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Pittsburgh Hosting the G-20 Summit; G-20 Leaders to Discuss Recession Prevention; Israeli Prime Minister Addresses U.N.; Terror Suspect Indicted on WMD Charge; Potential HIV Vaccine on Horizon?

Aired September 24, 2009 - 13:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: We are pushing forward from New York City to Pittsburgh. One global forum to another. President Obama prepares to put aside the world's conflicts, gripes, divisions and zero in on issue number one.

Phil Sparkman asked questions in school as a substitute teacher and door-to-door as a Census worker in Kentucky. Now his death is the biggest question of all.

And we're pushing forward on a first in the fight against AIDS. A vaccine that's actually prevented the virus in some, not all, but some of the human subjects who tested it.

Hello, everyone, I'm Kyra Phillips, live in the CNN world headquarters in Atlanta. And you're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

Well, it's another big day on the world stage. Make that stages. We are waiting right now for a speech by the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to the U.N. General Assembly. He has a lot to talk about, including last night's tirade by the president of Iran, and you'll hear him live, start to finish, right here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

And then all eyes are on Pittsburgh. Yes, Pittsburgh. The onetime buckle of the rust belt, now a glittering, green, high-tech host of the G-20 economic summit. President Obama arrives from New York about 2-1/2 hours from now.

So, good-bye, New York. Hello, Pittsburgh. That's a city that gave you the Ohio River, and is the central -- or the center, rather, of the global economic universe today and tomorrow. The leaders from the G-20, the word's most powerful economies, will talk about the worldwide recession and how to avoid a sequel. It's been about five months since the last G-20 summit in London. Things seemed closer to the brink then.

CNN's senior White House correspondent, Ed Henry, is in the burgh right now.

Ed, do you think that the tone's going to be a bit different this time around?

ED HENRY, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Oh, Yes, Kyra. I remember in the air in London the last time these leaders got together. There was fear in the air. Fear around the world of the possibility that a global recession could become a global depression. Now in the air here in Pittsburgh is the hopes -- and I stress the hopes -- that maybe there's a recovery that's starting to come back. But there's also a lot of concern about whether or not these leaders are going to come together and make sure that they put together some sort of framework to prevent a future crisis.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When these 20 leaders last met it was spring in London and the global recession was still catching fire. But as President Obama wrapped up his first big moment on the international stage, he declared they were putting out the flames.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We finished a very productive summit. There will be, I believe, a turning point in our pursuit of global economic recovery.

HENRY: Five months later, there are signs the recession is coming to a close. But unemployment is still sky high. Helping to fuel protesters already waiting for the leaders in Pittsburgh.

The president acknowledged to CNN's John King that unemployment may get worse in the next few months, which is why he will be pushing his counterparts to sign on to a specific pledge to make the global economy more balanced.

OBAMA: We can't go back to the era where the Chinese or the Germans or other countries just are selling everything to us and we're taking a bunch of credit card debt or home equity loans but we're not selling anything to them.

HENRY: But getting the Chinese to sign on will be difficult especially after Mr. Obama slapped a tariff on Chinese tires, which raised questions about whether leaders are reneging on free trade promises they made in London.

STEVEN SCHRAGE, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: So is the United States going to be standing up and stopping the slippage or is it going to be further pushing the world downward towards trade conflicts and possibly a downward spiral of new types of protectionism.

HENRY: Another potential dispute, European leaders continue to push hard for a crackdown on bonuses paid to bankers.

ANGELA MERKEL, GERMAN CHANCELLOR: We have to reach something on areas of compensation.

HENRY: And while Mr. Obama last week reiterated his call for broader reform of Wall Street, his hand has been weakened by inaction in Washington.

SCHRAGE: The U.S. is really handicapped by the fact that its own reforms haven't gotten out of Congress. So while, you know, they can talk about these broad reforms, until the United States has really acted, it's hard for them to really set the course.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY: Now, to give you an idea of the gravity of the financial crisis, this is the third time in just the last year that these 20 leaders have come together. The most meetings they've had in some time.

