:00:00. > :00:11.Now on BBC News, it is time for HARDtalk.
:00:12. > :00:19.Welcome to a special edition of HARDtalk, from Oslo. I am Stephen
:00:20. > :00:23.Sackur. Today I have an exclusive interview with the winner of this
:00:24. > :00:27.year's Nobel peace prize, President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia is
:00:28. > :00:33.being honoured for his efforts to bring an end to the long war between
:00:34. > :00:40.the Colombian government and the leftist Farc rebels. It has been a
:00:41. > :00:45.difficult, complex, a controversial process, at a peace deal is now in
:00:46. > :01:02.place. But for all of the accolades, here in Oslo, will it work?
:01:03. > :01:06.President Juan Manuel Santos, welcome to HARDtalk.
:01:07. > :01:12.And many congratulations on winning the Nobel Peace Prize. How are you
:01:13. > :01:18.feeling right now? Thank you very much. I'm feeling very happy, very
:01:19. > :01:24.excited, very honoured, and very motivated to continue working for
:01:25. > :01:28.peace in my country. Over the course of the last five, six years, that
:01:29. > :01:34.you have been working on this deal, we have spoken several times. And it
:01:35. > :01:38.strikes me that it is in some ways almost a miracle that you have got
:01:39. > :01:42.to this point, not least because, just a few months ago, the people of
:01:43. > :01:50.your country voters on the peace deal you had done, and they rejected
:01:51. > :01:55.it. How big a blow was that? It was a big load. I must confess that I
:01:56. > :02:01.didn't expect it. Nobody expected it, not even the people who won. But
:02:02. > :02:08.I am accustomed to following the Chinese proverb, try to find the
:02:09. > :02:18.opportunity from every crisis. And I found that opportunity, no one from
:02:19. > :02:22.a very small margin, and I said they all want peace, why don't we get
:02:23. > :02:26.together, talk about it, see what you don't like about this agreement,
:02:27. > :02:31.can we change it? We did that for 45 days. We ended up with a new
:02:32. > :02:36.agreement, which is a better agreement, a stronger agreement, and
:02:37. > :02:41.so it was, in a way, a blessing in disguise. Well, you can say that
:02:42. > :02:46.with a smile on your face here in Oslo as you're about to receive the
:02:47. > :02:49.Nobel Peace Prize, but the fact is, it did undermine your credibility.
:02:50. > :02:53.Let me just quote to you something that you said to me last time we
:02:54. > :02:57.spoke, a year ago, in the presidential palace in Bogota. You
:02:58. > :03:02.said to me, but people can say no, we don't like it, in the referendum,
:03:03. > :03:05.and then there will be no deal. So I said, with respect, Mr President,
:03:06. > :03:11.you will have to resign in that point. And you said, I will be in
:03:12. > :03:17.serious difficulty. But I'm quite convinced the overwhelming majority
:03:18. > :03:22.will support me. You were plain wrong. Yes, I was wrong. And many
:03:23. > :03:27.people these days are wrong about plebiscites, about referendums. It
:03:28. > :03:31.was a terrible mistake, wasn't it? I am not sorry about that, because I
:03:32. > :03:35.think I did the correct thing. I was not obliged to put the agreement to
:03:36. > :03:39.a referendum. It was on my own initiative, many people advised me
:03:40. > :03:46.against it, what I did it anyway. I learned my lesson. But the point is,
:03:47. > :03:49.you could talk about David Cameron after Brexit, you could talk about
:03:50. > :03:53.Renzi after the recent Italian referendum. They put their
:03:54. > :03:58.credibility on the line, they lost, and they resigned. How close did you
:03:59. > :04:04.come to resigning? We are in a Parliamentary system, we have a
:04:05. > :04:07.presidential system. We have a mandate, I have a mandate, from the
:04:08. > :04:14.people of Colombia until August 20 18. And the mandate is, you must
:04:15. > :04:19.achieve peace in Colombia, and that is what I am doing. Did you come
:04:20. > :04:23.close to resigning? In those dark hours, when you realise that just by
:04:24. > :04:27.a slim majority you have lost a referendum on the deal, did you
:04:28. > :04:33.consider resigning? No, I considered that it was my obligation to
:04:34. > :04:38.persevere, to take advantage of the situation, and that is what I did. I
