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CNN Live Sunday

Bush Meets with Putin; Zarqawi Aide Captured; Tips for Working Moms on Personal Time; Holocaust Survivors Mark V.E. Day with Memories

Aired May 08, 2005 - 17:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, HOST: The most wanted man in Iraq has one fewer aide today. We'll tell you who Iraqi security forces have captured.
As one war rages on in the Middle East, another war is remembered on another continent. Details on how President Bush remembered the fallen, straight ahead.

Hello and welcome to CNN LIVE SUNDAY. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. All that and more after a look at the headlines.

Australia's top Muslim cleric has offered to go to Baghdad to negotiate the release of an Australian man taken hostage by Iraqi militants. The cleric made the offer in hopes of securing the release of engineer Douglas Wood. On Friday, Wood's kidnappers issued a 72- hour deadline for Australia to begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq.

The Senate Foreign Relations chairman says his panel will probably approve a controversial ambassador nominee. Senator Richard Lugar says John Bolton's nomination could go to the full Senate by the end of the week. Bolton has drawn criticism for his fiery temperament and past treatment of subordinates.

Gas prices edge lower. The average for a gallon of sell serve regular fell three cents over the past two weeks to $2.21. That makes a total drop of 7.5 cents during the past month, according to the Lundberg survey.

President Bush is in Moscow this evening, preparing for tomorrow's huge celebrations marking the end of the World War II in Europe. Also on his agenda, current U.S. relations with Russia. At a time when the U.S. needs a strong ally in the war on terror, there are growing U.S. concerns that Russia is reducing its own commitment to democratic reforms.

For more, we turn to CNN Moscow bureau chief, Jill Dougherty -- Jill.

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, presidents Putin and Bush has a 45-minute discussion out at the Dach (ph), the country house of President Putin. And in that brief time, they were able to get through a number of issues.

In fact, just a few minutes ago we had a briefing by Steve Hadley, who is the national security adviser for President Bush. He said they discussed Iran, North Korea, both countries, of course, with nuclear programs. The WTO, the World Trade Organization that Russia wants to join.

And then finally, another issue which has been bedeviling this relationship over the past couple of months, and that is the issue of democracy and what the Bush administration alleges is backsliding on democracy by President Putin.

The victory celebration, 60th anniversary of the victory over fascism in World War II, Hadley said put World War II back in focus. And President Bush, as he put it, wants a full treatment so that includes not only the question of not only the issue that Russia paid dearly for this victory, 27 million people killed, but also, that President Bush wanted to talk about what happened after the war and what the Soviet Union did.

Finally, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, said that all of this was in the course of a very good relationship between two men who can talk about virtually anything with each other.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECRETARY OF STATE: This is an excellent relationship between these two men at a personal level and also as presidents of these two great countries. I believe they believe -- they feel that they can discuss anything. I would characterize the relationship as absolutely straight forward. They say what they think. They say what they mean, and then they act on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGHERTY: And they both obviously like antique cars. Because President Putin took out his antique car, a white one and put President Bush at the wheel. Got a turn to speed or drive around the complex out there outside of Moscow -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Jill Dougherty, thanks so much.

Well, President Bush began his day in the Netherlands, where he placed a wreath at a cemetery for Americans who died while fighting Nazi Germany. In his remarks, Mr. Bush linked the battle against Nazi Germany to the current war on terror, and he said the U.S. and Europe are working to bring freedom to places where, in his words, it has long denied.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The world's tyrants learned a lesson. There is no power like the power of freedom. And no soldier as strong as a soldier who fights for that freedom.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Other observances for the 60th anniversary of V.E. Day now. In Paris, French president Jacque Chirac laid flowers and relit the flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as jets flew over, streaming the colors of the French flag.

The mood was especially somber in Berlin. German leaders attended a cathedral service there before a wreath laying ceremony at a memorial to victims of the Nazis and the war.

And in Washington, D.C., the allied victory was celebrated with music and remembrances at the World War II memorial. Decorated war hero and former senator Bob Dole was there to deliver the keynote address.

In Iraq, U.S. forces strike back. Thirty-three suspected terrorists are captured a series of raids around Baghdad. They include what military sources describe as two high value targets.

U.S. and Iraqi forces also announced Iraqi troops had captured Ammar al-Zabaidi, a key aid to suspected terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. More on that from Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: U.S. Officials say they have captured the man who planned several bomb attacks that hit Baghdad April 29, part of a wave of rising violence. There is hope the arrest will bring them closer to getting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian- born terrorist leader responsible for months of violence.

Inside the U.S. military, growing worry about the deadly rise in car bombs and suicide attacks. U.S. officials now estimate nearly 30 Iraqi civilians and security forces have been killed in the last 10 days.

But officials insist their information is getting better, that each arrest now gives them more intelligence and more tips about Zarqawi.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That intelligence allows you to plan future operations which, after conducting those operations, also gives you more intelligence. It's a virtual cycle that has permitted us of late to take down a significant part of the Zarqawi network.

STARR: The latest arrest came in Baghdad a few days ago but was not immediately announced. Mohammad Hamza al-Zabaidi is described by the U.S. as a prominent figure in the Zarqawi organization.

When U.S. troops grabbed him, they got documents detailing the April insurgent attacks against Abu Ghraib prison and plans to assassinate a prominent Iraqi government official in the days ahead. The U.S. is not saying the name of that official.

The U.S. military also is trying to convince many people that Zarqawi is not 10 feet tall, in the words of one official. A U.S. military press release is taking the unprecedented step of detailing statements from Zarqawi's driver when he was arrested back in February. The press release saying the driver told interrogators, quote, "Zarqawi became hysterical" while he was trying to escape on February 20. Of course, there is no way for us to corroborate that information from the U.S. military.

Barbara Starr, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: U.S. forces have suffered more casualties on the battlefield. Two soldiers assigned to a Marine combat team were killed near Kaldiya (ph), just east of Ramadi. They were killed in a roadside bomb explosion.

A similar blast killed one soldier and wounded another in Samarra, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.

Those latest deaths pushed the U.S. troop casualties past 1,600. To date, 1,601 American forces have been killed in the Iraq war.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi national assembly approves six names to fill vacant cabinet positions. Four of the six posts went to Sunni Arabs. But one, tapped to be human rights minister, turned it down. He said he was against the idea of cabinet positions being allocated on the basis of religious or ethic affiliation. Sunnis also have the defense and industries ministries.

The transitional prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafari, says he's considering submitting a woman's name for the remaining deputy prime minister post.

Some pretty rugged weather today is whipping across Texas, where there's a threat of hail and high winds. CNN's Jacqui Jeras joins us latest from the Lone Star State. Or at least, the picture on the Lone Star State.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much, Jacqui.

Well, it's Mother's Day and the best gift you could possibly give most career moms is more time with their children. Well, that's actually something moms could be giving themselves every day. Oh really, you say? Well, we'll be asking an executive with Careerbuilder.com about her ideas.

And still ahead, how the No Child Left Behind program is changing America's school districts and not always for the better.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Well, if you're honoring your mom today, chances are good that you're honoring a mom who works outside the home. Surveys show that more than half of all American mothers with infants are in the work force. In two-parent families with kids under 18, two-thirds of mothers are employed. Working mothers report having less than an hour a day of personal time, down from 1.6 hours a day back in 1977. How can they make the most of that precious time? Mary Delaney is the chief sales officer for Careerbuilder.com. She is also a mother of three.

Happy Mother's Day to you.

MARY DELANEY, CAREERBUILDER.COM: Thank you. Happy Mother's Day to you, as well.

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much. I'll be taking copious notes as a new mom of a 3-month-old. I wonder if a lot of career moms all feel the same. They're asking themselves, do they want more money? Do they want more time? Do they want more power? What seems to be the resounding answer?

DELANEY: Well, I think the survey results this year showed that working mothers today want more than anything to get the time to be home with their children more.

In today's environments, both jobs are more strenuous than they were in years past. We've all heard about the productivity per employee increasing over the last few years with the advent of technology, e-mail. And at home, we all know that our children's lives are busier than they were when we were growing up.

So 38 percent of the women we surveyed said that they would take a pay cut if they could have more time at home with their kids -- with their children.

WHITFIELD: So you talk about kids who are being overscheduled. You know, older kids are overscheduled, being involved in so many activities. That means moms and dads are overscheduled, as well. What's your best advice on how moms can kind of carve out more time for themselves so they have more than just an hour these days on average of personal time?

DELANEY: A couple ideas. One is at work, keep a calendar that has work and personal time on it. That allows you to be able to look ahead and make sure that you're not scheduling a meeting at the same time you have a daughter tea or a soccer game that you don't want to miss.

Another one would be to make sure that you schedule individual time for each one of your children. It's the quality time versus the quantity time for working mothers. And to make sure you're at the very significant events. Save up some vacation time.

WHITFIELD: And, you know, when you talk about significant events like some of the firsts or some of the last opportunities to witness something that your child involved in, it seems as though a lot of working moms might have a difficult time trying to express that to their superiors, their bosses about why it's important for them to be able to carve out that extra vacation time for those firsts or for those lasts. DELANEY: I think that's the great news of the survey results. Three quarters of all the women surveyed said that their companies have been flexible and recognize the talent pool that the working mother pool has and that they have allowed for flexible arrangements or work from home. Actually...

WHITFIELD: So it's important for those moms, perhaps, to really express and articulate those things and not be embarrassed about expressing to their bosses that this is why I want to take this time off?

DELANEY: It is. I do it all the time and people also share that with me. I remember last year around Mother's Day, three months ahead I received a meeting for our leadership group to go to Tucson for a board meeting and it happened to be the day of the mother-daughter tea. And because it was three months in advance, we just e-mailed back and explained and they gladly changed it. And I think that is what's reflective of what the women said in the survey.

WHITFIELD: And I've heard moms who have said they can be better employees if they are equipped to be better moms. Mary Delaney...

DELANEY: That's correct.

WHITFIELD: ... Careerbuilder.com. Thanks so much.

DELANEY: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And happy Mother's Day again.

Well, he used hip-hop to become a media mogul. Now Russell Simmons wants to help the next generation gain their financial freedom. My conversation with him straight ahead.

Also up next, she survived the Holocaust and found a new life in America. But what is Isabella Leitner's (ph) greatest victory over Hitler? I'll speak with her when CNN continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Across Europe, the end of the fighting in World War I is a cause for celebration but for survivors, Germany's surrender meant starting over and a lifetime of painful memories.

CNN's John Vause reports from Jerusalem.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came not to celebrate but to remember, those who somehow survived not just the war but the Holocaust. Six thousand of them from around the world with their children and grandchildren at Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

Rabbi Leslie Hardman, now 92, was a British army chaplain. In 1945 he was at the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany. RABBI LESLIE HARDMAN, FORMER BRITISH ARMY CHAPLAIN: Then I walked around and another 50 bodies lying there and another 20 bodies lying there. Hundreds of them, hundreds of them.