It gives you an idea of how concerned they've been in recent months, but also there's now a lot of talk around the world that maybe the G-20 will not get together in the months ahead if they can't prove that they can actually get some action going, and that's why there's a lot riding on this summit to show they can follow-up on the promises they've made in the past - Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, that brings up a good point. I mean, just thinking back to the other summits, has there ever been a moment where there was a big decision, a big breakthrough, something that -- we were talking about this this this morning in the meeting and nobody could really pinpoint anything that's been groundbreaking out of these.

HENRY: Good point. If you think back to last November, in the waning days of the Bush administration, these leaders got together in Washington. And even though the crisis was really -- just really exploding, they were kind of slow to react. They had not really reacted very quickly.

And so I think that look back to London five months ago, there was action there. These leaders came together and poured billions more into the global economy. There's no telling what would have happened if they had not done that, but they also made a lot of promises in April in London about coming up with a framework, some sort of new structure, new rules of the road to make sure that you can't -- it's not the wild west on Wall Street anymore. And if you think back in the last five months, a lot of momentum for the reform has died down.

And so it's going to be key now for them this week to show that those were not just words and empty promises back in April. That they're actually going to follow through now - Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Got it.

Ed Henry, thank you so much.

So the G-20, who is in it and why?

Here's the answer.

The finance ministers and central bank governors of 19 powerful countries, plus the European Union. It was set up in 1999 for two reasons, really, to respond to financial meltdowns like the one we're seeing right now and living through right now, and to give countries with growing economies like India and China, a voice in the global economy. First meeting was actually in Berlin.

So why is the G-20 meeting in the city of three rivers?

Well, why not?

Pittsburgh is a city that lived by the steel and nearly died by it, but, hey, it transformed itself from a dirty, 20th century, one- trick manufacturing pony to a 21st century, diverse and environmentally-friendly economy. It's a model other G-20 countries are actually trying to copy. Pittsburgh, envy. Plus, come on, they've got the "Steelers," too. Great football team.

All right, this also comes with the G-20 protests. They have been going on all week, and Pittsburgh police think that thousands of people will be demonstrating tomorrow. The protesters target mostly big companies and organizations that they claim are all about greed and exploitation and warfare.

And look who is banging the gavel at the U.N. Security Council meeting.

Check this out.

President Obama, now the first U.S. president, get there in a minute, to chair one of those meetings. He focused on nuclear weapons, clearly with Iran and North Korea in mind. There you go. He added that he isn't singling out any one country, but standing up for all countries that live up to their nuclear responsibilities.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: It reflects the agenda I outlined in Prague, and builds on a consensus that all nations have the right to peaceful nuclear energy, that nations with nuclear weapons have the responsibility to move toward disarmament and those without them have the responsibility to forsake them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Now, before he heads to Pittsburgh, President Obama co-chairs a meeting with British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. The aim there is bringing together the friends of Pakistan.

A Bedouin tent leaves Bedford, New York, and Donald Trump is left to clean up the mess, metaphorically speaking. News cameras shot through the trees of a lavish trump property in Westchester County, where Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi had tried to rent digs while visiting the U.N.

He's already been turned down in New Jersey, Central Park, and the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

Take you now to the U.N. live, Benjamin Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel, speaking.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, PRIME MINISTER OF ISRAEL: The United Nations recognized the rights of the Jews, an ancient people 3,500 years old, to a state of their own in their ancestral homeland. I stand here today as the prime minister of Israel, the Jewish state. And I speak to you on behalf of my country and my people.

The United Nations was founded after the carnage of World War II, after the horrors of the holocaust. It was charged with preventing the reoccurrence of such horrendous events. Nothing has undermined that mission, nothing has impeded it more, than the systematic assault on the truth.

