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CNN Live Today

Power Outages, Water Shortages, Constant Threat of Terrorism Routine in Iraq; Talk With Breast Cancer Survivor Who Braved Heights of Mount Rainier

Aired July 28, 2005 - 11:30   ET

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

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: A look at our top stories now.
Discovery docked with the space station several hours ago. Over the next several days, NASA engineers will pour over images of the shuttle's protective skin, looking for any signs of damage that would jeopardize its re-entry. All future shuttle flights are canceled until NASA solves the problem of foam insulation breaking off Discovery's fuel tank during lift-off on Tuesday.

In Ireland, the Irish Republican Army is not disbanding, but its leaders say they are giving up on armed conflict. The order to disarm took effect just minutes ago, with a statement from the Sinn Fein leader, Gerry Adams.

Egypt's long-time president says he will run for re-election in September against other candidates. Hosni Mubarak has never faced an opponent since he was first elected back in 1981. Multi-candidate elections were approved by Egyptian voters just this past May during a referendum.

A bill that aims to promote free trade with Central America is on its way to the White House for President Bush's signature. CAFTA barely survived yesterday's House vote of 217 to 215, after the president's direct lobbying on the Hill. Many opponents denounced it as a job killer in the U.S. The Senate approved CAFTA back in June.

Turning, now, to the Korean peninsula and the six-way talks under way in Beijing, aimed at persuading North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions. For the third time since those talks resumed on Monday, U.S. and North Korean negotiators have met one-on-one.

Observers noted that today's meeting lasted three hours, which was longer than their two previous get-togethers. U.S. envoy Christopher Hill said, "The purpose of the one-on-one talks is to hear what North Korea wants and look for areas where the six-way negotiations can move forward."

There is growing noise on Capitol Hill for an exit timetable from Iraq. More lawmakers of both parties are lining up behind a House bill that would require the president to come up with a withdrawal plan and then stick to it.

The proposal picked up momentum yesterday when the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq suggested U.S. troops might begin pulling out by next spring if Iraq's political and security situation improves. Iraq's transportation system came under attack, today, by insurgents. A bomb exploded along railroad tracks in southern Baghdad, setting a train's fuel tanker car on fire. The blast killed two people and wounded four.

Elsewhere, two U.S. soldiers were killed, today, by a roadside bomb in northern Baghdad, and the military says a soldier died yesterday in a vehicle accident.

Power outages, water shortages, and the constant threat of terrorism, all have become routine in Iraq. CNN's Aneesh Raman has the story of an Iraqi family living their lives despite odds.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A typical morning in a typical Baghdad household. Adel's up for work at 7:00, his routine six days a week. He makes $180 a month as an accountant. In a country suffering from crippling unemployment, he's one of the lucky few.

His wife, Intissar, has already been awake for an hour making breakfast. The two married in 1993. A year later, they had their eldest boy, Farouk (ph), now 11, with Mohammed (ph) and Abdul (ph) soon to follow. For mom, the days start with the worries about the basics.

INTISSAR SALIH, MOTHER (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): All Iraqis are suffering from water and electricity. And if it gets cut off, that means today will be a hard day for me.

RAMAN: For dad, there's fear. The boys gather around as he heads for the office. Here, any good-bye, even the most routine, is never easy.

ADEL SALIH, FATHER (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): The first feeling, when I go into the street, I think of what might happen, explosions, car bombs, IEDs going off all of a sudden. You leave your home and might not be back.

RAMAN: But life goes on. Minds adapt. And for three brothers on summer break, the task is universal, playing in the small confines of the back yard.

(on-screen): Every family in Iraq is dealing with the situation in different ways, but most try and find the time, as often as they can, to get away from it all, at secluded parks like this one.

(voice-over): Given the violence, they don't go out often. But here, everything a kid could want, everything a Baghdad mother could, as well.

I. SALIH (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): I feel so happy when I see my sons happy. They are growing up and seeing nothing, except war and explosions. They always feel scared. We need to do something to make them forget. RAMAN: The Salihs live just beyond Fardus Square, the place where Saddam's statue came crumbling down two years ago along with his regime. That day they joined in a celebration.

A. SALIH (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): People thought it was a good thing. They wanted to get rid the former regime, its oppression. But failure has created reactions among the people. They had hopes, but we're disappointed.

