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New Day

Devastation in Philippines; Help Arrives; "I Am Not A Racist"; No Deal In Iran Nuclear Talks

Aired November 11, 2013 - 08:00   ET

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


CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: The devastation is near complete, as many as 10,000 dead from the super typhoon that lashed the Philippines. Tens of thousands more desperately in need of aid. And another storm on the way.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: The rush to help, U.S. Marines arriving in the Philippines this morning, ready to launch a massive relief effort. Cities and towns completely cut off, no food, no water. We're tracking it all like no other network can.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Collapsed talks between the U.S. and Iran fell apart over the weekend, the fallout severe, with allies now angry at the U.S. Christiane Amanpour joins us live.

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY continues right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Kate Bolduan and Michaela Pereira.

CUOMO: Good morning. Welcome to NEW DAY.

It is Veteran's Day, Monday, November 11th -- and on this day, we thank the men, women and families of our armed forces. Thank you for your service.

We want to talk to you this morning about what's going on in the Philippines. There's obviously a really long road of recovery ahead. The super typhoon has scattered businesses, homes and livelihoods in the streets and all of it has been flushed into the ocean. Too many dead to count, maybe even more missing, more than 1 million displaced in need of help, more than 2 million need food, people looking everywhere for help, whenever and wherever they can get it.

Take a look at these folks trying in vain to flag down helicopters, if only for the basic essentials.

BOLDUAN: Amid the chaos, one moment of peace, a glimmer of hope: a baby was born in a makeshift hospital at the Tacloban airport while the region was getting flooded. American Marines have touched down with cargo planes full of aid, more help coming from the pope, sending in $150,000 to local churches in the Philippines to distribute to victims and help there.

Typhoon Haiyan has weakened to a tropical storm, now over China after hitting Vietnam. We're covering the storm and the recovery from all angles this morning.

CUOMO: Let's begin with Andrew Stevens. He is in one of the hardest- hit areas, let's take a look at the damage and the human toll of this tragedy.

Andrew, what do we know at this point?

ANDREW STEVENS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Chris, it has been just purely devastating. I came through this airport. We're at the airport now, just hours ahead of the storm. I've just got back today. Take a look behind me. This is just part of the debris you can see, to the right of me, to the left of me, just piles and piles of debris, the whole airport itself all the walls blown out, the roof is just hanging off.

It's been a devastating weekend from that Friday storm. Just take a look at what's been happening.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS (voice-over): Overnight, a weakened Haiyan, still carrying winds of more than 90 miles an hour battered the coasts of Northern Vietnam and Southern China just days after the typhoon struck the Philippines with apocalyptic force. The massive storm, stretching 300 miles wide, smashed through cities and its close to 200-mile-an-hour winds and storm surge swept these gigantic ships onto land.

Early estimates, as many as 10,000 may have died and over a quarter of a million people are left homeless. A half a mile from the shoreline where our CNN crew was sheltering, the surge was waist deep as we rescued a family trapped in their hotel room.

MAGINA FERNANDEZ, LOST HOME AND BUSINESS: Get international help to come here now. Not tomorrow, now. This is really, really like bad, bad, worse than hell.

STEVENS: The aftermath, a humanitarian crisis of enormous scope. Rescue workers began the grim task of finding the dead in the rubble.

MAR ROXAS, PHILIPPINE INTERIOR SECRETARY: It's really horrific. It's a great human tragedy.

STEVENS: In the city of Coron, Haiyan ripped the roof from a building where many people were sheltering.

MAYOR ALFRED ROMUALDEZ, TACLOBAN, PHILIPPINES: I have not spoken to anyone who hasn't lost someone, a relative, most of them.

STEVENS: Officials estimate most of the housing on Leyte Island was damaged or destroyed. The U.S. is flying in emergency shelters and supplies for thousands.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We will help them in their need.

STEVENS: And in the hard hit city of Tacloban, storm victims with no food, shelter or water rushed to the demolished airport desperate for supplies. Cebu City received a batch of rice and canned foods Sunday. Delivering aid to the many other remote communities is a huge challenge. While in Tacloban, key roads are impassable and communications are severed.

The only functioning medical facility can't admit any more patients.

Thousands breaking into grocery and hardware stores increasingly desperate for food and water. Haiyan leaving an entire city on edge.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS: There's so much more we don't know still about the damage further along the coast. This is going to take a long time to get the information out, and it looks at this stage, Chris, like it can only be more and more bad news.

CUOMO: All right. Well, obviously we have to follow this, so early in the process even though the storm is gone. We know the U.S. military is sending food, water, generators, also sending manpower. They're also sending manpower, so needed in a situation like this. A group of Marines flying in with more help behind them, they'll try rebuild the airport, that's important so more help can come in.