Yesterday, the president of Iran stood at this very podium, spewing his latest anti-Semitic rants. Just a few days earlier, he, again, claimed that the Holocaust is a lie.

Last month, I went to a villa in a suburb of Berlin called Wannsee. There, on January 20th, 1942, after a hearty meal, senior Nazi officials met and decided to exterminate my people. They left detailed meetings -- or minutes of that meeting, and these minutes have been preserved for posterity by successive German governments.

Here is a copy of the minutes of the meeting of senior Nazi officials instructing the Nazi government exactly how to carry out the extermination of the Jewish people. Is this protocol a lie? Is the German government, all German governments, lying?

The day before I was Wannsee, I was given in Berlin the original construction plans for the Auschwitz Buchenwald concentration camp. These plans -- these plans of the Auschwitz Buchenwald concentration plans, I now hold in my hand. They contain a signature by Heinrich Himmler, Hitler's deputy himself. Are these plans of the Auschwitz Buchenwald concentration camp, where one million Jews were murdered, are they a lie, too?

This June, President Obama visited another concentration camp, one of many. The Buchenwald Concentration Camp. Did President Obama pay tribute to a lie? And what of the Auschwitz survivors whose arms still bear the tattooed numbers branded on them by the Nazis? Are those tattoos a lie, too?

One-third of all Jews perished in the great conflagration of the Holocaust. Nearly every Jewish family was affected, including my own. My wife's grandparents, her father's two sisters and his three brothers and all the aunts and uncles and cousins, all murdered by the Nazis.

Is this a lie?

Yesterday, the man who calls the Holocaust a lie spoke from this podium. To those who refused to come and to those who left in protest, I commend you. You stood up for moral clarity, and you brought honor to your countries. But to those who gave this holocaust denier a hearing, I say on behalf of my people, the Jewish people, and decent people everywhere, have you no shame? Have you no decency? A mere six decades after the Holocaust, you give legitimacy to a man who denies the murder of 6 million Jews? While promising to wipe out the state of Israel, the state of the Jews? What a disgrace. What a mockery of the charter of the United Nations.

Now, perhaps - perhaps some of you think that this man and his odious regime, perhaps they threaten only the Jews. Well, if you think that, you're wrong - dead wrong. History has shown us time and time again that what starts with attacks on the Jews eventually ends up engulfing many, many others, for this Iranian regime is fueled by an extreme fundamentalism that burst on to the world scene three decades ago after lying dormant for centuries.

In the past 30 years, this fanaticism has swept across the globe with a murderous violence that knows no bounds and with a cold-blooded impartiality in the choice of its victims. It has callously slaughtered Muslims and Christians, Jews and Hindus, and many others. Though it is comprised of different offshoots, the adherence of this unforgiving creed seek to return humanity to medieval times. Wherever they can, they impose a backward, regimented society where women, minorities, gays, or anyone else deemed not to be a true believer, is brutally subjugated.

The struggle against this fanaticism does not pit faith against faith nor civilization against civilization. It pits civilization against barbarism, the 21st Century against the 9th Century, those who sanctify life against those who glorify death.

Now, the primitivism of the 9th Century are to be no match for the progress of the 21st Century. The allure of freedom, the power of technology, the reach of communications should surely win the day. Ultimately, the past cannot triumph over the future, and our future offers all nations magnificent bounties of hope, because the pace of progress is growing, and it is growing exponentially.

It took us centuries to get from the printing press to the telephone, decades to get from the telephone to the personal computer, and only a few years to get from the personal computer to the internet. What seemed impossible a few years ago is already outdated, and we can scarcely fathom the changes that are yet to come. We will crack the genetic code, we will cure the incurable, we will lengthen our lives, we will find a cheap alternative to fossil fuel and, yes, we will clean up the planet.