RAMAN: Despite the hours Adel spends waiting in line for gas, despite Intissar's brother being wrongfully killed, she says, at a military checkpoint, there is a powerful will to keep going. It wasn't their war, but it is now.

A. SALIH (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): If we are afraid, life comes to a standstill and we help the enemies realize their objectives. They want to paralyze life. We make life. We have to go out to live a normal life.

RAMAN: In many respects, they are an average middle-class family. But in one important way, they are not. Adel is a Sunni, Intissar a Shiite, in a country where the two groups are struggling to unify. For both, the only thing that matters is that they're Iraqi.

Aneesh Raman, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Other stories making news overseas.

A U.S. military investigation has linked a dust storm and crew disorientation to a helicopter crash in Afghanistan last April. All 18 on board were killed. The helicopter was transporting passengers and supplies between bases when it went down. The storm had winds of more than 50 miles per hour.

In India, monsoon rains have caused flooding and landslides. The city of Mumbai is one of the country's hardest-hit areas. More than 400 people have died, and the death toll is expected to rise from there.

Floodwaters have started going down in some places. Hundreds of people are returning to their homes after spending two nights stranded in offices, buses, cars, trains, and airports.

In Mexico, the Volcano of Fire put on quite a show in Colima on Wednesday. The eruption shot rock, ash, lava, and steam nearly 9,000 feet into the air. The volcano has had several strong explosions in recent months, but officials say that's normal. It's located about 430 miles west of Mexico City.

Call it a high-class hand-me-down. Elizabeth Taylor, Sharon stone, and Barbra Streisand have all taken a turn in the Graffiti AIDS gown. More than 300 women from around the world have donned the famous frock. The dress made its debut in Bolivia on Monday. It symbolizes the fight against AIDS. The dress will be auctioned next year. It's expected to rake in more than $2 million.

A frightening possibility. What could be another case of mad cow disease, here in the United States. We'll have details on that coming up.

And climbing against the odds. Breast cancer survivors brave one of the world's tallest peaks. I'll be speaking to one of these courageous climbers when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: You're looking at a live picture right now of the Cobb's Creek area in Philadelphia. And there, you're seeing a formation of the Philadelphia police, who are about to launch a detailed search of this grassy area. They're looking for a missing pregnant woman.

Twenty-four-year-old LaToya Figueroa is five-and-a-half months pregnant. She's been missing since July 18, or at least that was the last time that anyone remembers seeing her. And this search has been ongoing, now, for a couple of weeks, now. Even the Citizens Crime Commission of Delaware Valley has gotten involved.

And they are now helping in the search by offering a $10,000 reward for any information leading to this pregnant woman. Her family has been just agonized over the last couple of weeks, as the search has been going on, wondering what happened to her. The last time they remember seeing her, she was heading to a doctor's appointment. More on that when we get it.

A 12-year-old cow that died after having complications while giving birth is suspected of having mad cow disease. U.S. agriculture officials say more tests of the cow's brain tissue are needed. They stress the animal never became part of the U.S. beef supply and poses no threat. Officials have not identified the farm where it died. Two positive cases of mad cow have been confirmed in the U.S. since 2003.

Climbing a mountain might be a fitting metaphor for battling breast cancer. But for nearly 40 women who took part in the Climb Against the Odds, it was more than a metaphor. The climb up Mount Rainier, in Washington, was a chance to raise money for, and awareness about, breast cancer.

Leigh Henman is a breast cancer survivor who braved the heights of Mount Rainier, and she joins us, now, from San Francisco for our daily dose of health news.

Good to see you, Leigh.

LEIGH HENMAN, BREAST CANCER SURVIVOR: Hi.

WHITFIELD: Well, how are you feeling these days, by the way?

HENMAN: I feel great. Much warmer than last week at this time.

WHITFIELD: Oh, well, that's fantastic. And you really did an extraordinary feat, challenging yourself to take on Mount Rainier after taking on the challenges of treatment of breast cancer. How did this come about?

HENMAN: I was diagnosed just about two years ago, and I was familiar with Breast Cancer Fund, and after I finished treatment, I became more familiar with them and the environmental problems we have with causes of breast cancer. And I believed in the cause, and heard about the climb, and decided to take on the challenge.