:04:39. > :04:43.persevered, I took advantage of the situation, and now we're a better
:04:44. > :04:50.position than we were before the plebiscite. The 77% of our Congress
:04:51. > :04:57.voted, endorsed this agreement, and the people in the streets went out
:04:58. > :05:01.to support a new agreement, and that is what I am giving the people. We
:05:02. > :05:04.will talk about the detail of the revised agreement in just a minute,
:05:05. > :05:09.but before we get there, just a second. Consider for me the impact
:05:10. > :05:13.of the announcement that you had won the Nobel Peace Prize. It is a came
:05:14. > :05:17.literally I think three days after the reversal that use of the
:05:18. > :05:21.referendum. Would it fair to say that without that international
:05:22. > :05:26.accolade, and the momentum it gave you, you might not have gotten to
:05:27. > :05:30.this point today, with a new deal? It is fair to say... It was four
:05:31. > :05:35.days after the plebiscite, it is fair to say that it was a gift from
:05:36. > :05:40.heaven, and it gave me a great push. And I was in the navy, and I learnt
:05:41. > :05:46.to sail, and when there is no wind, the ship starts to drift. And this
:05:47. > :05:53.came like a big wind, that pushed the whole country, and me, and the
:05:54. > :05:58.whole process, to the port of destiny, which was a peace
:05:59. > :06:02.agreement. Isn't it worrying, though, for the long-term stability
:06:03. > :06:06.of this deal, that you are telling me you probably wouldn't have
:06:07. > :06:10.reached the destination without international support? In the end it
:06:11. > :06:13.is going to live or failed by the strength of the support it has
:06:14. > :06:17.inside the country, and if it requires the committee of Nobel to
:06:18. > :06:22.give you the prop that you needed to keep this deal alive, that
:06:23. > :06:28.ultimately is quite worrying. I have never said that, without the Nobel,
:06:29. > :06:35.I could not have achieved a new agreement. I have not said that.
:06:36. > :06:39.What I have said is that this of course encouraged me and the whole
:06:40. > :06:42.of the Colombian people, because it was interpreted as a mandate from
:06:43. > :06:48.the international community to continue and to persevere. And that
:06:49. > :06:52.helped. To what extent do you think the Norwegians ultimately, in a
:06:53. > :06:56.sense, were giving themselves a pat on the back? They have been
:06:57. > :06:59.important guarantors of the peace negotiation for years. They are one
:07:00. > :07:03.of the key players supporting the whole process. And now they give you
:07:04. > :07:07.the Nobel Peace Prize at a moment when you needed support more than
:07:08. > :07:11.ever before. Do you think it was somewhat self-serving, from their
:07:12. > :07:15.point of view? Well, you will have to ask them. But what I do say is
:07:16. > :07:21.that the Norwegians have been very helpful, since the very beginning,
:07:22. > :07:25.when we started secret talks. They were there, present, helping,
:07:26. > :07:32.supporting, pushing. And they have been following this agreement for
:07:33. > :07:34.six years, and I owe a big debt of gratitude to the Norwegians.
:07:35. > :07:40.Wouldn't this be more convincing as a display of Lumby's commitment to
:07:41. > :07:45.peace if sitting alongside you today, talking to me, about to
:07:46. > :07:53.receive a Nobel Peace Prize, were the leader of Farc, known as
:07:54. > :07:57.Timochenko? Why is he not yet, why is he not receiving the prize,
:07:58. > :08:03.because it takes two to achieve peace, as it does to tango. That is
:08:04. > :08:07.a question for the committee. Would you like to see him next to you,
:08:08. > :08:10.receiving this prize? Well, we had some difficulties bringing him here
:08:11. > :08:16.if he would have been invited, because legally there are problems
:08:17. > :08:25.with the travel and the arrangements. But the fact is that
:08:26. > :08:29.when I say they are here in heart or spirit. What is your personal
:08:30. > :08:35.relationship like with Timochenko, who is that a factor of leader of
:08:36. > :08:41.Farc? It is distant. We have developed a degree of trust that
:08:42. > :08:47.allowed us to talk quite openly about certain problems. Today you
:08:48. > :08:53.can say, hand on heart, I trust him, and I believe in his commitments?