I'm proud that my country, Israel, is at the forefront of many of these advances, in science and technology, in medicine and biology, in agriculture and water, in energy and the environment. These innovations, in my country and many of your countries, offer humanity a sunlit future of unimagined promise. But if the most primitive fanaticism can acquire the most deadly weapons, the march of history could be reversed for a time. And like the belated victory over the Nazis, the forces of progress and freedom, they will prevail only after a horrific toll of blood and fortune has been exacted from mankind.

This is why the greatest threat facing the world today is the marriage between religious fundamentalism and the weapons of mass destruction. The most urgent challenge facing this body today is to prevent the tyrants of Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Are the members of the United Nations up to that challenge? Will the international community confront a despotism that terrorizes its own people as they bravely stand up for freedom? Will it take action against the dictators who stole an election in broad daylight and then gunned down Iranian protesters who died in the sidewalks, on the street, choking on their own blood? Will the international community thwart the world's most pernicious sponsor and practitioner of terrorism? Above all, will the international community stop the terrorist regime of Iran from developing atomic weapons, thereby endangering the peace of the entire world?

The people of Iran are courageously standing up to this regime. People of goodwill around the world stand with them, as do thousands of people who have been protesting and demonstrating outside this hall all of this week. Will the United Nations stand by their side?

Well, ladies and gentlemen, the jury's still out on the United Nations. And recent signs - recent signs are not encouraging. Rather than condemning the terrorists and their Iranian patrons, some here in the United Nations have condemned their victims.

This is exactly what a recent UN report on Gaza did, falsely equating terrorists with those they targeted. For eight long years Hamas fired rockets - fired those rockets from Gaza on nearby Israeli citizens - and citizens, thousands of missiles, mortars, hurling down from the sky on schools, on homes, shopping centers, bus stops - Years after - year after year as these missiles were deliberately fired on our civilians, not a single - not one UN resolution was passed condemning those criminal attacks. We heard nothing, absolutely nothing, from the UN Human Rights Council - a misnamed institution if there ever was one.

In 2005, hoping to advance peace, Israel unilaterally withdrew from every inch of Gaza. It was very painful. We dismantled 21 settlements, really, bedroom communities, and farms. We uprooted over 8,000 Israelis. We just yanked them out from their homes. We did this because many in Israel believed that this would get peace.

Well, we didn't get peace. Instead, we got an Iranian-backed terror base 50 miles from Tel Aviv. But life in the Israeli towns and cities immediately next to Gaza became nothing less than a nightmare. You see, the Hamas rocket launchers and the rocket attacks not only continued after we left, they actually increased dramatically. They increased tenfold. And, again, the UN was silent - absolutely silent.

Well, finally, after eight years of this unremitting assault, Israel was forced to respond - but how should we have responded? Well, there's only one example in history of thousands of rockets being fired on a country's civilian population. This happened when the Nazis rocketed British cities during World War II. During that war, the Allies leveled German cities, causing hundreds of thousands of casualties. I'm not passing judgment. I'm stating a fact, a fact that is the product of the decision of great and honorable men - the leaders of Britain and the United States, fighting an evil force in World War II.

It is also a fact that Israel chose to respond differently. Faced with an enemy committing a double war crime, of firing on civilians while hiding behind civilians, Israel sought to conduct surgical strikes directed against the rocket launchers themselves. Now, mind you, that was no easy task because the terrorists were fighting missiles - firing their missiles from homes and from schools. They were using mosques as weapons depots, as missile caches, and they were ferreting explosives in ambulances.

Israel, by contrast, tried to minimize casualties by urging Palestinian civilians to vacate the targeted areas. We dropped countless flyers - they cannot be counted, there were so many, obviously - countless flyers over their homes. We sent thousands and thousands of text messages to the Palestinian residents. We made thousands and thousands of cellular phone calls, urging them to vacate, to leave. Never has a country gone to such extraordinary lengths to remove the enemy's civilian population from harm's way, yet faced with an absolutely clear-cut case of aggressor and victim, who do you think the United Nations Human Rights Council decided to condemn? Israel.