VAUSE: He remembers the mass graves, the German officers who were made to bury those they'd killed.

HARDMAN: They brought them to the edge of the pit. And then they slung them down. I'm not used to this. I said because let's have a little bit more respect, a little honor of the dead.

And so one of the majors said to me, he said, "Padre, we've got to get them under the ground. Otherwise, we'll all suffer from typhus."

VAUSE: Lying, among the dead, Howard Kleinberg, sick with typhus, 18 years old. He'd given up on life.

HOWARD KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Many, many people like myself felt satisfied to die at this moment because you saw the end of this cruelty.

VAUSE: Sixty years later, for Rabbi Hardman, a miracle.

HARDMAN: To me, it's a wonder (ph). It's like the resurrection of the dead.

VAUSE: A resurrection at the hands of a teenage girl, Nancy, the woman who would later become Howard Kleinberg's wife.

H. KLEINBERG: From nowhere, three women appear, two elderly women and one young girl. And I hear between themselves debating when this young girl says, "I'm going to save him." And the others are saying, "He is dead. What are you going to do?"

NANCY KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: We took him in. He was sleeping always. Every day. He couldn't go down to bed. I don't know. He couldn't do nothing. The food went in and the food went out. And he kept saying, "I want a doctor."

VAUSE: Eventually he was taken to a military hospital, but the two became separated. Then, two years later in Toronto, they found each other and married.

(on camera) For many who survived the Nazi concentration camps, the end of the war in Europe was not a time for celebrations. Though ill and malnourished, soon they would find out how many family and friends had died.

Most had lost their homes, possessions and personal wealth. The future was anything but certain.

(voice-over) Like many others, Nancy Kleinberg says liberation was the lowest point of her life.

N. KLEINBERG: I'll tell you why. I walked the streets crying, because there was nobody around.

When I was in the camp, I was young. I had a lot of courage, and I was always hoping that maybe tomorrow would be better. Somehow I always thought a little light in the tunnel. Not big. Just small, tiny, little.

And all of a sudden, I find myself all alone. Nobody around. I would have given everything. I felt guilty that I survived. You know? And not my parents. Not my brother. Nobody.

VAUSE: In the days after liberating Bergen-Belsen, Rabbi Hardman held a service. To this day, he remembers the sermon.

HARDMAN: If all the skies in the world were turned into paper, and all the waters in the seas were turned into ink, and all the trees in the world were transformed into pens, we would still have insufficient material with which to describe the horrors and the sufferings of these people.

VAUSE: And on this day, a reminder that even from the darkest suffering can come compassion, love and happiness.

John Vause, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Today's date holds a special meaning for Isabella Leitner. After escaping a Nazi concentration camp, she and her two sisters arrived in the United States 60 years ago today. They were the first survivors of Auschwitz to set foot in the U.S.

Isabella Leitner joins me now from New York to share this very amazing story.

Good to se you, Ms. Leitner, and happy Mother's Day to you.

ISABELLA LEITNER, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Thank you so much.

WHITFIELD: Well, what is it like celebrating this Mother's Day on a day that you also marked the anniversary 60 years ago to this day coming to the U.S. with your two sisters?

LEITNER: May I read a statement that I wrote?

WHITFIELD: Absolutely.

LEITNER: Could I do that?

On V.E. Day, May 8, 1945, the very day Hitler's war ended, the merchant marine ship S.S. Brandhootlock (ph), after five weeks in a submarine infested seas, sailed into the sun-lit harbor of Newport news, Virginia. Two days later, in Baltimore, Maryland, the ship discharged its never before seen cargo, the first survivors of Auschwitz.

My two sisters, now the diseased, and myself in our battered beings, we carried the innocent, charred souls of the millions of children, their mothers, fathers, and all of their kin.

And America, I thank you for putting your healing arms around our weeping hearts.

WHITFIELD: Oh, Mrs. Leitner, thank you so much for sharing that with us.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: I know this is something you have been sharing over the years in your writings. Your experience, something you and your sisters and family experienced.

So often Holocaust survivors don't want to talk about it. It's just too painful. How is it that you bring yourself to share these very emotional, poignant moments with the public?

LEITNER: I have a very important mission in life. It's to share -- to tell the tale. To leave it behind me in -- for history. I want the young people to learn what we have gone through, painful as it is for me to hurt them with such stories.

Nonetheless, they have to listen and take warning and see to a future that is much better than the one I lived through. And I suffer the consequences, the emotional consequences for all my life. I have. I am going to be...





FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, HOST: The most wanted man in Iraq has one fewer aide today. We'll tell you who Iraqi security forces have captured.

As one war rages on in the Middle East, another war is remembered on another continent. Details on how President Bush remembered the fallen, straight ahead.

Hello and welcome to CNN LIVE SUNDAY. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. All that and more after a look at the headlines.

Australia's top Muslim cleric has offered to go to Baghdad to negotiate the release of an Australian man taken hostage by Iraqi militants. The cleric made the offer in hopes of securing the release of engineer Douglas Wood. On Friday, Wood's kidnappers issued a 72- hour deadline for Australia to begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq.

The Senate Foreign Relations chairman says his panel will probably approve a controversial ambassador nominee. Senator Richard Lugar says John Bolton's nomination could go to the full Senate by the end of the week. Bolton has drawn criticism for his fiery temperament and past treatment of subordinates.

Gas prices edge lower. The average for a gallon of sell serve regular fell three cents over the past two weeks to $2.21. That makes a total drop of 7.5 cents during the past month, according to the Lundberg survey.

President Bush is in Moscow this evening, preparing for tomorrow's huge celebrations marking the end of the World War II in Europe. Also on his agenda, current U.S. relations with Russia. At a time when the U.S. needs a strong ally in the war on terror, there are growing U.S. concerns that Russia is reducing its own commitment to democratic reforms.

For more, we turn to CNN Moscow bureau chief, Jill Dougherty -- Jill.

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, presidents Putin and Bush has a 45-minute discussion out at the Dach (ph), the country house of President Putin. And in that brief time, they were able to get through a number of issues.

In fact, just a few minutes ago we had a briefing by Steve Hadley, who is the national security adviser for President Bush. He said they discussed Iran, North Korea, both countries, of course, with nuclear programs. The WTO, the World Trade Organization that Russia wants to join.

And then finally, another issue which has been bedeviling this relationship over the past couple of months, and that is the issue of democracy and what the Bush administration alleges is backsliding on democracy by President Putin.

The victory celebration, 60th anniversary of the victory over fascism in World War II, Hadley said put World War II back in focus. And President Bush, as he put it, wants a full treatment so that includes not only the question of not only the issue that Russia paid dearly for this victory, 27 million people killed, but also, that President Bush wanted to talk about what happened after the war and what the Soviet Union did.

Finally, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, said that all of this was in the course of a very good relationship between two men who can talk about virtually anything with each other.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECRETARY OF STATE: This is an excellent relationship between these two men at a personal level and also as presidents of these two great countries. I believe they believe -- they feel that they can discuss anything. I would characterize the relationship as absolutely straight forward. They say what they think. They say what they mean, and then they act on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGHERTY: And they both obviously like antique cars. Because President Putin took out his antique car, a white one and put President Bush at the wheel. Got a turn to speed or drive around the complex out there outside of Moscow -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Jill Dougherty, thanks so much.

Well, President Bush began his day in the Netherlands, where he placed a wreath at a cemetery for Americans who died while fighting Nazi Germany. In his remarks, Mr. Bush linked the battle against Nazi Germany to the current war on terror, and he said the U.S. and Europe are working to bring freedom to places where, in his words, it has long denied.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The world's tyrants learned a lesson. There is no power like the power of freedom. And no soldier as strong as a soldier who fights for that freedom.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Other observances for the 60th anniversary of V.E. Day now. In Paris, French president Jacque Chirac laid flowers and relit the flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as jets flew over, streaming the colors of the French flag.

The mood was especially somber in Berlin. German leaders attended a cathedral service there before a wreath laying ceremony at a memorial to victims of the Nazis and the war.

And in Washington, D.C., the allied victory was celebrated with music and remembrances at the World War II memorial. Decorated war hero and former senator Bob Dole was there to deliver the keynote address.

In Iraq, U.S. forces strike back. Thirty-three suspected terrorists are captured a series of raids around Baghdad. They include what military sources describe as two high value targets.

U.S. and Iraqi forces also announced Iraqi troops had captured Ammar al-Zabaidi, a key aid to suspected terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. More on that from Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: U.S. Officials say they have captured the man who planned several bomb attacks that hit Baghdad April 29, part of a wave of rising violence. There is hope the arrest will bring them closer to getting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian- born terrorist leader responsible for months of violence.

Inside the U.S. military, growing worry about the deadly rise in car bombs and suicide attacks. U.S. officials now estimate nearly 30 Iraqi civilians and security forces have been killed in the last 10 days. But officials insist their information is getting better, that each arrest now gives them more intelligence and more tips about Zarqawi.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That intelligence allows you to plan future operations which, after conducting those operations, also gives you more intelligence. It's a virtual cycle that has permitted us of late to take down a significant part of the Zarqawi network.

STARR: The latest arrest came in Baghdad a few days ago but was not immediately announced. Mohammad Hamza al-Zabaidi is described by the U.S. as a prominent figure in the Zarqawi organization.

When U.S. troops grabbed him, they got documents detailing the April insurgent attacks against Abu Ghraib prison and plans to assassinate a prominent Iraqi government official in the days ahead. The U.S. is not saying the name of that official.

The U.S. military also is trying to convince many people that Zarqawi is not 10 feet tall, in the words of one official. A U.S. military press release is taking the unprecedented step of detailing statements from Zarqawi's driver when he was arrested back in February.

The press release saying the driver told interrogators, quote, "Zarqawi became hysterical" while he was trying to escape on February 20. Of course, there is no way for us to corroborate that information from the U.S. military.

Barbara Starr, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: U.S. forces have suffered more casualties on the battlefield. Two soldiers assigned to a Marine combat team were killed near Kaldiya (ph), just east of Ramadi. They were killed in a roadside bomb explosion.

A similar blast killed one soldier and wounded another in Samarra, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.

Those latest deaths pushed the U.S. troop casualties past 1,600. To date, 1,601 American forces have been killed in the Iraq war.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi national assembly approves six names to fill vacant cabinet positions. Four of the six posts went to Sunni Arabs. But one, tapped to be human rights minister, turned it down. He said he was against the idea of cabinet positions being allocated on the basis of religious or ethic affiliation. Sunnis also have the defense and industries ministries.

The transitional prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafari, says he's considering submitting a woman's name for the remaining deputy prime minister post.

Some pretty rugged weather today is whipping across Texas, where there's a threat of hail and high winds. CNN's Jacqui Jeras joins us latest from the Lone Star State. Or at least, the picture on the Lone Star State.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much, Jacqui.