Let's bring in CNN's Paula Hancocks. She has that part of the story.

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Chris, the U.S. Marines arrived here at the airport just this afternoon, an advanced team came to see the situation, what the needs were here, and then they came in with a C-130, and basically what they're going to be doing, they're going to be supplying these C-130s, four of them, supplying helicopters and also some forklifts and pallets and trucks, basically, the infrastructure you need to get the supplies into the airport and also get them out to the people who need them, which is really crucial.

As we saw today, many people still don't have food and water and the most important thing they are doing, they are going to make this a 24- hour operation, they're going to light up the runway and make sure that it's filled with radars to make sure there's no dangers with sharing air space, so that this can continue through the night.

At the moment the helicopters stop when it gets dark, but it will be crucial to be able to keep going 24 hours.

Kate, back to you.

BOLDUAN: Exactly right, Paula. And, first and foremost, getting a handle on the scope of the devastation. Paula Hancocks -- thank you so much, Paula.

Let's talk more about this. Let's bring in Orla Fagan. She's with the U.N. Humanitarian Affairs Office.

Orla, thank you for joining us. I know this is the last thing you need to be doing right now is talking to the media but it's great to get this message out, you're joining us via Skype from Manila.

First off, how bad is it? What are you seeing?

ORLA FAGAN, SPOKESWOMAN, U.N. OFFICE OF HUMANITARIAN AFFAIRS: It's devastating; the whole place is devastated. The teams that we have on the ground are still coming back with reports that can't get anywhere, can't get past the amount of rubble, everything, it's all over the streets, they can't move past this stuff.

It's still the same. The government are saying now the figures are 9.8 million people affected by this typhoon. That's a massive amount of people. There is over 600,000, they say, are homeless, but that's only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this.

BOLDUAN: And, of course, when you say the tip of the iceberg, we don't even have a full handle of some of the areas in the outskirts, the harder to reach areas because they've been a complete shutdown of communications, many of these areas completely cut off.

What do you see as the most immediate need right now?

FAGAN: To save lives so that involves the logistics of getting this aid in and that's really what is vitally important at this stage. The logistics to get the roads clear, to get the aid moving, you know, thankfully that plane has come in today from the U.S., the government have provided the C-130s, they also have the helicopters there, and it's literally getting the aid in so people can survive.

We can look after the rest as soon as we get to them but getting to them in the first instance is top of our priority now.

BOLDUAN: How big of an operation do you think this will be for your organization? How long do you foresee being on the ground with this?

FAGAN: Six months initially, but I would think it would be a lot longer than that. This requires massive input. It's going to be really, really big. Everybody is gearing up. It's all kind of cranking up at the moment, and it will be a massive operation to get to people, to get them shelter, to get them food, to get them water, to deal with the trauma as well.

You got to remember that you've got a lot of people out there that are very, very traumatized. You've got a lot of people who are, would be concerned about their health risks because of waterborne diseases, so there's just -- it's everything. They need everything at the moment.

BOLDUAN: Yes, from soup to nuts, they need so much help and people when you see those images of just how devastating this typhoon has been and people are just trying to survive at this moment.

Orla Fagan, spokeswoman for the U.N. Office of Humanitarian Affairs -- thank you so much for you work and thank you so much for talking to us this morning. Appreciate it.

FAGAN: OK. Good morning.

BOLDUAN: Good morning. Thank you.

If you would like to help go to CNN.com/impact, we have all the information there for you, how you can help.

And also programming note for you, Anderson Cooper is on his way to the Philippines, will be reporting on the situation from the ground tonight starting at 8:00 p.m. Eastern on "AC360."

Watching this of course but a lot of other headlines, Michaela.

PEREIRA: Yes, let's bring you up-to-date on the news.

Two senior military intelligence officers classified access now suspended, as Navy investigators look into a growing bribery and prostitution scandal, at least three Navy officials have been charged in a case accusing them of accepting prostitutes and other services from a Singapore-based defense contractor.

More than 180,000 pounds of salad products being recalled over E. coli concerns. California-based Glass Onion Catering recalling ready-to- eat salads and sandwich wraps with chicken and ham. Those products were shipped since the end of September, mostly the states in the West, for sale at stores including Trader Joe's. If you'd like a full list of recalled items, go to the FDA's website.

Will he or won't he? New Jersey's Chris Christie made the rounds on Sunday morning news, shows trying to side-step questions of a White House run. The newly reelected governor says his focus is on his home state and the recovery from Superstorm Sandy. He did acknowledge he could prematurely leave the governor's mansion to pursue his presidential ambitions.