WHITFIELD: And this life-threatening experience that you encountered also had you reflecting on what else you could do with your life after becoming a survivor. And joining these other women with this retreat -- and this really is a challenge that the Breast Cancer Fund has been doing since 1995. Give us an idea of what your experience was like.

HENMAN: It was coming together of, as you said, 40 women and a lot of support staff. A lot of people's different experiences. And how, really, we just have to tackle each phase one step at a time. That's the metaphor of climbing a mountain.

It's a challenge. You face unexpected obstacles in doing it. And it was great to meet people and share a common experience, and then a common goal, to get up the mountain.

WHITFIELD: And along the way, here, you had already experienced what you probably may have thought was the worst set of adversities ever encountered. Yet during the climb, you encountered another form of adversity, didn't you, in the form of weather?

HENMAN: Yes, we did. Very unexpected. It was a winter blizzard with extreme winds and very low temperatures and a very steep mountain you that really can't see anything at all. The majority of the climb was in the dark and then a whiteout blizzard. So it was a bit more of a challenge than I thought we were in for.

WHITFIELD: And through it all, all of you climbers exceeded your goals of raising money for the Breast Cancer Fund. On average, something like $9,000 was raised per climber, right?

HENMAN: That's correct.

WHITFIELD: And how are you seeing that money perhaps helping towards the improvement of any research or awareness? How is that money being used?

HENMAN: The Breast Cancer Fund specifically targets identifying and advocating for the elimination of toxic chemicals in our everyday products, cleaning products, cosmetics. You know, all the household things that we're all exposed to every day.

And that's really where their funds and their money goes. For legislation and awareness to the community at large. So that's where our funds are being spent.

WHITFIELD: Leigh Henman, thanks so much for joining us. And congratulations on making the climb of Mount Rainier, and congratulations on continued good health.

HENMAN: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: Well, get your daily dose of health news online at our web site. You'll find the latest medical stories, special reports, and a health library. The address is CNN.com/health.

And we'll have a check of the weather and business coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: Well this just in, a federal judge hands down a 75- year sentence to a Yemeni cleric who once called himself Osama bin- Laden's spiritual adviser. He, of course, this man, by the name of Sheik Mohammed Ali Hassan, said to the federal judge, earlier, "Your honor, what have I done?"

And apparently, he's a 57-year-old man who was secretly recorded, promising to funnel more than $2 million to Hamas in a meeting with two FBI informants in a German hotel room. He was arrested by German police back in January of 2003 and then extradited to the United States.

So now, a federal judge has now handed him a 75-year sentence. And apparently, the judge then invoking and reminding the courtroom of the devastation of the September the 11th terror attacks and a suicide bombing in Israel to help justify that 75-year sentence.

Now, we want to go on to our business and check in with Susan Lisovicz, who has a check from Wall Street -- Susan?

SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Fredricka. Well, you know, we had another slow start, but bulls, the bulls, right now, have the upper hand once again. Investors have a batch of corporate earnings to peruse, including results from Starbucks and Daimler- Chrysler.

In economic news, the latest weekly jobless report showed a slight increase in claims, but that was less than expected. Right now, the Dow Industrials are up 45 points. The NASDAQ, meanwhile, is up a quarter of 1 percent.

Exxon-Mobile shares are about a third of a percent lower, despite the fact that the oil giant turned in a sharply higher profit in the latest quarter, thanks, of course, to a surge in oil and gas prices.

And as Congress appears set to pass a major energy bill, the Environmental Protection Agency reportedly made an 11th hour decision to withhold a report that shows a decline in fuel efficiency. According to the "New York Times," the report was supposed to be released today, but the EPA decided to delay the release until next week.

But the newspaper inadvertently received a copy of the report that shows a 2004 model vehicle was less fuel-efficient than the average new automobile in the 1980s. The report says the improvements in engine technology have been mostly used to make cars faster and heavier.

The EPA report also says fuel economy is directly related to energy security because consumer cars and trucks account for about 40 percent of the nation's oil consumption. The "Times" says the EPA denies that the delay is tied to the energy legislation pending before congress.

And that is some fuel for thought and the latest from Wall Street. Now back to Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Thanks so much, Susan.

Well, I'm Fredricka Whitfield. International news is coming up next. Stay tuned for "Your World Today," after a quick break.

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