Well, it's Mother's Day and the best gift you could possibly give most career moms is more time with their children. Well, that's actually something moms could be giving themselves every day. Oh really, you say? Well, we'll be asking an executive with Careerbuilder.com about her ideas.

And still ahead, how the No Child Left Behind program is changing America's school districts and not always for the better.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Well, if you're honoring your mom today, chances are good that you're honoring a mom who works outside the home. Surveys show that more than half of all American mothers with infants are in the work force. In two-parent families with kids under 18, two-thirds of mothers are employed.

Working mothers report having less than an hour a day of personal time, down from 1.6 hours a day back in 1977. How can they make the most of that precious time? Mary Delaney is the chief sales officer for Careerbuilder.com. She is also a mother of three.

Happy Mother's Day to you.

MARY DELANEY, CAREERBUILDER.COM: Thank you. Happy Mother's Day to you, as well.

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much. I'll be taking copious notes as a new mom of a 3-month-old. I wonder if a lot of career moms all feel the same. They're asking themselves, do they want more money? Do they want more time? Do they want more power? What seems to be the resounding answer?

DELANEY: Well, I think the survey results this year showed that working mothers today want more than anything to get the time to be home with their children more.

In today's environments, both jobs are more strenuous than they were in years past. We've all heard about the productivity per employee increasing over the last few years with the advent of technology, e-mail. And at home, we all know that our children's lives are busier than they were when we were growing up.

So 38 percent of the women we surveyed said that they would take a pay cut if they could have more time at home with their kids -- with their children.

WHITFIELD: So you talk about kids who are being overscheduled. You know, older kids are overscheduled, being involved in so many activities. That means moms and dads are overscheduled, as well. What's your best advice on how moms can kind of carve out more time for themselves so they have more than just an hour these days on average of personal time?

DELANEY: A couple ideas. One is at work, keep a calendar that has work and personal time on it. That allows you to be able to look ahead and make sure that you're not scheduling a meeting at the same time you have a daughter tea or a soccer game that you don't want to miss.

Another one would be to make sure that you schedule individual time for each one of your children. It's the quality time versus the quantity time for working mothers. And to make sure you're at the very significant events. Save up some vacation time.

WHITFIELD: And, you know, when you talk about significant events like some of the firsts or some of the last opportunities to witness something that your child involved in, it seems as though a lot of working moms might have a difficult time trying to express that to their superiors, their bosses about why it's important for them to be able to carve out that extra vacation time for those firsts or for those lasts.

DELANEY: I think that's the great news of the survey results. Three quarters of all the women surveyed said that their companies have been flexible and recognize the talent pool that the working mother pool has and that they have allowed for flexible arrangements or work from home. Actually...

WHITFIELD: So it's important for those moms, perhaps, to really express and articulate those things and not be embarrassed about expressing to their bosses that this is why I want to take this time off?

DELANEY: It is. I do it all the time and people also share that with me. I remember last year around Mother's Day, three months ahead I received a meeting for our leadership group to go to Tucson for a board meeting and it happened to be the day of the mother-daughter tea. And because it was three months in advance, we just e-mailed back and explained and they gladly changed it. And I think that is what's reflective of what the women said in the survey.

WHITFIELD: And I've heard moms who have said they can be better employees if they are equipped to be better moms. Mary Delaney...

DELANEY: That's correct.

WHITFIELD: ... Careerbuilder.com. Thanks so much.

DELANEY: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And happy Mother's Day again.

Well, he used hip-hop to become a media mogul. Now Russell Simmons wants to help the next generation gain their financial freedom. My conversation with him straight ahead. Also up next, she survived the Holocaust and found a new life in America. But what is Isabella Leitner's (ph) greatest victory over Hitler? I'll speak with her when CNN continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Across Europe, the end of the fighting in World War I is a cause for celebration but for survivors, Germany's surrender meant starting over and a lifetime of painful memories.

CNN's John Vause reports from Jerusalem.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came not to celebrate but to remember, those who somehow survived not just the war but the Holocaust. Six thousand of them from around the world with their children and grandchildren at Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

Rabbi Leslie Hardman, now 92, was a British army chaplain. In 1945 he was at the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany.

RABBI LESLIE HARDMAN, FORMER BRITISH ARMY CHAPLAIN: Then I walked around and another 50 bodies lying there and another 20 bodies lying there. Hundreds of them, hundreds of them.

VAUSE: He remembers the mass graves, the German officers who were made to bury those they'd killed.

HARDMAN: They brought them to the edge of the pit. And then they slung them down. I'm not used to this. I said because let's have a little bit more respect, a little honor of the dead.

And so one of the majors said to me, he said, "Padre, we've got to get them under the ground. Otherwise, we'll all suffer from typhus."

VAUSE: Lying, among the dead, Howard Kleinberg, sick with typhus, 18 years old. He'd given up on life.

HOWARD KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Many, many people like myself felt satisfied to die at this moment because you saw the end of this cruelty.

VAUSE: Sixty years later, for Rabbi Hardman, a miracle.

HARDMAN: To me, it's a wonder (ph). It's like the resurrection of the dead.

VAUSE: A resurrection at the hands of a teenage girl, Nancy, the woman who would later become Howard Kleinberg's wife.

H. KLEINBERG: From nowhere, three women appear, two elderly women and one young girl. And I hear between themselves debating when this young girl says, "I'm going to save him." And the others are saying, "He is dead. What are you going to do?"

NANCY KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: We took him in. He was sleeping always. Every day. He couldn't go down to bed. I don't know. He couldn't do nothing. The food went in and the food went out. And he kept saying, "I want a doctor."

VAUSE: Eventually he was taken to a military hospital, but the two became separated. Then, two years later in Toronto, they found each other and married.

(on camera) For many who survived the Nazi concentration camps, the end of the war in Europe was not a time for celebrations. Though ill and malnourished, soon they would find out how many family and friends had died.

Most had lost their homes, possessions and personal wealth. The future was anything but certain.

(voice-over) Like many others, Nancy Kleinberg says liberation was the lowest point of her life.

N. KLEINBERG: I'll tell you why. I walked the streets crying, because there was nobody around.

When I was in the camp, I was young. I had a lot of courage, and I was always hoping that maybe tomorrow would be better. Somehow I always thought a little light in the tunnel. Not big. Just small, tiny, little.

And all of a sudden, I find myself all alone. Nobody around. I would have given everything. I felt guilty that I survived. You know? And not my parents. Not my brother. Nobody.

VAUSE: In the days after liberating Bergen-Belsen, Rabbi Hardman held a service. To this day, he remembers the sermon.

HARDMAN: If all the skies in the world were turned into paper, and all the waters in the seas were turned into ink, and all the trees in the world were transformed into pens, we would still have insufficient material with which to describe the horrors and the sufferings of these people.

VAUSE: And on this day, a reminder that even from the darkest suffering can come compassion, love and happiness.

John Vause, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Today's date holds a special meaning for Isabella Leitner. After escaping a Nazi concentration camp, she and her two sisters arrived in the United States 60 years ago today. They were the first survivors of Auschwitz to set foot in the U.S.

Isabella Leitner joins me now from New York to share this very amazing story. Good to se you, Ms. Leitner, and happy Mother's Day to you.

ISABELLA LEITNER, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Thank you so much.

WHITFIELD: Well, what is it like celebrating this Mother's Day on a day that you also marked the anniversary 60 years ago to this day coming to the U.S. with your two sisters?

LEITNER: May I read a statement that I wrote?

WHITFIELD: Absolutely.

LEITNER: Could I do that?

On V.E. Day, May 8, 1945, the very day Hitler's war ended, the merchant marine ship S.S. Brandhootlock (ph), after five weeks in a submarine infested seas, sailed into the sun-lit harbor of Newport news, Virginia. Two days later, in Baltimore, Maryland, the ship discharged its never before seen cargo, the first survivors of Auschwitz.

My two sisters, now the diseased, and myself in our battered beings, we carried the innocent, charred souls of the millions of children, their mothers, fathers, and all of their kin.

And America, I thank you for putting your healing arms around our weeping hearts.

WHITFIELD: Oh, Mrs. Leitner, thank you so much for sharing that with us.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: I know this is something you have been sharing over the years in your writings. Your experience, something you and your sisters and family experienced.

So often Holocaust survivors don't want to talk about it. It's just too painful. How is it that you bring yourself to share these very emotional, poignant moments with the public?

LEITNER: I have a very important mission in life. It's to share -- to tell the tale. To leave it behind me in -- for history. I want the young people to learn what we have gone through, painful as it is for me to hurt them with such stories.

Nonetheless, they have to listen and take warning and see to a future that is much better than the one I lived through. And I suffer the consequences, the emotional consequences for all my life. I have. I am going to be 84-years-old in just about 25 days. And less than that -- and this month as a matter of fact. And I cannot come to terms with anything about the Holocaust. Such insanity I have not known, nor I hope will anyone know. But the world is pretty unkind.

WHITIFELD: And Isabella Leitner, thank you so much for sharing your story with us. And happy birthday in advance. With your birthday coming up in less than 25 days.

LEITNER: 28th of the month.

WHITFIELD: OK. And happy birthday to you. And I understand that, you know, you look at your sons Peter and Richard on this Mother's Day and every day and you say to yourself that they really are -- do exemplify the greatest victory over Hitler.

LEITNER: Over Hitler, indeed.

WHITFIELD: Well, thank you so much for joining us. And Happy Mother's day to you.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And we will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: An update now on some familiar faces.

For the last eight years, Jill Dougherty has served as CNN's Moscow bureau chief. After covering the V-E Day celebrations on Monday, she is leaving Moscow to take up new duties for CNN in Hong Kong.

John King has covered the White House for CNN since 1999. And although he'll continue to report for us from Washington and around the world, this is his last trip inside what we call the White House bubble.

We thought this would be a great time to ask Jill and John to reflect on their years covering their respective beats starting with their first impressions of the men currently in charge at the White House and the Kremlin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): The first time that I saw Vladimir Putin up close was actually in the Kremlin. It was a round table discussion with a small number of foreign journalists. And I sat right next to him. And we sat there for three and-a-half hours as he answered questions in great detail.

And I think that as I watched him over the years, that is the one thing, he appears to me to be a person of great self control and discipline. And that comes out in the way that he governs.

JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): The most interesting thing about President Bush in the early days was how determined he was to essentially ignore the election results. He had come to office under extremely controversial circumstances. He had lost the popular vote. And yet he came out of the box saying he was not going to back down and he was going to push the sweeping tax cut through the Congress. In the early days, we saw what's his now trademark. Be bold. Throw deep. Don't compromise early. If you're going to compromise, wait as late in the process as you can. It was definitely a surprise how well Bush and Putin got along in the beginning.

DOUGHERTY: Definitely did not expect them to get along as well as they did. And I was in Slovenia at their very first meeting in Ljubljana.

KING: When they first met and they had a long walk in Slovenia, and Bush comes to the microphone.

