You are looking at the HTML representation of the XML format.
HTML is good for debugging, but is unsuitable for application use.
Specify the format parameter to change the output format.
To see the non HTML representation of the XML format, set format=xml.
See the complete documentation, or API help for more information. 
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<api>
  <query>
    <search>
      <p ns="0" title="Characteristics of iRidium Script" snippet="* &#039;&#039;&#039;IR&#039;&#039;&#039; – a reserved word &lt;span class=&#039;searchmatch&#039;&gt;meaning&lt;/span&gt; that the command is the instruction of &#039;&#039;&#039;iRidium API&#039;&#039;&#039;. &#10;" size="11521" wordcount="1812" timestamp="2013-08-30T06:35:54Z" />
      <p ns="0" title="IRidium Transfer" snippet="# The status of connection of control panels to Transfer. See the &lt;span class=&#039;searchmatch&#039;&gt;meaning&lt;/span&gt; of the indicator colors below.&#10;" size="10540" wordcount="1601" timestamp="2014-10-13T07:44:03Z" />
    </search>
  </query>
</api>