A democracy legitimately defending itself against terror is morally hanged, drawn, and quartered and given an unfair trial to boot. By these twisted standards, the UN Human Rights Council would have dragged Roosevelt and Churchill to the dock as war criminals. What a perversion of truth. What a perversion of justice.

Now, delegates of the United Nations, and the governments whom you represent, you have a decision to make. Will you accept this farce? Because if you do, the United Nations would revert to its darkest days, when the worst violators of human rights sat in judgment against the law-abiding democracies, when Zionism was equated with racism, and when an automatic majority could be mustered to declare that the earth is flat.

If you had to choose a date when the United Nations began its descent, almost a freefall, and lost the respect of many thoughtful people in the international community, it was that decision in 1975 to equate Zionism with racism.

Now this body has a choice to make. If it does not reject this biased report, it would vitiate itself, it would begin - or re-begin the process of vitiating itself from its own relevance and importance. But it would do something else. It would send a message to the terrorists everywhere saying terrorism pays. All you have to do is launch your attacks from densely populated areas, and you will win immunity.

And then a third thing, in condemning Israel this body would also deal a mortal blow to peace. Let me explain why. When Israel left Gaza, many hoped that the missile attacks would stop. Others believed that even if they don't stop, at the very least Israel would have made this gesture - extraordinary gesture - for peace. But it would have international legitimacy to exercise its right of self defense if peace failed. What legitimacy? What self-defense? The same U.N. that cheered Israel as we left Gaza, the same U.N. that promised to back our right of self-defense now accuses us, my people, my country, of being war criminals. And for what? For acting responsibly in self-defense? For acting in a way that any country would act with a restraint unmatched by many.

What a travesty. Ladies and gentlemen, Israel justly defended itself against terror. This biased and unjust report provides a clear-cut test for all governments. Will you stand with Israel? Or will you stand with the terrorists? We must know the answer to that question now. Now, not later.

Because if Israel is again asked to take more risk for peace, we must know today that you will stand with us tomorrow. Only if we have the confidence that we can defend ourselves can we take further risks for peace. And make no mistake about it, all of Israel wants peace. Anytime an Arab leader genuinely wanted peace with us, we made peace. We made peace with Egypt led by Anwar Sadat. We made peace with Jordan led by King Hussein.

And if the Palestinians truly want peace, I and my government and my people will make peace. But we want a genuine peace, a defensible peace, a permanent peace.

In 1947 this body voted to establish two states for two peoples, a Jewish state and an Arab state. The Jews accepted this resolution. The Arabs rejected it and invaded the embryonic Jewish state with the hopes of annihilating it. We asked the Palestinians to finally do what they refused to do for 62 years, say yes to a Jewish state. As simple, as clear, as elementary as that. Just as we are asked to recognize a nation-state for the Palestinian people, the Palestinians must be asked to recognize the nation-state of the Jewish people.

The Jewish people are not foreign conquerers in the land of Israel. It is the land of our forefathers. Inscribed on the walls outside this building is the great biblical vision of peace: "Nation shall not lift up sword against nation. They shall learn war no more." These words were spoken by the great Jewish prophet Isaiah 2,800 years ago as he walked in my country, in my city, in the hills of Judea and in the streets of Jerusalem.

We are not strangers to this land. This is our homeland. But as deeply connected as we are to our homeland, we also recognize that the Palestinians also live there. And they want a home of their own. We want to live side by side with them, two free peoples living in peace, living in prosperity, living in dignity.

(APPLAUSE)

NETANYAHU: Peace, prosperity and dignity require one other element. We must have security. The Palestinians should have all the powers to govern themselves, except a handful of powers that could endanger Israel, and this is why the Palestinian state must be effectively demilitarized. I say effectively because we don't want another Gaza or another south Lebanon, another Iranian-backed terror base abutting Jerusalem and perched on the hills a few kilometers from Tel Aviv.