DOUGHERTY: And I remember when President Bush said...

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I looked the man in the eye, I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. And we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul.

DOUGHERTY: It was electric. When people, and especially I reacted in an amazing way.

KING: It was quite controversial. It was very telling of how Bush does business.

DOUGHERTY: Now, that has changed over the years between the two men. But they still seem to be able to talk to each other pretty straight ahead.

KING: It is a tough question to ask what is George W. Bush's greatest foreign relations accomplishment. Had there not be an Iraq war, you could say on this day that his greatest accomplishment was responding to September 11, rallying the world to his cause.

BUSH: What is your name? I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you.

KING: Kicking out the Taliban and helping Afghanistan take its early steps toward a democracy.

DOUGHERTY: I think Putin's greatest foreign policy achievement was one moment, it was September 11.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA (through translator): I want to say to the American people, we are with you. We fully share and feel your pain.

DOUGHERTY: He was a first international leader to call up George Bush and express solidarity after the attacks on 9/11.

KING: There's no question the greatest miscue, miscalculation was Iraq. And the number of troops, how long it would take, how long U.S. troops would be there to the atmosphere in which the troops would be living, they were wrong.

DOUGHERTY: I think President Bush and President Putin will continue to say the right things about their relationship. They will continue to say that they have a warm and productive personal relationship.

KING: Bush and Putin have made the relationship bigger than any differences. Will that sustain itself? I think Bush certainly hopes so. And from everything he said in public, I think Putin hopes so.

DOUGHERTY: I came here first as a student in 1969. And I never in my wildest dreams ever, ever believed that the Soviet system could crumble.

I ended up covering the end of the Soviet Union at the White House. It happened December 25, 1991. That's Christmas Day. I was new at the White House as a correspondent. So, that happened to be the day that the president, President Gorbachev resigned as Soviet president. And that's technically the day that the Soviet Union ended.

And I can remember standing on the lawn of the White House.

Now that he has resigned.

And thinking, I was almost in shock, because I could not believe what I was reporting. That the Soviet Union, the U.S.S.R. was collapsing.

This is a great country. And it's been around for a thousand years. So, it's going to define it one way or the another, but it's going to be an important country in the world for, I think, the rest of our lifetimes.

KING: I make jokes about it, because it's hard -- it is hard for me to -- it's hard for me to acknowledge sometimes that -- that's it. It's been almost eight years. This will be the last trip.

78, 79 countries that I would not have seen or at least not have seen so quickly. That's pretty amazing and extraordinary. And it's been a privilege.

You get to see moments in history. And remembering that leaders meet and you watch pictures of war on TV, but there are people who live in those places.

The kids in the Kosovo camps and the kids I saw after the tsunami are images that is are more important to me than any leader shaking hands. It's been a pretty amazing ride. It's been a pretty amazing ride.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And they've both done an amazing job.

Well, why would financial guru Susie Ormand be going on a hip hop tour. Or better yet, why is hip hop's Russell Simmons making a new financial commitment? Hear about Simmons, inventive, music and money mission coming up next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Media mogul Rusell Simmons is on a mission, taking the hip hop generation to another level, teaching young people financial empowerment. Earlier I spoke with him. And he explains his new tour coming to a major city near you.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RUSSELL SIMMONS, HIP HOP SUMMIT ACTION NETWORK: Kids get in so much trouble, because of their lack of information. And all these resources are available right in their face. And so, if we can give the kids easy opportunities, or just tell them about the easy opportunities and resources that are already around them, make a big difference if their lives.

WHITFIELD: Susie Ormand, you know, talks about empowerment through her books, through television shows as you mentioned, and you even introduce folks to a prepaid Visa card. It sounds as though you are trying to target the younger audience, the younger folks who generally feel like they know how to spend money and want to think about think and her now, but now you are talking about reconditioning a whole mind set, aren't you, along with Susie Ormand and others? To try to encourage kids it's important to pay off credit card debt and save money.

SIMMONS: Well, this whole idea is one I learned from my UniRush financial service company. It's not only a prepaid debit card, we have a virtual bank account. And the fact is that because these 60 million Americans don't have bank accounts, they have to go check cashing places, get robbed. And then go to online and pay their bills.

And then they don't start a process of rebuilding their credit. They don't start a process of connecting to the world. You can't rent a hotel room, you can't rent a car, you can't use the Internet. You're locked out of the world.

So, I learned that. And then learned all the predatory practices. You know? The loans that they get that they have to pay back in one week and they pay 500, 800 percent on the loans. Or just so many ways to take advantage of the people that need the most. They pay the most.

WHITFIELD: And that's how you're trying to send the message to a lot of these folks? That, you know, they're getting taken advantage of. They're getting ripped off as they think they're doing the right thing and the most accessible thing?

SIMMONS: Well, a lot of times they don't even think they're doing the right thing.

We just need -- the core to this that the rappers always -- Eminem and Fantasia and all the rappers who have success, Lil' Jon -- the core, there's a spiritual component of having ideas of abundance versus scarcity, you know? We're fighting poverty and ignorance in the hip hop community. And poverty in American, a great part of it is a mind set. And we need kids to take the first steps.

You know, the whole idea of hard work and dedication, they watch these rappers bling-bling and they think they didn't work. But Eminem can tell you a story to inspire you about how he became successful. So can Lil Jon or any rapper can get on the stage and tell you, I worked my butt off and I was very dedicated and I didn't give up.

And these are kinds of ideas that, you know, I was happier at work than I was sitting at home. You know, these basic ideas that come out of the mouths -- we did St. Louis with Nelly. We did L.A. with Snoop Dogg. We did Eminem twice in Detroit before. We did Philadelphia with Will Smith. We have been all over the country -- New York with Puffy and Jay-Z.

So we've been all over the country to hip hop summit. And we find that the kids -- you know, you can quote the scripture all day, the Torah, the Bible, the Koran, the whole -- your Buddhist scripture, the yoga -- you can do all that all day long and a lot of kids will not listen.

But if 50 Cent tells you that the Rockfeller drug laws are no good, that Governor Pataki changes the laws. And that's the truth. And that's what hip hop is doing all over the country, they're speaking the language of young people and inspiring them to do good things.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: The tour with Russell Simmons and money guru Susie Ormand and singers Eminem and Fantasia starts in Detroit next Saturday, May 14 and runs through November.

The No Child Left Behind program is supposed to reform schools, but students, teachers and parents aren't so sure that it's working. In this excerpt from "High Stakes: The Battle To Save Our Schools," "CNN PRESENTS" reports that some children are left far behind. And test scores don't add up.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BUSH: Our economy's the envy of the world. Unfortunately, our schools are not.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As governor, George W. Bush was determined to improve student achievement and reduce dropout rates in schools across Texas. He implemented statewide reforms including mandatory testing. and he said he would hold school officials accountable for rising test scores.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we have got our top scores...

BUSH: Bush found a kindred spirit in Houston superintendent Rod Paige.

ROD PAIGE, FMR. HOUSTON SUPERINTENDENT: We know how to make organizations work. And the same thing is true for schools. The idea is to link performance and contribution, and incentives.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Principals who could show rising test scores on the Texas assessment of Knowledge and Skills or TAKS, could get bonuses of up to $5,000. For district superintendents, bonuses could rise to $20,000.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You all of a sudden saw many schools with 40 to 45 percent pass rate on the TAKS go up to 90 percent the very next year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The fast rising test scores hailed as the Houston Miracle, but the miracle was not what it seemed, thousands of students were actually dropping out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One day, I was informed that a report had been turned in to the district from my high school and our principal reported zero dropouts. Well, I knew that was impossible. Because I had seen over 400 students leave that year and many told me they dropped out. I saw many assistant principals tell students to quit school, to get out, go withdraw.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Another strategy to make the statistics tell a good story, according to Kimball, was for officials to retain students in ninth grade so they would haven't to take the TAKS test in tenth grade.

In 2000, there were 1,160 ninth grade students at Austin High School. But the next year, only 257 made it to the tenth grade. And what was happening at Austin High was happening at schools across the district.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Award winning filmmaker Stanley Nelson goes in depth in this documentary. And you can see it tonight at 8:00 Eastern. "CNN PRESENTS High Stakes: The Battle to Save our Schools."

Carol Lin is here with a preview of what's ahead on more of CNN LIVE SUNDAY -- Carol?

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Well Fred, there might be a bit of fire and brimstone at a North Carolina church service today. You probably heard about the story about the conservative pastor who basically asked the Democratic members who voted for the Democrats in the last presidential race to leave the church. All right? Well, they went to church today with their attorneys, Fred. So, that's coming up in the next hour.

WHITFIELD: All right. Look forward to that. Thanks a lot, Carol.

Also coming up, they're mothers and they're HIV positive. But that's not stopping these South African women from taking charge of their lives. Find out how they're now helping AIDS victims here in the United States.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: On this Mother's Day, hope for a group of HIV positive mothers from half way around the world. These women from South Africa have learned to live with the truth of their virus and to help others like them do the same through the so-called Mother's Program. Now they're in New York learning one more lesson, they're not alone. Here's CNN's Alina Cho.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A walk through the streets of New York is a dream for these women. None of them would be here were it not for an awful fact, they are mothers living with HIV.

QUEEN MDA, HIV-POSITIVE MOTHER: HIV? What is HIV? I had this disease. It's a killer.

CHO: Queen and her friends Babala (ph) and Miki learned they were HIV positive while they were pregnant three years ago. They live in South Africa where 25 percent of all pregnant women have HIV.

DR. MITCHELL BESSER, FOUNDER, MOTHER'S PROGRAMMES: I mean, it's an epidemic of Biblical proportions. Communities are disappearing.

CHO: Dr. Mitch Besser moved from to Cape Town from the U.S. five years ago. He founded a group called Mother's Programme. The goal is to teach these women how to take care of themselves and their children.

BESSER: They know how to take their medicine, they know how to feed their babies. Most important, they're able to disclose their status to family members and partners without fear.

CHO: Miki was so angry when she found out she was HIV positive, she refused to get help. After her baby tested positive, she changed her ways.

(on camera): You seem so happy.

MIKI NTELWA, HIV-POSITIVE MOTHER: Yes. I'm happy. Because I know is that what I was singing is that this virus for me is just a blessing in disguise. Yes. Because my life is still going on and I see so many places because of this virus.

CHO (voice-over): The women now work as counselors for Mother's Programmes. They're in New York to talk to women here who have had similar experiences, like 43-year-old Annette.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like so many two different worlds away, but yeah, we're going through the same thing.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

CHO: These women had never been to New York before, had never been on a plane. Now that they're here...

(on camera: You'll be in New York for a week. After a week, are you going to want to go home?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

CHO (voice-over): A Mother's Day none of these women will soon forget.

