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Do you feel intimidated?

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Definitely, I do.

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I'm going to tell you what you just mentioned is the smallest things

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that happened to the film.

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A week before the release of the film, the distributor

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of the film got a call.

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I don't know what happened, but even though he put money

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in the film, he backed off and he said he's not

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going to distribute the film.

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He scared every cinema in Egypt, they pulled off

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all the posters of the film.

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So it was actually...

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And at some point, there was personal information about me

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and the producer leaked in a way that made us look like spies.

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During the Film Festival in Cannes, there was a ten-minute piece

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about me on Egyptian TV accusing me of being a spy.

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A Parliament member went on TV and said I'm a spy.

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I have got some quotes here.

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One of the official TV stations, state-sponsored TV stations

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in Cairo, described you as somebody who portrays

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Egypt as a moving prison.

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It says that, through your works and social media accounts,

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you promote ideas that are hostile to the state.

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Essentially you are being accused of treachery.

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There was one article that says art in the service of terrorism.

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I think if the article was right I should have been in jail for 25

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years or something.

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When you read that sort of thing, do you think to yourself,

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"I can no longer be my creative true self, I can no longer make

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movies in today's Egypt"?

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No, I know inside me it is going to be harder but I know

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I'm going to make films no matter what, even if in my room.

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I'm going to make films, I'm not going to quit.

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I always had a back-up plan for this film if I didn't have enough

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finances or I didn't have the permissions for it.

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I would have shot it all in my house.

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I would have got that car...

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Where did you shoot it?

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In the streets of Cairo.

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And how much...

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How can I put it this way?

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How obstructive were some people to your efforts to actually film

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on the streets of Cairo?

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The biggest obstruction was the people themselves.

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We were so scared that people mistake us for a real protest

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with police, if they took sides they might shoot us,

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if the police shoot the protesters, so it was a great amount

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of organisation and preparation.

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At some point we shot things like a flash mob.

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We are going to shoot in the biggest street of Cairo with 1,000 extras,

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we are going to show up on film until someone stops us.

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And it happened.

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An hour later the police stormed the place, one guy got stabbed,

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the people attacked us.

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It is so intense, and that proved to me that we are talking

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about hysteria in the right time.

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You have got to have such a passion, such a drive, such commitment

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to keep doing this sort of thing in such a difficult situation,

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which Egypt is today, and we will get back to Egypt today

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in just a minute.

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But just on the personal front, I'm wondering if you are always

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convinced it is worth it.

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Because I'm thinking about the earlier movie you made,

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just before the Tahrir uprising, all about the violence directed

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against women in Egypt today, sexual violence.

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You called it Cairo 678.

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Again, it's won acclaim internationally but the horrible

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depressing truth is that even though the movie

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was seen by some Egyptians, it seems to have made no

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difference to that particular problem in Egypt today.

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I completely disagree.

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I'm going to tell you exactly how it made a difference.

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Six years ago when I showed the film, the trailer itself created

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a tsunami of people saying this is a fabrication and this

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is completely fake.

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Now six years later, the first step, and we say that

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actually in the film, of curing anything is actually

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admitting that you have a problem.

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And now Egyptians, after six years, we started the conversation.

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Six years.

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Every Egyptian knows we have a pandemic called sexual harassment.

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Have we found a solution?

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No, but every Egyptian now, if you talk to anyone,

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will acknowledge that we have a problem.

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The power of the trailer is interesting.

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Luckily enough we have got it so let's invite

0:17:410:17:43

everybody to take a look.

0:17:430:17:44

I mean it's interesting to reflect.

0:18:100:18:12

You made that film what, five or six years ago,

0:18:120:18:14

and yet today, if one looks at all the data from the UN

0:18:140:18:22

and from civic society groups inside Egypt, Egypt -

0:18:220:18:24

of all the countries in the Arab world -

0:18:240:18:27

still has the highest levels of sexual

0:18:270:18:30

violence against women.

0:18:300:18:31

Why?

0:18:310:18:32

It is very complicated.

0:18:320:18:34

It is not only one thing.

0:18:340:18:35

The way we look at women definitely, objectifying women, is one thing.

0:18:350:18:40

I think the film focuses on the shame that is put on women

0:18:400:18:45

if they report the case.

0:18:450:18:48

So silence is the biggest contributor to this pandemic.

0:18:480:18:52

Has that changed in any way?

0:18:520:18:54

Even if the stats are still terrible, is there actually more

0:18:540:18:59

space, if you like, for women to tell the truth

0:18:590:19:02

about their experiences?

0:19:020:19:06

Yes, I can see that during, when we made the film,

0:19:060:19:09

there was only one case of sexual harassment in the history of

0:19:090:19:12

Egypt reported.

0:19:120:19:13

One case.

0:19:130:19:14

So now we have hundreds, hundreds of thousands may be.

0:19:140:19:17

Women are now on social media, you can see how women and girls

0:19:170:19:20

are talking about sexual harassment, completely different,

0:19:200:19:26

and how their families and husbands and fiances

0:19:260:19:29

are taking it differently.

0:19:290:19:31

I remember some girls, women, telling me that she took her husband

0:19:310:19:34

to the cinema to show them 678, to explain.

0:19:340:19:37

She couldn't even bear to talk about it through the film.

0:19:370:19:40

So it is such a complicated film.

0:19:400:19:43

It is not only one thing, and you have to see the film

0:19:430:19:47

because the film for 90 minutes is trying to explain how are things.

0:19:470:19:51

There is a main character who was following everything

0:19:510:19:54

and he sees it from a male point of view, which is, it is a touch.

