ISLAMABAD, March 14: On his first visit to Pakistan, one of the heroes of South African anti-apartheid struggle and companion of the long imprisonment days of Nelson Mandela, the 76-year old Ahmed Kathrada shared his views, vision and reminiscences of an extraordinary life from humble beginnings to world fame with Dawn here on Monday.

“I remember Dawn from the days of Mr Muhammad Ali Jinnah,” was the opening remark of Mr Kathrada during his visit to the newspaper’s offices. Mr Kathrada, who served as a parliamentary counsellor in the office of President Mandela after serving a 25-year imprisonment in 1989, was among the accused in both the Treason Trial and the Rivonia Trial, where he was sentenced to life imprisonment. The story of the life long struggle and commitment to ideals of equality were further strengthened during the 18 years spent in the Robben Island prison and another seven in Pollsmoor prison with Mr Mandela and eminent communist leader Walter Sisulu.

Mr Kathrada was accompanied by Barbara Hogen, now member of the South African parliament, who also spent 12 years of her life in prison for believing in an ideology of equality for all South Africans which was initially resisted by the liberal and enlightened governments of the US under Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in the UK who regarded the freedom fighters of the African National Congress as terrorists.

“One man’s freedom fighter is another’s terrorist,” said Mr Kathrada while commenting on ANC’s struggle which made a distinction between hard and soft targets during the armed stage of the non-racial struggle in South Africa in contrast to random killings of innocent civilians and children in the war against terrorism by the fighting machines of the big powers.

Condemning the killing of innocent human beings in the war against terror, Mr Kathrada said, “the US has misconstrued the situation. We condemn any action in which innocent persons lose their lives. When innocent people are killed, that is terrorism.”

“In the anti-apartheid struggle we took care that no innocent human life was lost,” said Mr Kathrada while disapproving the killing of human beings in suicide bombings and the 9/11 incident.

Recounting how Mr Mandela remembered the friends of the hard times, Mr Kathrada narrated the events which contradict the “pragmatic” principles of foreign policy in which it is taught that there are no permanent friends or enemies but only the interests of the states which guide the inter-state relations. Not so for the idealists in ANC led by Mr Mandela.

Mr Kathrada said the Americans, after Mr Mandela’s release from prison, wanted him to break relations with Cuba, Col Qaddafi of Libya and Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO). Mr Kathrada said Mr Mandela refused to be budged by the US demands by saying, “when we embarked on the struggle, you condemned us. You supported the apartheid regime. It would be immoral to abandon our friends.”

Mr Kathrada proudly narrates how the South African people enthusiastically remember their friends and give a rousing welcome to the leaders like Fidel Castro.

Chipping in with her memories, Ms Hogen paid tributes to the Cubans for helping the struggle at crucial stages and in critical battles in Namibia and Angola.

With the freedom struggle reaching its destined victory, Mr Kathrada shed light on the problems of equitable land distribution, agriculture and economic reconstruction facing South Africa where 85 per cent of the Blacks had ownership of only 13 per cent of the land.

Ms Hogen said the problems in South Africa were compounded by years of discrimination as 40 per cent of the population was still unemployed and steps had to be taken for ending the effects of years of neglect.

As a strict idealist believer in humanitarian justness of causes, Mr Kathrada had distinct views about the war against terrorism.

“Everything has been hyped as war against terror,” he said while commenting on the US invasion of Iraq and condemning the earlier regime of Saddam Hussain.

“What Saddam did over the years was not exemplary. His action in Kuwait was wrong.” He continued, “no country has the right to invade another country. Our president has condemned the action by George Bush in very tough language and said Tony Blair is his foreign minister.”

Mr Kathrada said the end to fighting in Iraq was not in sight despite the fact that thousands had been killed there, including children.

On the controversy about Iran’s nuclear weapons and moral justifications for any impending action, Mr Kathrada said the US used the atomic weapons in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He said South Africa wanted the world to be free from the scourge of nuclear weapons but the US policies seemed to be guided with the aim of grabbing the larger oil fields of the Gulf and the Middle East.

He said the realities of the world had changed with only one superpower calling the shots, whether someone liked the fact or not.

Ms Hogen drew a distinction between the policies pursued by the states and said the people in Europe and the US were against the imperialistic policies pursued by their governments. She said 9/11 and the new realities of globalization have irrevocably changed the world which require new set of parameters to be set by the future revolutionaries to effect a change. She said there was no handbook of revolutions with specified reference points but change could be affected with political struggle by filling in the vacuum left by the demise of the leftist ideologies.

About possibilities of reconciliation between civilisations by using the South African example, Mr Kathrada said every struggle finally lands at the negotiating table and all parties have to design the reconciliation process under their own unique circumstances.

Ms Hogen said the Muslim countries had to form international strategic alliances to break the stereotypes.

Mr Kathrada said the disunity among the Muslim countries was their biggest bane. Palestine would have been liberated long time ago had the Muslim countries taken a united stance, he maintained. South Africa was lucky in the sense that it had international support for the struggle while no one seemed to be helping the Palestinians. Mr Kathrada said it was his desire to see Israel defeated.

Proud to have struggled for the idealistic principles, Mr Kathrada looked back at the times in a jiffy of a thought since he was 12 years old and joined the active fray of politics to say confidently that if the circumstances demanded, he would live his life the same way if given another chance.

While going back to the prison days, Mr Kathrada said there was never a moment of despair as the struggle and much greater agonies of the people outside the prison walls kept their spirits to fight alive. “We scribbled on a rock in the prison in 1967 that victory will belong to ANC. There was always hope.”

With a a life long commitment to the anti-apartheid struggle when he left school at a young age before matriculating to devote himself to politics, Mr Kathrada, with the voice of experience echoing in his words, said there was no shortcut to revolutions and change could only be effected with political struggle having roots in the people.