Alina Cho, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And from AIDS to Autism, find out how a mother is using the power of pictures to change the hearts and minds of those who don't understand the disease. Carol Lin is next with that story, plus all the day's top headlines. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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Aired May 8, 2005 - 17:00   ET
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FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, HOST: The most wanted man in Iraq has one fewer aide today. We'll tell you who Iraqi security forces have captured.
As one war rages on in the Middle East, another war is remembered on another continent. Details on how President Bush remembered the fallen, straight ahead.

Hello and welcome to CNN LIVE SUNDAY. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. All that and more after a look at the headlines.

Australia's top Muslim cleric has offered to go to Baghdad to negotiate the release of an Australian man taken hostage by Iraqi militants. The cleric made the offer in hopes of securing the release of engineer Douglas Wood. On Friday, Wood's kidnappers issued a 72- hour deadline for Australia to begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq.

The Senate Foreign Relations chairman says his panel will probably approve a controversial ambassador nominee. Senator Richard Lugar says John Bolton's nomination could go to the full Senate by the end of the week. Bolton has drawn criticism for his fiery temperament and past treatment of subordinates.

Gas prices edge lower. The average for a gallon of sell serve regular fell three cents over the past two weeks to $2.21. That makes a total drop of 7.5 cents during the past month, according to the Lundberg survey.

President Bush is in Moscow this evening, preparing for tomorrow's huge celebrations marking the end of the World War II in Europe. Also on his agenda, current U.S. relations with Russia. At a time when the U.S. needs a strong ally in the war on terror, there are growing U.S. concerns that Russia is reducing its own commitment to democratic reforms.

For more, we turn to CNN Moscow bureau chief, Jill Dougherty -- Jill.

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, presidents Putin and Bush has a 45-minute discussion out at the Dach (ph), the country house of President Putin. And in that brief time, they were able to get through a number of issues.

In fact, just a few minutes ago we had a briefing by Steve Hadley, who is the national security adviser for President Bush. He said they discussed Iran, North Korea, both countries, of course, with nuclear programs. The WTO, the World Trade Organization that Russia wants to join.

And then finally, another issue which has been bedeviling this relationship over the past couple of months, and that is the issue of democracy and what the Bush administration alleges is backsliding on democracy by President Putin.

The victory celebration, 60th anniversary of the victory over fascism in World War II, Hadley said put World War II back in focus. And President Bush, as he put it, wants a full treatment so that includes not only the question of not only the issue that Russia paid dearly for this victory, 27 million people killed, but also, that President Bush wanted to talk about what happened after the war and what the Soviet Union did.

Finally, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, said that all of this was in the course of a very good relationship between two men who can talk about virtually anything with each other.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECRETARY OF STATE: This is an excellent relationship between these two men at a personal level and also as presidents of these two great countries. I believe they believe -- they feel that they can discuss anything. I would characterize the relationship as absolutely straight forward. They say what they think. They say what they mean, and then they act on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGHERTY: And they both obviously like antique cars. Because President Putin took out his antique car, a white one and put President Bush at the wheel. Got a turn to speed or drive around the complex out there outside of Moscow -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Jill Dougherty, thanks so much.

Well, President Bush began his day in the Netherlands, where he placed a wreath at a cemetery for Americans who died while fighting Nazi Germany. In his remarks, Mr. Bush linked the battle against Nazi Germany to the current war on terror, and he said the U.S. and Europe are working to bring freedom to places where, in his words, it has long denied.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The world's tyrants learned a lesson. There is no power like the power of freedom. And no soldier as strong as a soldier who fights for that freedom.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Other observances for the 60th anniversary of V.E. Day now. In Paris, French president Jacque Chirac laid flowers and relit the flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as jets flew over, streaming the colors of the French flag.

The mood was especially somber in Berlin. German leaders attended a cathedral service there before a wreath laying ceremony at a memorial to victims of the Nazis and the war.

And in Washington, D.C., the allied victory was celebrated with music and remembrances at the World War II memorial. Decorated war hero and former senator Bob Dole was there to deliver the keynote address.

In Iraq, U.S. forces strike back. Thirty-three suspected terrorists are captured a series of raids around Baghdad. They include what military sources describe as two high value targets.

U.S. and Iraqi forces also announced Iraqi troops had captured Ammar al-Zabaidi, a key aid to suspected terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. More on that from Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: U.S. Officials say they have captured the man who planned several bomb attacks that hit Baghdad April 29, part of a wave of rising violence. There is hope the arrest will bring them closer to getting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian- born terrorist leader responsible for months of violence.

Inside the U.S. military, growing worry about the deadly rise in car bombs and suicide attacks. U.S. officials now estimate nearly 30 Iraqi civilians and security forces have been killed in the last 10 days.

But officials insist their information is getting better, that each arrest now gives them more intelligence and more tips about Zarqawi.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That intelligence allows you to plan future operations which, after conducting those operations, also gives you more intelligence. It's a virtual cycle that has permitted us of late to take down a significant part of the Zarqawi network.

STARR: The latest arrest came in Baghdad a few days ago but was not immediately announced. Mohammad Hamza al-Zabaidi is described by the U.S. as a prominent figure in the Zarqawi organization.

When U.S. troops grabbed him, they got documents detailing the April insurgent attacks against Abu Ghraib prison and plans to assassinate a prominent Iraqi government official in the days ahead. The U.S. is not saying the name of that official.

The U.S. military also is trying to convince many people that Zarqawi is not 10 feet tall, in the words of one official. A U.S. military press release is taking the unprecedented step of detailing statements from Zarqawi's driver when he was arrested back in February. The press release saying the driver told interrogators, quote, "Zarqawi became hysterical" while he was trying to escape on February 20. Of course, there is no way for us to corroborate that information from the U.S. military.

Barbara Starr, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: U.S. forces have suffered more casualties on the battlefield. Two soldiers assigned to a Marine combat team were killed near Kaldiya (ph), just east of Ramadi. They were killed in a roadside bomb explosion.

A similar blast killed one soldier and wounded another in Samarra, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.

Those latest deaths pushed the U.S. troop casualties past 1,600. To date, 1,601 American forces have been killed in the Iraq war.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi national assembly approves six names to fill vacant cabinet positions. Four of the six posts went to Sunni Arabs. But one, tapped to be human rights minister, turned it down. He said he was against the idea of cabinet positions being allocated on the basis of religious or ethic affiliation. Sunnis also have the defense and industries ministries.

The transitional prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafari, says he's considering submitting a woman's name for the remaining deputy prime minister post.

Some pretty rugged weather today is whipping across Texas, where there's a threat of hail and high winds. CNN's Jacqui Jeras joins us latest from the Lone Star State. Or at least, the picture on the Lone Star State.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much, Jacqui.

Well, it's Mother's Day and the best gift you could possibly give most career moms is more time with their children. Well, that's actually something moms could be giving themselves every day. Oh really, you say? Well, we'll be asking an executive with Careerbuilder.com about her ideas.

And still ahead, how the No Child Left Behind program is changing America's school districts and not always for the better.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Well, if you're honoring your mom today, chances are good that you're honoring a mom who works outside the home. Surveys show that more than half of all American mothers with infants are in the work force. In two-parent families with kids under 18, two-thirds of mothers are employed. Working mothers report having less than an hour a day of personal time, down from 1.6 hours a day back in 1977. How can they make the most of that precious time? Mary Delaney is the chief sales officer for Careerbuilder.com. She is also a mother of three.

Happy Mother's Day to you.

MARY DELANEY, CAREERBUILDER.COM: Thank you. Happy Mother's Day to you, as well.

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much. I'll be taking copious notes as a new mom of a 3-month-old. I wonder if a lot of career moms all feel the same. They're asking themselves, do they want more money? Do they want more time? Do they want more power? What seems to be the resounding answer?

DELANEY: Well, I think the survey results this year showed that working mothers today want more than anything to get the time to be home with their children more.

In today's environments, both jobs are more strenuous than they were in years past. We've all heard about the productivity per employee increasing over the last few years with the advent of technology, e-mail. And at home, we all know that our children's lives are busier than they were when we were growing up.

So 38 percent of the women we surveyed said that they would take a pay cut if they could have more time at home with their kids -- with their children.

WHITFIELD: So you talk about kids who are being overscheduled. You know, older kids are overscheduled, being involved in so many activities. That means moms and dads are overscheduled, as well. What's your best advice on how moms can kind of carve out more time for themselves so they have more than just an hour these days on average of personal time?

DELANEY: A couple ideas. One is at work, keep a calendar that has work and personal time on it. That allows you to be able to look ahead and make sure that you're not scheduling a meeting at the same time you have a daughter tea or a soccer game that you don't want to miss.

Another one would be to make sure that you schedule individual time for each one of your children. It's the quality time versus the quantity time for working mothers. And to make sure you're at the very significant events. Save up some vacation time.

WHITFIELD: And, you know, when you talk about significant events like some of the firsts or some of the last opportunities to witness something that your child involved in, it seems as though a lot of working moms might have a difficult time trying to express that to their superiors, their bosses about why it's important for them to be able to carve out that extra vacation time for those firsts or for those lasts. DELANEY: I think that's the great news of the survey results. Three quarters of all the women surveyed said that their companies have been flexible and recognize the talent pool that the working mother pool has and that they have allowed for flexible arrangements or work from home. Actually...

WHITFIELD: So it's important for those moms, perhaps, to really express and articulate those things and not be embarrassed about expressing to their bosses that this is why I want to take this time off?

DELANEY: It is. I do it all the time and people also share that with me. I remember last year around Mother's Day, three months ahead I received a meeting for our leadership group to go to Tucson for a board meeting and it happened to be the day of the mother-daughter tea. And because it was three months in advance, we just e-mailed back and explained and they gladly changed it. And I think that is what's reflective of what the women said in the survey.

WHITFIELD: And I've heard moms who have said they can be better employees if they are equipped to be better moms. Mary Delaney...

DELANEY: That's correct.

WHITFIELD: ... Careerbuilder.com. Thanks so much.

DELANEY: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And happy Mother's Day again.

Well, he used hip-hop to become a media mogul. Now Russell Simmons wants to help the next generation gain their financial freedom. My conversation with him straight ahead.

Also up next, she survived the Holocaust and found a new life in America. But what is Isabella Leitner's (ph) greatest victory over Hitler? I'll speak with her when CNN continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Across Europe, the end of the fighting in World War I is a cause for celebration but for survivors, Germany's surrender meant starting over and a lifetime of painful memories.

CNN's John Vause reports from Jerusalem.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came not to celebrate but to remember, those who somehow survived not just the war but the Holocaust. Six thousand of them from around the world with their children and grandchildren at Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

Rabbi Leslie Hardman, now 92, was a British army chaplain. In 1945 he was at the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany. RABBI LESLIE HARDMAN, FORMER BRITISH ARMY CHAPLAIN: Then I walked around and another 50 bodies lying there and another 20 bodies lying there. Hundreds of them, hundreds of them.

VAUSE: He remembers the mass graves, the German officers who were made to bury those they'd killed.

