- Pacific
Malaysia’s Mahathir Mohamad has once again stated that the September 11 attacks were a staged event, rejecting claims that his comments are a publicity stunt.
“What do I gain from a publicity stunt? I am merely going by a public statement. I am not going to be a Prime Minister anymore unless you (pointing to a journalist) want me to …” the former Malaysian prime minister told reporters on Friday.
After watching a three-hour video of the attack on the World Trade Center buildings, Mohamad, had suggested earlier in his blog that the twin towers had collapsed “demolition style.”
Later on Friday, Mahathir also called on local television stations to show the three-hour video.
“It sounds logical to me. Until today, you cannot even find scraps of the plane that crashed into the World Trade Centre and there is no picture of the other plane, which was supposed to crash.”
“The way the tower came crashing down was also funny. People who saw it were also not ordinary people. They were professional engineers and what they say is quite credible.”
“I wish some television stations would consent to show the video as it is not long and only three hours. You can then see what I saw.”
Mahathir also said some people were afraid of saying anything critical about the governments of powerful countries or accusing them of doing something wrong.
“But the government of powerful countries said lies to go to war,” he added
“I have great respect for the Arabs but for them to hijack four planes is not very Arab. Just imagine the amount of planning that would be involved.”
Rejecting claims that he was being insensitive to the victims, Mahathir stressed that he was “being more sensitive to the victims” as he was saying the attacks were carried out “deliberately.”
The former Malaysian prime minister also said that his views about how 9/11/2001 attacks were carried out would not affect Malaysia’s chances of attracting foreign investment.
“I have said this many times even when I was the prime minister. But we still have the foreign direct investment. However, we cannot rely on foreign direct investments alone. We must build on our own system,” he said.
Mahathir made the comments at a debut held for a book titled Civilizations, Nomadic Migrations, Empires and The Trail of Islam, at the Islamic Arts Museum in Kuala Lumpur.
The book which entails the history of mankind, origin and commonality of major religions, is authored by Syed Salem Albukhary. (Press TV, 7.26.2010)