We want peace. And I believe that with good will and with hard work, such a peace can be achieved. But it requires, from all of us, to roll back the forces of terror led by Iran that seek to destroy peace, that seek to eliminate Israel and to overthrow the world order. The question facing the international community is whether it is prepared to confront those forces or to accommodate them.

Over 70 years ago, Winston Churchill amended what he called -- he called it the confirmed unteachability of mankind. And by that, he meant the unfortunate habit of civilized societies to sleep and to slumber until danger nearly overtakes them. Churchill bemoaned what he called -- I'm reading -- "the want of foresight, the unwillingness to act when action will be simple and effective, the lack of clear thinking, the confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong."

Ladies and gentlemen, I speak here today in the hope that Churchill's assessment of the unteachability of mankind is for once proven wrong. I speak here today in the hope that we can learn from history, that we can prevent danger in time. In the spirit of the timeless words spoken to Joshua over 3,000 years ago, let us be strong and of good courage. Let us confront this peril, secure our future, and, God willing, forge an enduring peace for generations to come.

(SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE) Thank you very much.

PHILLIPS: Well, there's definitely no disputing who Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was talking to. It wasn't just to us or the U.N. General Assembly. The prime minister was talking directly to Iran's president, the man who continues to denies the horrors of the Holocaust. So Netanyahu, as you heard there, reminded him, reminded all of us how brutal that part of history was. And no surprise here, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was a no-show, the Iranian delegation seats empty. Just like the Israeli delegation last night when Iran's president gave his U.N. address.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD, PRESIDENT OF IRAN (through translator): Oppression and military aggression must be stopped. Regrettably, official reports concerning the brutalities of the Zionist regime in Gaza have not all been published. The secretary-general and the United Nations have crucial responsibilities in this respect, and the international community is impatiently waiting for the punishment of the aggressors and the murderers of the defenseless people of Gaza.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: That is the anti-Semitic rant that Netanyahu was referring to. So, what does this tension between Israel and Iran mean to us here in the U.S.? Let's ask international security analyst Jim Walsh. He's in New York. And in D.C., intelligence analyst, Reva Bhalla. Jim, let me start with you. I mean, when you've got Palestinians walking out, you've got no-shows by Iran. When Iran's president speaks, you've got no-shows by the Israelis. You know, how do you achieve anything when people are walking out, and how do you even have an effective U.N. General Assembly? It's just like a big photo-op and forum for people to spew?

JIM WALSH, RESEARCH ASSOCIATE IN SECURITY STUDIES, MIT: You're right, Kyra, and in the various audiences that you mentioned that were for this speech, one that you left out was the citizens back home in both countries. Because Netanyahu's speech aimed not only at Iran or others, but aimed at the voters back home. Similarly, Ahmadinejad's speech last night aimed at Iranians back home.

And, you're right, they're talking past each other. Prime Minister Netanyahu did not mention the settlements. No one expected him to talk about that. And, of course, Ahmadinejad did not talk about the disputed election and what many believe was a stolen election, and whether stolen or not, the violence that accompanied the aftermath of that election.

It was easier for both to focus on the problems of the others. For Iran to play the Israel card, because Israel is not popular in the Middle East. And, of course, for Israel to do the same. And, of course, Israel had to respond after Ahmadinejad called them out. Naturally anyone in that position would have responded. But easier to talk past each other, to talk about the past, to talk about the Holocaust, than dealing with the real problems we have right now, staring us in the face.

PHILLIPS: So, Reva, how do you make something like this effective? Because it doesn't look like anything is going to come out of this when it comes to how Iran feels about Israel, Israel feels about Iran, and therein lies the U.S. How does all of that affect us?

REVA BHALLA, INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: It's essentially a crisis. If you look at what Netanyahu said, he was basically saying in a nutshell that he does not trust the United Nations Security Council to protect Israel's national security interests. And if you look at what Ahmadinejad said yesterday, he reiterated that Iran will not bend to Western demands to curb its nuclear program.