HARDMAN: They brought them to the edge of the pit. And then they slung them down. I'm not used to this. I said because let's have a little bit more respect, a little honor of the dead.

And so one of the majors said to me, he said, "Padre, we've got to get them under the ground. Otherwise, we'll all suffer from typhus."

VAUSE: Lying, among the dead, Howard Kleinberg, sick with typhus, 18 years old. He'd given up on life.

HOWARD KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Many, many people like myself felt satisfied to die at this moment because you saw the end of this cruelty.

VAUSE: Sixty years later, for Rabbi Hardman, a miracle.

HARDMAN: To me, it's a wonder (ph). It's like the resurrection of the dead.

VAUSE: A resurrection at the hands of a teenage girl, Nancy, the woman who would later become Howard Kleinberg's wife.

H. KLEINBERG: From nowhere, three women appear, two elderly women and one young girl. And I hear between themselves debating when this young girl says, "I'm going to save him." And the others are saying, "He is dead. What are you going to do?"

NANCY KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: We took him in. He was sleeping always. Every day. He couldn't go down to bed. I don't know. He couldn't do nothing. The food went in and the food went out. And he kept saying, "I want a doctor."

VAUSE: Eventually he was taken to a military hospital, but the two became separated. Then, two years later in Toronto, they found each other and married.

(on camera) For many who survived the Nazi concentration camps, the end of the war in Europe was not a time for celebrations. Though ill and malnourished, soon they would find out how many family and friends had died.

Most had lost their homes, possessions and personal wealth. The future was anything but certain.

(voice-over) Like many others, Nancy Kleinberg says liberation was the lowest point of her life.

N. KLEINBERG: I'll tell you why. I walked the streets crying, because there was nobody around.

When I was in the camp, I was young. I had a lot of courage, and I was always hoping that maybe tomorrow would be better. Somehow I always thought a little light in the tunnel. Not big. Just small, tiny, little.

And all of a sudden, I find myself all alone. Nobody around. I would have given everything. I felt guilty that I survived. You know? And not my parents. Not my brother. Nobody.

VAUSE: In the days after liberating Bergen-Belsen, Rabbi Hardman held a service. To this day, he remembers the sermon.

HARDMAN: If all the skies in the world were turned into paper, and all the waters in the seas were turned into ink, and all the trees in the world were transformed into pens, we would still have insufficient material with which to describe the horrors and the sufferings of these people.

VAUSE: And on this day, a reminder that even from the darkest suffering can come compassion, love and happiness.

John Vause, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Today's date holds a special meaning for Isabella Leitner. After escaping a Nazi concentration camp, she and her two sisters arrived in the United States 60 years ago today. They were the first survivors of Auschwitz to set foot in the U.S.

Isabella Leitner joins me now from New York to share this very amazing story.

Good to se you, Ms. Leitner, and happy Mother's Day to you.

ISABELLA LEITNER, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Thank you so much.

WHITFIELD: Well, what is it like celebrating this Mother's Day on a day that you also marked the anniversary 60 years ago to this day coming to the U.S. with your two sisters?

LEITNER: May I read a statement that I wrote?

WHITFIELD: Absolutely.

LEITNER: Could I do that?

On V.E. Day, May 8, 1945, the very day Hitler's war ended, the merchant marine ship S.S. Brandhootlock (ph), after five weeks in a submarine infested seas, sailed into the sun-lit harbor of Newport news, Virginia. Two days later, in Baltimore, Maryland, the ship discharged its never before seen cargo, the first survivors of Auschwitz.

My two sisters, now the diseased, and myself in our battered beings, we carried the innocent, charred souls of the millions of children, their mothers, fathers, and all of their kin.

And America, I thank you for putting your healing arms around our weeping hearts.

WHITFIELD: Oh, Mrs. Leitner, thank you so much for sharing that with us.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: I know this is something you have been sharing over the years in your writings. Your experience, something you and your sisters and family experienced.

So often Holocaust survivors don't want to talk about it. It's just too painful. How is it that you bring yourself to share these very emotional, poignant moments with the public?

LEITNER: I have a very important mission in life. It's to share -- to tell the tale. To leave it behind me in -- for history. I want the young people to learn what we have gone through, painful as it is for me to hurt them with such stories.

Nonetheless, they have to listen and take warning and see to a future that is much better than the one I lived through. And I suffer the consequences, the emotional consequences for all my life. I have. I am going to be...





FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, HOST: The most wanted man in Iraq has one fewer aide today. We'll tell you who Iraqi security forces have captured.

As one war rages on in the Middle East, another war is remembered on another continent. Details on how President Bush remembered the fallen, straight ahead.

Hello and welcome to CNN LIVE SUNDAY. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. All that and more after a look at the headlines.

Australia's top Muslim cleric has offered to go to Baghdad to negotiate the release of an Australian man taken hostage by Iraqi militants. The cleric made the offer in hopes of securing the release of engineer Douglas Wood. On Friday, Wood's kidnappers issued a 72- hour deadline for Australia to begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq.

The Senate Foreign Relations chairman says his panel will probably approve a controversial ambassador nominee. Senator Richard Lugar says John Bolton's nomination could go to the full Senate by the end of the week. Bolton has drawn criticism for his fiery temperament and past treatment of subordinates.

Gas prices edge lower. The average for a gallon of sell serve regular fell three cents over the past two weeks to $2.21. That makes a total drop of 7.5 cents during the past month, according to the Lundberg survey.

President Bush is in Moscow this evening, preparing for tomorrow's huge celebrations marking the end of the World War II in Europe. Also on his agenda, current U.S. relations with Russia. At a time when the U.S. needs a strong ally in the war on terror, there are growing U.S. concerns that Russia is reducing its own commitment to democratic reforms.

For more, we turn to CNN Moscow bureau chief, Jill Dougherty -- Jill.

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, presidents Putin and Bush has a 45-minute discussion out at the Dach (ph), the country house of President Putin. And in that brief time, they were able to get through a number of issues.

In fact, just a few minutes ago we had a briefing by Steve Hadley, who is the national security adviser for President Bush. He said they discussed Iran, North Korea, both countries, of course, with nuclear programs. The WTO, the World Trade Organization that Russia wants to join.

And then finally, another issue which has been bedeviling this relationship over the past couple of months, and that is the issue of democracy and what the Bush administration alleges is backsliding on democracy by President Putin.

The victory celebration, 60th anniversary of the victory over fascism in World War II, Hadley said put World War II back in focus. And President Bush, as he put it, wants a full treatment so that includes not only the question of not only the issue that Russia paid dearly for this victory, 27 million people killed, but also, that President Bush wanted to talk about what happened after the war and what the Soviet Union did.

Finally, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, said that all of this was in the course of a very good relationship between two men who can talk about virtually anything with each other.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECRETARY OF STATE: This is an excellent relationship between these two men at a personal level and also as presidents of these two great countries. I believe they believe -- they feel that they can discuss anything. I would characterize the relationship as absolutely straight forward. They say what they think. They say what they mean, and then they act on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGHERTY: And they both obviously like antique cars. Because President Putin took out his antique car, a white one and put President Bush at the wheel. Got a turn to speed or drive around the complex out there outside of Moscow -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Jill Dougherty, thanks so much.

Well, President Bush began his day in the Netherlands, where he placed a wreath at a cemetery for Americans who died while fighting Nazi Germany. In his remarks, Mr. Bush linked the battle against Nazi Germany to the current war on terror, and he said the U.S. and Europe are working to bring freedom to places where, in his words, it has long denied.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The world's tyrants learned a lesson. There is no power like the power of freedom. And no soldier as strong as a soldier who fights for that freedom.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Other observances for the 60th anniversary of V.E. Day now. In Paris, French president Jacque Chirac laid flowers and relit the flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as jets flew over, streaming the colors of the French flag.

The mood was especially somber in Berlin. German leaders attended a cathedral service there before a wreath laying ceremony at a memorial to victims of the Nazis and the war.

And in Washington, D.C., the allied victory was celebrated with music and remembrances at the World War II memorial. Decorated war hero and former senator Bob Dole was there to deliver the keynote address.

In Iraq, U.S. forces strike back. Thirty-three suspected terrorists are captured a series of raids around Baghdad. They include what military sources describe as two high value targets.

U.S. and Iraqi forces also announced Iraqi troops had captured Ammar al-Zabaidi, a key aid to suspected terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. More on that from Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: U.S. Officials say they have captured the man who planned several bomb attacks that hit Baghdad April 29, part of a wave of rising violence. There is hope the arrest will bring them closer to getting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian- born terrorist leader responsible for months of violence.

Inside the U.S. military, growing worry about the deadly rise in car bombs and suicide attacks. U.S. officials now estimate nearly 30 Iraqi civilians and security forces have been killed in the last 10 days. But officials insist their information is getting better, that each arrest now gives them more intelligence and more tips about Zarqawi.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That intelligence allows you to plan future operations which, after conducting those operations, also gives you more intelligence. It's a virtual cycle that has permitted us of late to take down a significant part of the Zarqawi network.

STARR: The latest arrest came in Baghdad a few days ago but was not immediately announced. Mohammad Hamza al-Zabaidi is described by the U.S. as a prominent figure in the Zarqawi organization.

When U.S. troops grabbed him, they got documents detailing the April insurgent attacks against Abu Ghraib prison and plans to assassinate a prominent Iraqi government official in the days ahead. The U.S. is not saying the name of that official.

The U.S. military also is trying to convince many people that Zarqawi is not 10 feet tall, in the words of one official. A U.S. military press release is taking the unprecedented step of detailing statements from Zarqawi's driver when he was arrested back in February.

The press release saying the driver told interrogators, quote, "Zarqawi became hysterical" while he was trying to escape on February 20. Of course, there is no way for us to corroborate that information from the U.S. military.

Barbara Starr, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: U.S. forces have suffered more casualties on the battlefield. Two soldiers assigned to a Marine combat team were killed near Kaldiya (ph), just east of Ramadi. They were killed in a roadside bomb explosion.

A similar blast killed one soldier and wounded another in Samarra, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.

Those latest deaths pushed the U.S. troop casualties past 1,600. To date, 1,601 American forces have been killed in the Iraq war.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi national assembly approves six names to fill vacant cabinet positions. Four of the six posts went to Sunni Arabs. But one, tapped to be human rights minister, turned it down. He said he was against the idea of cabinet positions being allocated on the basis of religious or ethic affiliation. Sunnis also have the defense and industries ministries.

The transitional prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafari, says he's considering submitting a woman's name for the remaining deputy prime minister post.

Some pretty rugged weather today is whipping across Texas, where there's a threat of hail and high winds. CNN's Jacqui Jeras joins us latest from the Lone Star State. Or at least, the picture on the Lone Star State.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much, Jacqui.

Well, it's Mother's Day and the best gift you could possibly give most career moms is more time with their children. Well, that's actually something moms could be giving themselves every day. Oh really, you say? Well, we'll be asking an executive with Careerbuilder.com about her ideas.