:08:54. > :08:57.Well, I can say today that he has been committed to reaching an
:08:58. > :09:03.agreement, because otherwise this would not have been possible. But of
:09:04. > :09:08.course, we are putting in the agreement all type of guarantees for
:09:09. > :09:13.both sides to comply with what was agreed. And we have to stick to
:09:14. > :09:17.those guarantees. Let's talk a little bit about the detail of the
:09:18. > :09:25.deal, and it is highly complex, so we will try to keep it simple. Your
:09:26. > :09:28.opponents, led by the former president, your leader and mental,
:09:29. > :09:32.say that there are two fundamental problems you have not removed from
:09:33. > :09:44.the agreement, despite the modifications you have made.
:09:45. > :09:48.Number one, the Farc are not going to be published the terrible
:09:49. > :09:50.they committed, crimes of war, crimes against humanity.
:09:51. > :09:54.They are going to go unpunished, they will not be put into jail.
:09:55. > :09:56.And number two, the leaders of the Farc, even those who,
:09:57. > :10:00.during the process of truth telling, are found to have committed war
:10:01. > :10:02.crimes, they will be allowed to take public office.
:10:03. > :10:05.Some of them will sit in your parliament, and that,
:10:06. > :10:08.to your critics, is an insult to the Colombian people.
:10:09. > :10:20.Well, former president Uribe himself was the one who presented
:10:21. > :10:23.to the Columbian Congress full amnesty for the M-19 guerrillas,
:10:24. > :10:33.Second, it is not true that there is impunity.
:10:34. > :10:36.For the first time, for the first time in the history of conflict
:10:37. > :10:38.resolutions, armed conflict resolutions,
:10:39. > :10:40.the two parties got together and agreed on a transitional
:10:41. > :10:46.justice, whereby the most responsible will be investigated,
:10:47. > :10:56.judged and sanctioned by special tribunal.
:10:57. > :11:01.They will not be put in prison, where many Colombians believe
:11:02. > :11:05.they belong, for all of the atrocities they committed
:11:06. > :11:16.They will have to repair and restore.
:11:17. > :11:20.This is a new approach to justice, not only in Colombia,
:11:21. > :11:26.And tell me one example where the guerrillas have agreed
:11:27. > :11:28.to lay down their arms and go to jail.
:11:29. > :11:37.The whole purpose of a peace process is for the armed insurgents
:11:38. > :11:45.It is the whole purpose of the process.
:11:46. > :11:50.So if you don't allow them to get elected into public office,
:11:51. > :11:57.to continue fighting for their ideas, but in the legal
:11:58. > :11:59.framework, in the democracy, then what's the purpose
:12:00. > :12:03.But Mr President, how do you tell the families of those
:12:04. > :12:06.who were assassinated, those who were kidnapped and held
:12:07. > :12:09.for years in the jungle, those whose families were bombed
:12:10. > :12:17.How do you persuade all of those people that it is right and proper
:12:18. > :12:25.and just that the men who ordered those actions can,
:12:26. > :12:28.in the future, sit in your congres, your lower house
:12:29. > :12:36.and your senate, and could, in theory, even run for president?
:12:37. > :12:38.Well, let me tell you, one of the things I've learned
:12:39. > :12:41.in this process, a process that has very
:12:42. > :12:48.because this is the first process where the victims,
:12:49. > :12:54.the victims, are put in the centre of the solution
:12:55. > :12:58.And they, the victims, have been my
:12:59. > :13:02.And they are the ones who are telling me, go ahead,
:13:03. > :13:06.It's the people who have not suffered the conflict directly,
:13:07. > :13:08.the ones that are apprehensive about this particular issue.
:13:09. > :13:13.And the problem is now, because of what happened
:13:14. > :13:16.with the first referendum, and the fact you now have got
:13:17. > :13:18.the deal approved through the Colombian legislature,
:13:19. > :13:21.but not through another referendum, you don't have a popular mandate
:13:22. > :13:37.Well, in the UK, you are discussing at this very moment
:13:38. > :13:39.what is the role of Parliament in treaties like Brexit?
:13:40. > :13:41.Is parliament going to intervene or not?
:13:42. > :13:44.In our constitution there are two specific articles that say Congress
:13:45. > :13:52.is the representative of the people and they have the power.
:13:53. > :13:54.We have negotiated nine peace agreements.
:13:55. > :13:56.And where have these peace agreements gone to?
:13:57. > :14:12.I told you, I was not obligated to put this to a referendum.
:14:13. > :14:18.Even the opposition did not want the referendum.
:14:19. > :14:20.And I think it is my duty, my obligation,
:14:21. > :14:28.We have many people who voted no, now supporting the agreement.
:14:29. > :14:32.It seems to me there is still a lot of scope for things to go wrong.