0:19:540:19:58

It is like Donald Trump, exactly.

0:19:580:20:00

It is a small torch.

0:20:000:20:02

He doesn't think it is going to change someone's life.

0:20:020:20:05

But it does, and you see that through the film.

0:20:050:20:07

A lot of this conversation has been about change, and how you change

0:20:070:20:11

people using art, not just politics.

0:20:110:20:13

You are not a politician, you are an artist.

0:20:130:20:15

I hate politics.

0:20:150:20:16

You hate politics?

0:20:160:20:17

Definitely.

0:20:170:20:18

But let's reflect on politics.

0:20:180:20:20

We talked about the activism you have engaged in,

0:20:200:20:22

in January 2011 and beyond, the Tahrir revolution.

0:20:220:20:25

We were all moved by what we saw on the TV screens, and yet here

0:20:250:20:30

we are five and a half years later.

0:20:300:20:33

There is a former general in power, the most extraordinary repression

0:20:330:20:36

which is seeing thousands and thousands of people locked

0:20:360:20:38

up for speaking out.

0:20:380:20:41

Do you actually believe that anything was achieved

0:20:410:20:43

by that Tahrir uprising?

0:20:430:20:48

I think it is very wrong to look at a particular time and say

0:20:480:20:52

the effect of things stop here.

0:20:520:20:57

If we did the same thing with the French Revolution,

0:20:570:21:02

going after three years of the French Revolution,

0:21:020:21:04

we would have said it failed.

0:21:040:21:06

Would people now say it failed?

0:21:060:21:08

No, but the civility was achieved after 75 years.

0:21:080:21:10

They brought the dictator three times.

0:21:100:21:12

Three times they brought an emperor back.

0:21:120:21:14

So we can just freeze a moment in time and say the effect today.

0:21:140:21:17

The effect of today is bad but people are willing to change.

0:21:170:21:21

We have a new generation that is aspiring for a new world,

0:21:210:21:24

a new life, a better life of freedom of speech,

0:21:240:21:27

democracy for everyone.

0:21:270:21:35

Until now, since five years we haven't been in power by the way.

0:21:350:21:39

There is in single person who was really someone who believed

0:21:390:21:43

in democracy at heart who is in power in Egypt yet.

0:21:430:21:46

But do you admit you were wildly optimistic

0:21:460:21:50

back in those days?

0:21:500:21:51

100%.

0:21:510:21:53

You went up, I remember the picture, you went up to receive

0:21:530:21:56

a Webby Award, one of the big global internet awards, on behalf

0:21:560:21:59

of the Egyptian people because of all the activism you had

0:21:590:22:02

done on social media, and you said then, you said,

0:22:020:22:05

injustice plus oppression plus social media equals revolution.

0:22:050:22:08

Well, you know, so much for that.

0:22:090:22:12

I'm learning, I'm growing, and I was naive definitely.

0:22:120:22:14

As I told you before, what we thought was just

0:22:140:22:21

like democracy is going to be easy once the dictator is out, no,

0:22:210:22:24

actually what we need to fight more than the dictator

0:22:240:22:27

in the regime is ourselves.

0:22:270:22:28

Most oppression right now is not coming from the military regime,

0:22:280:22:32

it's coming from the people who right now are actually

0:22:320:22:36

completely with what's going on.

0:22:360:22:38

And a final thought.

0:22:380:22:40

You talk about your own personal journey and no longer naive.

0:22:400:22:44

The danger is that you become jaded, you become resigned and wary.

0:22:440:22:49

One of the leaders of the April 6 protest movement said the other day

0:22:490:22:53

when he was talking about whether there could be a new revolt,

0:22:530:22:56

because someone on the web was talking about getting new mass

0:22:560:22:59

protests going on in Egypt.

0:22:590:23:01

He said, "No, forget about it, Egyptians are too tired and too

0:23:010:23:04

divided to revolt today."

0:23:040:23:05

Do you think that is true?

0:23:050:23:07

I think it is true but things are changing so fast and so rapidly.

0:23:070:23:11

The past six months, Egyptian currency lost

0:23:110:23:12

50% of its value.

0:23:120:23:16

I don't think anything matters except economy.

0:23:160:23:18

No one cares any more about human rights.

0:23:180:23:20

No one cares any more about torture, no one cares about democracy.

0:23:200:23:23

We care about one thing, Egyptians, about one thing

0:23:230:23:26

which is economy and economy is going to the worst place

0:23:260:23:29

that we ever saw in our lives.

0:23:290:23:31

And I can see from the people around me who used to support

0:23:310:23:34

the regime that things are not going so well.

0:23:340:23:37

And by the way, from someone who believes in the revolution 100%,

0:23:370:23:40

a revolution is a medical operation.

0:23:400:23:41

There is a better way, and a way that we all wish

0:23:410:23:45

that we don't go to a medical operation, which is pills,

0:23:450:23:48

any kind of medication.

0:23:480:23:51

So that's reform.

0:23:510:23:53

So we wish and pray for reform before the next revolution

0:23:530:23:56

is going to be a bloody revolution.

0:23:560:23:58

Everyone around me that I know is escaping the country,

0:23:580:24:00

fearing that day.

0:24:000:24:05

We have to end there.

0:24:050:24:06

It is a bleak thought to end on, but, Mohamed Diab, I thank you very

0:24:060:24:10

much for being on HARDtalk.

0:24:100:24:12

Thank you very much.

0:24:120:24:15

Hello there.

0:24:360:24:37

For a good portion of the UK, as we head deeper into the week,

0:24:370:24:41

conditions will settle down as high-pressure builds in.

0:24:410:24:43

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