And still ahead, how the No Child Left Behind program is changing America's school districts and not always for the better.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Well, if you're honoring your mom today, chances are good that you're honoring a mom who works outside the home. Surveys show that more than half of all American mothers with infants are in the work force. In two-parent families with kids under 18, two-thirds of mothers are employed.

Working mothers report having less than an hour a day of personal time, down from 1.6 hours a day back in 1977. How can they make the most of that precious time? Mary Delaney is the chief sales officer for Careerbuilder.com. She is also a mother of three.

Happy Mother's Day to you.

MARY DELANEY, CAREERBUILDER.COM: Thank you. Happy Mother's Day to you, as well.

WHITFIELD: Thanks so much. I'll be taking copious notes as a new mom of a 3-month-old. I wonder if a lot of career moms all feel the same. They're asking themselves, do they want more money? Do they want more time? Do they want more power? What seems to be the resounding answer?

DELANEY: Well, I think the survey results this year showed that working mothers today want more than anything to get the time to be home with their children more.

In today's environments, both jobs are more strenuous than they were in years past. We've all heard about the productivity per employee increasing over the last few years with the advent of technology, e-mail. And at home, we all know that our children's lives are busier than they were when we were growing up.

So 38 percent of the women we surveyed said that they would take a pay cut if they could have more time at home with their kids -- with their children.

WHITFIELD: So you talk about kids who are being overscheduled. You know, older kids are overscheduled, being involved in so many activities. That means moms and dads are overscheduled, as well. What's your best advice on how moms can kind of carve out more time for themselves so they have more than just an hour these days on average of personal time?

DELANEY: A couple ideas. One is at work, keep a calendar that has work and personal time on it. That allows you to be able to look ahead and make sure that you're not scheduling a meeting at the same time you have a daughter tea or a soccer game that you don't want to miss.

Another one would be to make sure that you schedule individual time for each one of your children. It's the quality time versus the quantity time for working mothers. And to make sure you're at the very significant events. Save up some vacation time.

WHITFIELD: And, you know, when you talk about significant events like some of the firsts or some of the last opportunities to witness something that your child involved in, it seems as though a lot of working moms might have a difficult time trying to express that to their superiors, their bosses about why it's important for them to be able to carve out that extra vacation time for those firsts or for those lasts.

DELANEY: I think that's the great news of the survey results. Three quarters of all the women surveyed said that their companies have been flexible and recognize the talent pool that the working mother pool has and that they have allowed for flexible arrangements or work from home. Actually...

WHITFIELD: So it's important for those moms, perhaps, to really express and articulate those things and not be embarrassed about expressing to their bosses that this is why I want to take this time off?

DELANEY: It is. I do it all the time and people also share that with me. I remember last year around Mother's Day, three months ahead I received a meeting for our leadership group to go to Tucson for a board meeting and it happened to be the day of the mother-daughter tea. And because it was three months in advance, we just e-mailed back and explained and they gladly changed it. And I think that is what's reflective of what the women said in the survey.

WHITFIELD: And I've heard moms who have said they can be better employees if they are equipped to be better moms. Mary Delaney...

DELANEY: That's correct.

WHITFIELD: ... Careerbuilder.com. Thanks so much.

DELANEY: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And happy Mother's Day again.

Well, he used hip-hop to become a media mogul. Now Russell Simmons wants to help the next generation gain their financial freedom. My conversation with him straight ahead. Also up next, she survived the Holocaust and found a new life in America. But what is Isabella Leitner's (ph) greatest victory over Hitler? I'll speak with her when CNN continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Across Europe, the end of the fighting in World War I is a cause for celebration but for survivors, Germany's surrender meant starting over and a lifetime of painful memories.

CNN's John Vause reports from Jerusalem.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came not to celebrate but to remember, those who somehow survived not just the war but the Holocaust. Six thousand of them from around the world with their children and grandchildren at Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

Rabbi Leslie Hardman, now 92, was a British army chaplain. In 1945 he was at the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany.

RABBI LESLIE HARDMAN, FORMER BRITISH ARMY CHAPLAIN: Then I walked around and another 50 bodies lying there and another 20 bodies lying there. Hundreds of them, hundreds of them.

VAUSE: He remembers the mass graves, the German officers who were made to bury those they'd killed.

HARDMAN: They brought them to the edge of the pit. And then they slung them down. I'm not used to this. I said because let's have a little bit more respect, a little honor of the dead.

And so one of the majors said to me, he said, "Padre, we've got to get them under the ground. Otherwise, we'll all suffer from typhus."

VAUSE: Lying, among the dead, Howard Kleinberg, sick with typhus, 18 years old. He'd given up on life.

HOWARD KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Many, many people like myself felt satisfied to die at this moment because you saw the end of this cruelty.

VAUSE: Sixty years later, for Rabbi Hardman, a miracle.

HARDMAN: To me, it's a wonder (ph). It's like the resurrection of the dead.

VAUSE: A resurrection at the hands of a teenage girl, Nancy, the woman who would later become Howard Kleinberg's wife.

H. KLEINBERG: From nowhere, three women appear, two elderly women and one young girl. And I hear between themselves debating when this young girl says, "I'm going to save him." And the others are saying, "He is dead. What are you going to do?"

NANCY KLEINBERG, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: We took him in. He was sleeping always. Every day. He couldn't go down to bed. I don't know. He couldn't do nothing. The food went in and the food went out. And he kept saying, "I want a doctor."

VAUSE: Eventually he was taken to a military hospital, but the two became separated. Then, two years later in Toronto, they found each other and married.

(on camera) For many who survived the Nazi concentration camps, the end of the war in Europe was not a time for celebrations. Though ill and malnourished, soon they would find out how many family and friends had died.

Most had lost their homes, possessions and personal wealth. The future was anything but certain.

(voice-over) Like many others, Nancy Kleinberg says liberation was the lowest point of her life.

N. KLEINBERG: I'll tell you why. I walked the streets crying, because there was nobody around.

When I was in the camp, I was young. I had a lot of courage, and I was always hoping that maybe tomorrow would be better. Somehow I always thought a little light in the tunnel. Not big. Just small, tiny, little.

And all of a sudden, I find myself all alone. Nobody around. I would have given everything. I felt guilty that I survived. You know? And not my parents. Not my brother. Nobody.

VAUSE: In the days after liberating Bergen-Belsen, Rabbi Hardman held a service. To this day, he remembers the sermon.

HARDMAN: If all the skies in the world were turned into paper, and all the waters in the seas were turned into ink, and all the trees in the world were transformed into pens, we would still have insufficient material with which to describe the horrors and the sufferings of these people.

VAUSE: And on this day, a reminder that even from the darkest suffering can come compassion, love and happiness.

John Vause, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Today's date holds a special meaning for Isabella Leitner. After escaping a Nazi concentration camp, she and her two sisters arrived in the United States 60 years ago today. They were the first survivors of Auschwitz to set foot in the U.S.

Isabella Leitner joins me now from New York to share this very amazing story. Good to se you, Ms. Leitner, and happy Mother's Day to you.

ISABELLA LEITNER, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: Thank you so much.

WHITFIELD: Well, what is it like celebrating this Mother's Day on a day that you also marked the anniversary 60 years ago to this day coming to the U.S. with your two sisters?

LEITNER: May I read a statement that I wrote?

WHITFIELD: Absolutely.

LEITNER: Could I do that?

On V.E. Day, May 8, 1945, the very day Hitler's war ended, the merchant marine ship S.S. Brandhootlock (ph), after five weeks in a submarine infested seas, sailed into the sun-lit harbor of Newport news, Virginia. Two days later, in Baltimore, Maryland, the ship discharged its never before seen cargo, the first survivors of Auschwitz.

My two sisters, now the diseased, and myself in our battered beings, we carried the innocent, charred souls of the millions of children, their mothers, fathers, and all of their kin.

And America, I thank you for putting your healing arms around our weeping hearts.

WHITFIELD: Oh, Mrs. Leitner, thank you so much for sharing that with us.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: I know this is something you have been sharing over the years in your writings. Your experience, something you and your sisters and family experienced.

So often Holocaust survivors don't want to talk about it. It's just too painful. How is it that you bring yourself to share these very emotional, poignant moments with the public?

LEITNER: I have a very important mission in life. It's to share -- to tell the tale. To leave it behind me in -- for history. I want the young people to learn what we have gone through, painful as it is for me to hurt them with such stories.

Nonetheless, they have to listen and take warning and see to a future that is much better than the one I lived through. And I suffer the consequences, the emotional consequences for all my life. I have. I am going to be 84-years-old in just about 25 days. And less than that -- and this month as a matter of fact. And I cannot come to terms with anything about the Holocaust. Such insanity I have not known, nor I hope will anyone know. But the world is pretty unkind.

WHITIFELD: And Isabella Leitner, thank you so much for sharing your story with us. And happy birthday in advance. With your birthday coming up in less than 25 days.

LEITNER: 28th of the month.

WHITFIELD: OK. And happy birthday to you. And I understand that, you know, you look at your sons Peter and Richard on this Mother's Day and every day and you say to yourself that they really are -- do exemplify the greatest victory over Hitler.

LEITNER: Over Hitler, indeed.

WHITFIELD: Well, thank you so much for joining us. And Happy Mother's day to you.

LEITNER: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: And we will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: An update now on some familiar faces.

For the last eight years, Jill Dougherty has served as CNN's Moscow bureau chief. After covering the V-E Day celebrations on Monday, she is leaving Moscow to take up new duties for CNN in Hong Kong.

John King has covered the White House for CNN since 1999. And although he'll continue to report for us from Washington and around the world, this is his last trip inside what we call the White House bubble.

We thought this would be a great time to ask Jill and John to reflect on their years covering their respective beats starting with their first impressions of the men currently in charge at the White House and the Kremlin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): The first time that I saw Vladimir Putin up close was actually in the Kremlin. It was a round table discussion with a small number of foreign journalists. And I sat right next to him. And we sat there for three and-a-half hours as he answered questions in great detail.

And I think that as I watched him over the years, that is the one thing, he appears to me to be a person of great self control and discipline. And that comes out in the way that he governs.

JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): The most interesting thing about President Bush in the early days was how determined he was to essentially ignore the election results. He had come to office under extremely controversial circumstances. He had lost the popular vote. And yet he came out of the box saying he was not going to back down and he was going to push the sweeping tax cut through the Congress. In the early days, we saw what's his now trademark. Be bold. Throw deep. Don't compromise early. If you're going to compromise, wait as late in the process as you can. It was definitely a surprise how well Bush and Putin got along in the beginning.

DOUGHERTY: Definitely did not expect them to get along as well as they did. And I was in Slovenia at their very first meeting in Ljubljana.

KING: When they first met and they had a long walk in Slovenia, and Bush comes to the microphone.

DOUGHERTY: And I remember when President Bush said...