:14:33. > :14:35.Right now the Constitutional Court in your country is considering
:14:36. > :14:38.whether to give you the sort of fast track authority to carry
:14:39. > :14:41.through some of the measures that are vital to making this process
:14:42. > :14:45.work, including the amnesty law and a whole raft of other things
:14:46. > :14:48.that the Farc say must happen if they are to disarm.
:14:49. > :14:50.How worried are you that this process could yet
:14:51. > :14:57.While this has been a difficult process.
:14:58. > :15:00.A war of 52 years, to end it, of course,
:15:01. > :15:03.We have encountered many obstacles, many challenges.
:15:04. > :15:12.We have been fixing and eliminating through perseverance.
:15:13. > :15:16.This case with the Constitutional Court, what is the issue is the fast
:15:17. > :15:22.track to shorten the time between the signature of the
:15:23. > :15:26.The bottom line is, if you don't get that authority and you cannot
:15:27. > :15:28.deliver these changes quickly, including the amnesty law,
:15:29. > :15:31.the Farc say, you can forget about us disarming
:15:32. > :15:33.and going to these special safe areas.
:15:34. > :15:39.They are now moving towards those safe areas.
:15:40. > :15:42.We still have a shorter procedure in the Congress
:15:43. > :15:44.through regular means to, for example, to approve
:15:45. > :16:03.But I am very confident and I hope that the Constitutional Court
:16:04. > :16:06.will give its blessing to the fast track.
:16:07. > :16:08.Here is perhaps as a bigger, more unpredictable problem.
:16:09. > :16:12.In an ironic way, you now depend on the safety and the protection
:16:13. > :16:14.of the Farc leaders, and indeed the Farc
:16:15. > :16:15.militants generally, because if other elements...
:16:16. > :16:18.I am thinking of paramilitary remnants, criminal gangs.
:16:19. > :16:20.If they start to target the Farc leadership,
:16:21. > :16:22.to assassinate them, the long-term effect will be
:16:23. > :16:29.that the Farc may well go back to the battlefield.
:16:30. > :16:32.So you now need to supervise and guarantee the safety
:16:33. > :16:43.Yes, and we have set a special commission
:16:44. > :16:45.presided by me as president, with the Armed Forces,
:16:46. > :16:48.with the Attorney General, with NGOs that defend human rights,
:16:49. > :16:51.and representatives of the Farc, to follow very closely the process
:16:52. > :17:03.This is something quite unique- our soldiers, our policeman,
:17:04. > :17:20.which were the ones who fought the Farc, are now protecting them.
:17:21. > :17:21.Yes, but Mr President, there are worrying signs.
:17:22. > :17:25.You know better than either in the last two months or so,
:17:26. > :17:28.there have been a series of targeted killings of social activists,
:17:29. > :17:38.They are not Farc people, they are people associated
:17:39. > :17:40.with leftist politics and the Farc said this, the surgeon paramilitary
:17:41. > :17:42.actions, the killings, against our civilian population
:17:43. > :17:48.and political and social leaders is casting a long shadow.
:17:49. > :17:52.We have had meetings with the representatives
:17:53. > :18:06.Who is behind these killings, do you believe?
:18:07. > :18:08.The Attorney General had made a thorough investigation.
:18:09. > :18:11.What he has said so far is that there is no
:18:12. > :18:14.These are killings that have happened in the areas
:18:15. > :18:17.where the Farc has left, they are areas where is illegal
:18:18. > :18:39.It is more related with the dispute of what is going to happen with that
:18:40. > :18:41.business, more than a systematic intention to repeat
:18:42. > :18:44.what the Farc and the country lived 20, 30 years ago.
:18:45. > :18:48.But this is a different country with a state that is more in control
:18:49. > :18:50.and some Armed Forces that are very much more effective
:18:51. > :18:54.and so we are on top of that and let me assure you that
:18:55. > :18:57.what happened 25, 30 years ago will not happen this time.
:18:58. > :19:01.It is very interesting to me, Mr President, that you say it is now
:19:02. > :19:03.a different country, we have moved on.
:19:04. > :19:06.In some ways the profound problems that lay at the heart
:19:07. > :19:09.of the insurgency for so long have not been eradicated in Colombia.
:19:10. > :19:12.I am thinking of one example, the gross economic
:19:13. > :19:18.The fact that 50% of all Colombia's land is in the hands of less
:19:19. > :19:22.You are still a profoundly unequal society.