And that's where things get especially complicated. In the lead- up to the October 1st talk with the P-5 plus one, Iran has not given any indication yet that it's willing to give concessions, real concessions, that would satisfy Israel. And that doesn't leave Israel with very many options.

PHILLIPS: Now, one thing -- so, you've got this finger-pointing back and forth. There really hasn't been anything achieved by Ahmadinejad in his address and now you're hearing Netanyahu and how he feels about Iran. OK, the threat, one of the main threats everybody is so concerned about, nukes. Let's take a listen to what Ahmadinejad said about that last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) AHMADINEJAD (through translator): There are those who export billions of dollars of arms annually. Stockpile chemical and biological weapons, as well as nuclear weapons. Establish military bases or have military presence in other countries while accusing others of militarism, and mobilize all their resources in the world to impede the scientific and technological progress of other nations under the pretext of countering arms proliferation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: So, Reva, OK, talking about nukes, how do you take Iran seriously when Iran just continually downplays this as a threat?

BHALLA: You know, this may seem like the same old routine, where the West threatens sanctions, Iran flouts deadlines, stretches the negotiations and then you're back to where we started. But this time around, there are a lot of things happening that could actually break the nuclear impasse. And the key to that is Israel.

Not too long ago, Israel publicized that Washington had promised Israel crippling sanctions against Iran. So far, Iran is showing that they're not going to take those negotiations seriously. And if not, Israel is saying it's going to have to take things into its own hands, and that time is up.

And so, you can kind of see a collision course forming as all of these different tensions are building up. And also, Israel understands the Russia factor. You know, Russia has its own beef with the United States in trying to get Washington to recognize its influence in the former Soviet periphery, and the U.S. hasn't given Russia what it wants.

And so Russia actually maintains very critical leverage over Iran. Not only can it bust the sanctions regime apart, the sanctions against the gasoline imports, but also it can provide critical defense systems to Iran that would complicate a military strike down the road. So, Israel really doesn't see much value in delaying this much longer.

PHILLIPS: Jim, final thoughts?

WALSH: Well, I'm not so as pessimistic as Reva. I mean, clearly there are big obstacles ahead to these discussions. But we shouldn't prejudge that nothing's going to happen from it because then you're going to get the thing you predict.

Ahmadinejad in a meeting with "The Washington Post" yesterday offered some new ideas that had previously not been heard. Of course, they're not going to say, we're making concessions. No politician's going to come out and advertise their concessions.

But they are, you know, President Obama offered a very good response. He said, we're doing our part. We're reducing the nuclear danger. We want to see other countries doing the same. In that framework, there's more wiggle room, and there may be greater possibilities for some sort of resolution. Who is in the middle on this? You asked this before, Kyra. The U.S. is in the middle on this, and they're the ones trying to resolve it.

PHILLIPS: Jim Walsh, Reva Bhalla, great discussion. Thanks, guys.

WALSH: Thank you.

BHALLA: Thank you.

PHILLIPS: A suspected terrorist ringleader now accused in a WMD conspiracy. What was this man allegedly planning to do? Prosecutors now playing hardball.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Blowing up bombs, not just any bombs, but weapons of mass destruction. That's what an airport shuttle driver is now accused of plotting right here in the U.S. Najibullah Zazi was indicted in New York on far more serious charges than the ones he faced when he was first arrested hundreds of miles away. But Zazi's two alleged co-conspirators, his father in the middle, a Muslim cleric on the right, are allowed out on bond.

Deb Feyerick live in New York. Deb, a lot of new developments, some pretty frightening new developments in this case.

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, because Najibullah Zazi has been charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction. He is in Denver. He will be brought here to New York within the next 24 hours, we are being told.

