Left-wing British Member of Parliament George Galloway, a long-time defender of the world’s worst dictatorships, blamed the tensions on the Korean peninsula on the United States Thursday.
“I’m much more afraid of the United States of America and so are most people in the world,” Galloway said on “Comments,” a show he hosts on the Iranian government’s English-language propaganda station, Press TV.
“North Korea has no intention to harm any of us. North Korea’s problem is with South Korea. South Korea exists because America invaded Korea, killed millions of people, divided the country and continues to garrison South Korea with military bases, nuclear weapons, chemical and biological weapon.”
According to Galloway, the U.S. “trumped” up the current crisis with North Korea and is responsible for repressive country’s dire economic situation.
“I believe that this is a United States trumped up little crisis,” he said. “They have pushed and pushed North Korea into a corner. The people in North Korea are in very dire straights in terms of standards of food, amount of food and access to oil and other energy resources.”
While Galloway conceded he wouldn’t want to live in North Korea, he generally praised the country for its achievements and standing up to the West.
“Look, I don’t agree with the North Korean political system and I’ve been there. I’ve seen it up close and personal,” he said.
“But there have been achievements in North Korea. They do have a satellite circling the earth. They have built a nuclear power industry even though they suspended it on false promises from President Clinton and other U.S. statesmen. They do have a cohesive, pristine actually, innocent culture. A culture that has not been penetrated by globalization and by Western mores and is very interesting to see.”
“But I wouldn’t like to live there. And I’m not advocating their system. Not least because they certainly don’t believe in God in North Korea,” he continued. “But they are courageously refusing to bow the knee to big power dictate and domination, and that is something that other people could take a lesson from.” (RELATED: Meet history’s most eccentrically evil dictators)
In contrast to his gentle critique of North Korea’s oppressive regime, which is considered one of the most brutal and inhumane in the world, Galloway was far less restrained in his attack on the United States, Britain and South Korea.
During the show, Galloway called the free and prosperous South Korea an American “puppet state” and said “there is crime and vice and wickedness everywhere in the United States.”
“And we here in Britain where evil also stalks the land in the form of the British government,” he added.
Galloway also compared Kim Jong Un, who presides over the North Korean prison state, to former U.S. President George W. Bush.
“They say the young man who is the leader of North Korea is mad and he can’t be allowed to have nuclear weapons, but George W. Bush was mad and he had thousands of nuclear weapons,” Galloway said.
Galloway has a long history of defending dictatorships, from Syria’s Bashar al-Assad to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein.
He is also a relentless critic of Israel. In February, Galloway made news when he stormed out of a debate at Oxford University when he realized his opponent was a student from the Jewish state.
“I don’t debate with Israelis. I’ve been misled,” he said, abruptly exiting the debate hall. “I don’t recognize Israel, and I don’t debate with Israelis.”