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I looked the man in the eye, I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. And we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul.

DOUGHERTY: It was electric. When people, and especially I reacted in an amazing way.

KING: It was quite controversial. It was very telling of how Bush does business.

DOUGHERTY: Now, that has changed over the years between the two men. But they still seem to be able to talk to each other pretty straight ahead.

KING: It is a tough question to ask what is George W. Bush's greatest foreign relations accomplishment. Had there not be an Iraq war, you could say on this day that his greatest accomplishment was responding to September 11, rallying the world to his cause.

BUSH: What is your name? I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you.

KING: Kicking out the Taliban and helping Afghanistan take its early steps toward a democracy.

DOUGHERTY: I think Putin's greatest foreign policy achievement was one moment, it was September 11.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA (through translator): I want to say to the American people, we are with you. We fully share and feel your pain.

DOUGHERTY: He was a first international leader to call up George Bush and express solidarity after the attacks on 9/11.

KING: There's no question the greatest miscue, miscalculation was Iraq. And the number of troops, how long it would take, how long U.S. troops would be there to the atmosphere in which the troops would be living, they were wrong.

DOUGHERTY: I think President Bush and President Putin will continue to say the right things about their relationship. They will continue to say that they have a warm and productive personal relationship.

KING: Bush and Putin have made the relationship bigger than any differences. Will that sustain itself? I think Bush certainly hopes so. And from everything he said in public, I think Putin hopes so.

DOUGHERTY: I came here first as a student in 1969. And I never in my wildest dreams ever, ever believed that the Soviet system could crumble.

I ended up covering the end of the Soviet Union at the White House. It happened December 25, 1991. That's Christmas Day. I was new at the White House as a correspondent. So, that happened to be the day that the president, President Gorbachev resigned as Soviet president. And that's technically the day that the Soviet Union ended.

And I can remember standing on the lawn of the White House.

Now that he has resigned.

And thinking, I was almost in shock, because I could not believe what I was reporting. That the Soviet Union, the U.S.S.R. was collapsing.

This is a great country. And it's been around for a thousand years. So, it's going to define it one way or the another, but it's going to be an important country in the world for, I think, the rest of our lifetimes.

KING: I make jokes about it, because it's hard -- it is hard for me to -- it's hard for me to acknowledge sometimes that -- that's it. It's been almost eight years. This will be the last trip.

78, 79 countries that I would not have seen or at least not have seen so quickly. That's pretty amazing and extraordinary. And it's been a privilege.

You get to see moments in history. And remembering that leaders meet and you watch pictures of war on TV, but there are people who live in those places.

The kids in the Kosovo camps and the kids I saw after the tsunami are images that is are more important to me than any leader shaking hands. It's been a pretty amazing ride. It's been a pretty amazing ride.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And they've both done an amazing job.

Well, why would financial guru Susie Ormand be going on a hip hop tour. Or better yet, why is hip hop's Russell Simmons making a new financial commitment? Hear about Simmons, inventive, music and money mission coming up next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Media mogul Rusell Simmons is on a mission, taking the hip hop generation to another level, teaching young people financial empowerment. Earlier I spoke with him. And he explains his new tour coming to a major city near you.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RUSSELL SIMMONS, HIP HOP SUMMIT ACTION NETWORK: Kids get in so much trouble, because of their lack of information. And all these resources are available right in their face. And so, if we can give the kids easy opportunities, or just tell them about the easy opportunities and resources that are already around them, make a big difference if their lives.

WHITFIELD: Susie Ormand, you know, talks about empowerment through her books, through television shows as you mentioned, and you even introduce folks to a prepaid Visa card. It sounds as though you are trying to target the younger audience, the younger folks who generally feel like they know how to spend money and want to think about think and her now, but now you are talking about reconditioning a whole mind set, aren't you, along with Susie Ormand and others? To try to encourage kids it's important to pay off credit card debt and save money.

SIMMONS: Well, this whole idea is one I learned from my UniRush financial service company. It's not only a prepaid debit card, we have a virtual bank account. And the fact is that because these 60 million Americans don't have bank accounts, they have to go check cashing places, get robbed. And then go to online and pay their bills.

And then they don't start a process of rebuilding their credit. They don't start a process of connecting to the world. You can't rent a hotel room, you can't rent a car, you can't use the Internet. You're locked out of the world.

So, I learned that. And then learned all the predatory practices. You know? The loans that they get that they have to pay back in one week and they pay 500, 800 percent on the loans. Or just so many ways to take advantage of the people that need the most. They pay the most.

WHITFIELD: And that's how you're trying to send the message to a lot of these folks? That, you know, they're getting taken advantage of. They're getting ripped off as they think they're doing the right thing and the most accessible thing?

SIMMONS: Well, a lot of times they don't even think they're doing the right thing.

We just need -- the core to this that the rappers always -- Eminem and Fantasia and all the rappers who have success, Lil' Jon -- the core, there's a spiritual component of having ideas of abundance versus scarcity, you know? We're fighting poverty and ignorance in the hip hop community. And poverty in American, a great part of it is a mind set. And we need kids to take the first steps.

You know, the whole idea of hard work and dedication, they watch these rappers bling-bling and they think they didn't work. But Eminem can tell you a story to inspire you about how he became successful. So can Lil Jon or any rapper can get on the stage and tell you, I worked my butt off and I was very dedicated and I didn't give up.

And these are kinds of ideas that, you know, I was happier at work than I was sitting at home. You know, these basic ideas that come out of the mouths -- we did St. Louis with Nelly. We did L.A. with Snoop Dogg. We did Eminem twice in Detroit before. We did Philadelphia with Will Smith. We have been all over the country -- New York with Puffy and Jay-Z.

So we've been all over the country to hip hop summit. And we find that the kids -- you know, you can quote the scripture all day, the Torah, the Bible, the Koran, the whole -- your Buddhist scripture, the yoga -- you can do all that all day long and a lot of kids will not listen.

But if 50 Cent tells you that the Rockfeller drug laws are no good, that Governor Pataki changes the laws. And that's the truth. And that's what hip hop is doing all over the country, they're speaking the language of young people and inspiring them to do good things.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: The tour with Russell Simmons and money guru Susie Ormand and singers Eminem and Fantasia starts in Detroit next Saturday, May 14 and runs through November.

The No Child Left Behind program is supposed to reform schools, but students, teachers and parents aren't so sure that it's working. In this excerpt from "High Stakes: The Battle To Save Our Schools," "CNN PRESENTS" reports that some children are left far behind. And test scores don't add up.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BUSH: Our economy's the envy of the world. Unfortunately, our schools are not.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As governor, George W. Bush was determined to improve student achievement and reduce dropout rates in schools across Texas. He implemented statewide reforms including mandatory testing. and he said he would hold school officials accountable for rising test scores.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we have got our top scores...

BUSH: Bush found a kindred spirit in Houston superintendent Rod Paige.

ROD PAIGE, FMR. HOUSTON SUPERINTENDENT: We know how to make organizations work. And the same thing is true for schools. The idea is to link performance and contribution, and incentives.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Principals who could show rising test scores on the Texas assessment of Knowledge and Skills or TAKS, could get bonuses of up to $5,000. For district superintendents, bonuses could rise to $20,000.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You all of a sudden saw many schools with 40 to 45 percent pass rate on the TAKS go up to 90 percent the very next year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The fast rising test scores hailed as the Houston Miracle, but the miracle was not what it seemed, thousands of students were actually dropping out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One day, I was informed that a report had been turned in to the district from my high school and our principal reported zero dropouts. Well, I knew that was impossible. Because I had seen over 400 students leave that year and many told me they dropped out. I saw many assistant principals tell students to quit school, to get out, go withdraw.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Another strategy to make the statistics tell a good story, according to Kimball, was for officials to retain students in ninth grade so they would haven't to take the TAKS test in tenth grade.

In 2000, there were 1,160 ninth grade students at Austin High School. But the next year, only 257 made it to the tenth grade. And what was happening at Austin High was happening at schools across the district.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Award winning filmmaker Stanley Nelson goes in depth in this documentary. And you can see it tonight at 8:00 Eastern. "CNN PRESENTS High Stakes: The Battle to Save our Schools."

Carol Lin is here with a preview of what's ahead on more of CNN LIVE SUNDAY -- Carol?

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Well Fred, there might be a bit of fire and brimstone at a North Carolina church service today. You probably heard about the story about the conservative pastor who basically asked the Democratic members who voted for the Democrats in the last presidential race to leave the church. All right? Well, they went to church today with their attorneys, Fred. So, that's coming up in the next hour.

WHITFIELD: All right. Look forward to that. Thanks a lot, Carol.

Also coming up, they're mothers and they're HIV positive. But that's not stopping these South African women from taking charge of their lives. Find out how they're now helping AIDS victims here in the United States.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: On this Mother's Day, hope for a group of HIV positive mothers from half way around the world. These women from South Africa have learned to live with the truth of their virus and to help others like them do the same through the so-called Mother's Program. Now they're in New York learning one more lesson, they're not alone. Here's CNN's Alina Cho.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A walk through the streets of New York is a dream for these women. None of them would be here were it not for an awful fact, they are mothers living with HIV.

QUEEN MDA, HIV-POSITIVE MOTHER: HIV? What is HIV? I had this disease. It's a killer.

CHO: Queen and her friends Babala (ph) and Miki learned they were HIV positive while they were pregnant three years ago. They live in South Africa where 25 percent of all pregnant women have HIV.

DR. MITCHELL BESSER, FOUNDER, MOTHER'S PROGRAMMES: I mean, it's an epidemic of Biblical proportions. Communities are disappearing.

CHO: Dr. Mitch Besser moved from to Cape Town from the U.S. five years ago. He founded a group called Mother's Programme. The goal is to teach these women how to take care of themselves and their children.

BESSER: They know how to take their medicine, they know how to feed their babies. Most important, they're able to disclose their status to family members and partners without fear.

CHO: Miki was so angry when she found out she was HIV positive, she refused to get help. After her baby tested positive, she changed her ways.

(on camera): You seem so happy.

MIKI NTELWA, HIV-POSITIVE MOTHER: Yes. I'm happy. Because I know is that what I was singing is that this virus for me is just a blessing in disguise. Yes. Because my life is still going on and I see so many places because of this virus.

CHO (voice-over): The women now work as counselors for Mother's Programmes. They're in New York to talk to women here who have had similar experiences, like 43-year-old Annette.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like so many two different worlds away, but yeah, we're going through the same thing.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

CHO: These women had never been to New York before, had never been on a plane. Now that they're here...

(on camera: You'll be in New York for a week. After a week, are you going to want to go home?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

CHO (voice-over): A Mother's Day none of these women will soon forget.

Alina Cho, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And from AIDS to Autism, find out how a mother is using the power of pictures to change the hearts and minds of those who don't understand the disease. Carol Lin is next with that story, plus all the day's top headlines. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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