Reading through the indictment, Kyra, makes some very interesting reading. In the summer of 2009, according to investigators, Zazi went to a beauty supply store in the Denver area with other people, and he bought large quantities of industrial-strength peroxide and acetone.

Now, in the indictment, it also alleges in the days before he left Denver to come to New York, he actually checked into a hotel room that had a stove. And what's interesting about that, is that investigators later found traces of the acetone in a stove vent.

Now, during the time he was in the hotel, he made a series of calls on his cell phone, apparently with greater frequency, quote, "seeking to correct seeking to correct mixtures of ingredients to mix explosives." He also needed the answers right away. Not clear, according to papers, as to who was on the other line of that call. But we are told that he did also look for locations of Home Depots, improvement stores here in the Queens area before arriving.

Now, as for the imam, he was actually released or he's going to be released on $1.5 million bond. The imam was accused of making false statements and possibly even tipping off Zazi to the fact that he was under surveillance. But he is going to be released sometime today. His mom, his dad and his brother, all who own restaurants in Virginia, putting up the money to secure his release and make sure that he will show up in court as expected. But really, the big news, Najibullah Zazi, who has now been indicted for conspiracy with others to use weapons of mass destruction -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Wow. Well, we'll continue to follow up on the investigation with you.

Deb Feyerick, thanks so much.

After years and years of trying, a possible breakthrough in the fight against HIV and AIDS. We're going to get a live report from our senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen.

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PHILLIPS: Is it a breakthrough in the fight against AIDS? A lot of buzz today about an experimental vaccine. CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joining us now from Washington. Elizabeth, let's talk more about this and how exciting it is for researchers and for anyone dealing with this.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Oh, Kyra, absolutely. I mean, they have been trying to get a vaccine against HIV for more than two decades, and some said it was going so poorly that it was just not going to happen ever. But in this trial, which was run by the U.S. military and by the government of Thailand, among others, they found that folks who got the HIV vaccine were 31 percent less likely to get HIV.

So, let me tell you about what they did. They took 16,000 study subjects in Thailand who did not have HIV, and half of them got a vaccine, and half of them didn't. The half that got vaccinated were, again, 31 percent less likely to contract HIV.

Now, it's important to say a couple things here. One, some people who got vaccinated still got HIV, so it wasn't foolproof. And also, this wasn't just one vaccine, it was two vaccines given in a series of six doses -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Wow. We'll definitely keep talking about it as more information comes forward. You're also in Washington for an update on the swine flu virus. What's going on with that?

COHEN: That's right. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and others gathered to talk to reporters about some of their concerns for when the vaccine comes out. It's expected to come out around October 5. Their concerns are that Americans are not taking H1N1 seriously enough and might not get vaccinated. So, they talked about vaccination, especially for high-risk groups like children and pregnant women.

PHILLIPS: All right, your "Empowered Patient," it's about another myth of sorts with H1N1 about hand washing?

COHEN: Right, right. Some people have a myth with H1N1 that if you just wash your hands all the time, you will be OK. You won't get it, or it will certainly lessen the chances to a great degree. But -- I know this sounds a little bit crazy here. A lot of experts are telling me hand washing really isn't the key. It is not going to protect you all that much against H1N1.

So, to read all about it, go to CNNhealth.com, and you can see my column. And if you have any questions about H1N1, I want to answer them in next week's "Empowered Patient." So, send me an e-mail at EmpoweredPatient@CNN.com.

PHILLIPS: You look pretty good there on the front of the White House lawn, Elizabeth Cohen.

COHEN: Oh, thank you.

PHILLIPS: We'll see you when you get back.

COHEN: Thanks.

PHILLIPS: Pushing forward to the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM now. Some stories that we're working on for you. The nose knows, or does it? Civil rights groups say police lineups using dogs just don't pass the sniff test. Did some bloodhounds frame an innocent man?

And time to take out the trash, punk. Garbage crews already keep the streets clean. Now they're keeping them safe too. Meet a Florida county's newest crime fighters.

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