:19:23. > :19:24.Let me tell you that in the last five, six
:19:25. > :19:26.years, we have decreased poverty by 12%.
:19:27. > :19:33.4,600,000 Colombians have been brought out of poverty.
:19:34. > :19:36.I have been able to reduce extreme poverty in half, 50%.
:19:37. > :19:38.We have created more than 4.3 million formal employments.
:19:39. > :19:41.For the first time, the difference between rich regions and poor
:19:42. > :19:59.So has the difference between rich people and poor people.
:20:00. > :20:03.We have a long way to go still, but we are going
:20:04. > :20:13.We now have, for the first time, universal coverage
:20:14. > :20:17.Everybody has the right to be treated by the health system.
:20:18. > :20:23.And we have free education for every single Colombian.
:20:24. > :20:27.And one other area where you still have a huge amount of work to do
:20:28. > :20:30.is on eradicating the drugs trade, and that is another way
:20:31. > :20:33.which for so long the Farc and other militant groups have
:20:34. > :20:35.funded their activities and, frankly, criminalised your society.
:20:36. > :20:38.Colombia remains, today, according to the US,
:20:39. > :20:41.the single largest source of cocaine coming into America.
:20:42. > :20:43.Double the supplies coming from Peru and Bolivia combined.
:20:44. > :20:58.You have failed to eradicate the drugs trade.
:20:59. > :21:00.The world has failed in the war on drugs.
:21:01. > :21:03.And I have been saying this for the last five years.
:21:04. > :21:06.The war on drugs declared by the world, the UK, the US,
:21:07. > :21:09.Europe, the whole world, the United Nations, 40 years
:21:10. > :21:13.So with the authority of the Nobel Peace Prize on your shoulders,
:21:14. > :21:16.what is your message to the world today?
:21:17. > :21:20.That we have to address the war on drugs, which is creating more
:21:21. > :21:23.damage than all the wars that have been fought together combined.
:21:24. > :21:26.And Colombia has been the country that has put the highest cost,
:21:27. > :21:35.Now, this particular peace agreement will give us, for the first time,
:21:36. > :21:48.the opportunity to find a structural solution to the illegal crops.
:21:49. > :21:51.Because before, we went with our soldiers, our policemen,
:21:52. > :21:53.our civilian eradicators, to these very revoked regions.
:21:54. > :21:56.We were met by the Farc, among others, snipers, or landmines.
:21:57. > :21:59.We of the second most mined country in the whole
:22:00. > :22:16.We went there at a very high cost, eradicated 1000 hectares,
:22:17. > :22:20.2000 hectares, went back and the day after they just planted more.
:22:21. > :22:24.Now we will have the opportunity to go with the state and give
:22:25. > :22:26.an alternative for the first time to the peasants.
:22:27. > :22:30.Just a quick thought before we end on one unknowable for the future.
:22:31. > :22:33.You have had strong support from Barack Obama in pursuing this
:22:34. > :22:36.peace agreement and in the quote, unquote, war on drugs, which you
:22:37. > :22:40.Donald Trump is about to enter the White House.
:22:41. > :22:42.You have expressed, you did during the campaign in September,
:22:43. > :22:46.you said Trump's policies are not in sync with what Colombia wants
:22:47. > :22:58.So how concerned are you that a Trump Presidency will not offer
:22:59. > :23:01.Colombia the support it needs as it tries to make this
:23:02. > :23:10.Well, fortunately, we have had a bipartisan foreign policy
:23:11. > :23:13.Both Republicans and Democrats have supported the deal
:23:14. > :23:17.It was a bipartisan foreign policy which has been
:23:18. > :23:21.We are almost out of time, but your thoughts on Trump.
:23:22. > :23:23.How concerned are you that he won't support
:23:24. > :23:37.We hope that the Republicans will continue to support,
:23:38. > :23:40.as they have supported us, in the last 15-20 years.
:23:41. > :23:44.So I hope that he will support us, but we don't know, as of today,
:23:45. > :23:50.I hope he looks at the regions south of the Rio Grande and he sees
:23:51. > :23:53.that there is a strategic interest for the United States there.
:23:54. > :23:57.In a word, you really believe this peace deal is going to work?
:23:58. > :24:01.We have to end there, but President Juan Manuel Santos,
:24:02. > :24:05.congratulations again and thank you for being with me on HARDtalk.