Heartless thieves in Washington state stole a fishing boat for injured veterans. The day before the vote was stolen, owner Jeff Mason had gotten final approval from military officials to offer guided fishing trips to vets. The retired executive and avid fisherman was prepared to lead two trips a week free of charge through the Wounded Warriors program.

Leave it to Lady Gaga to make us go gaga. Check out the applause, some folks are calling the world's first flying dress. Hard to go through a door.

She wore this at a launch party for -- literally launch party for her new album art pop and lifted off inside the Brooklyn Navy yard. She called it a big time step for her. Her ultimate goal is to stage the first musical performance from space. I don't think she'll take that. It could take a while.

CUOMO: The applause was pretty underwhelming. All I here are the fans from whatever that thing is -- wrong kind of fans.

BOLDUAN: One of her songs.

CUOMO: Oh, is it what it is?

BOLDUAN: I think so.

CUOMO: Lucky for her. Let's get over to Indra. Obviously, we're covering the huge weather story in the Philippines and a lot of local forecast concerns as well.

What do we know about the board?

INDRA PETERSONS, AMS METEREOLOGIST: Yes, very easy to see, big chill. Look at this huge bull's eye, arctic air coming in from Canada. Watch as I make it go forward in time, so easy to see this guy spread into the northeast and the mid-Atlantic, these temperatures are going to be chilly out there.

We're going to watch the cold front make its way through the Ohio valley today and eventually into the Northeast overnight tonight. And remember, it's cold from Canada. So moisture starved lane there. But over the lake, of course, you have another source from moisture there.

So we are going to be seeing lake-effect snow, three to five inches around Lake Erie and one to three around the other Great Lakes there. Now, let's talk about this chill, this cold air diving so far south, it's going to be flurries out here, Charleston, West Virginia, and in through just east of Nashville, we're going to be talking about a dusting of snow -- I mean, so light it won't stick to the ground, should melt probably on impact but a good month early for them to see this weather.

Talking about temperatures, this is one of the other stories. Yes, cold arctic air temperatures going way down. We are talking about highs in the 30s tomorrow for Pittsburgh, even Chicago, no, these are not your lows, it is going to be good 15, 20 degrees below normal even on Wednesday.

Remember the arctic high spreading east? There you go, New York City your high tomorrow, Wednesday 41 degrees if that's not bad enough we'll be adding some winds in there. So, watch for delays anywhere from the Midwest to the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. Still talking about gusts, anywhere from 20 to even 40 miles an hour.

So a lot to be talking about when it comes to the chill and it's staying here for a while so get used to it.

BOLDUAN: That's right. Hello winter.

PETERSONS: Yes, hello.

BOLDUAN: Coming up next on NEW DAY, trying to bridge the gap with the talk with Iran over its nuclear program. The talks are revealing tensions between the U.S. and Israel. But is an interim deal on Iran worse than no deal at all? Chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour will be weighing in.

CUOMO: And Richie Incognito gives a big interview and raises new issues. See if they change how you see the situation?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: Welcome back to "NEW DAY". Richie Incognito is firing back insisting the bullying allegations against him are not what they seem. He was suspended from the Miami Dolphins to running (ph) allegations that he harassed a teammate, but now, Incognito insists they were friends and the whole thing was just part of locker room culture.

Nischelle Turner is here with much more of what was a very interesting interview.

NISCHELLE TURNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, interesting, very revealing. A lot of meat to this interview.

BOLDUAN: Raising more questions than answers, right?

TURNER: Exactly. We don't have a lot of answers, we still do have a lot of questions. You know, the phrase "locker room culture" was front and center in this interview. We heard from a seemingly contrite and thoughtful Richie Incognito, a man who said he was also hurt by someone he considered a good friend.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHIE INCOGNITO, MIAMI DOLPHINS LINEMAN: Sounds like I'm a racist pig. It sounds like I'm a meat head. It sounds a lot of things that it's not. And I wanted to clear the air just by saying I'm a good person.

TURNER (on-camera): Miami Dolphins lineman, Richie Incognito, defending himself against allegations that he bullied his teammate, Jonathan Martin.

INCOGNITO: I've taken stuff too far, and I didn't know it was hurting him.

TURNER: Incognito explained the threatening voice message he left for Martin which reportedly said in part, "Hey wassup you half 'N' word piece of blank. I'm going to slap your real mother across the face." Laughter. "And you're still a rookie. I'll kill you."

INCOGNITO: I'm embarrassed by it. I'm embarrassed by my actions. But what I want people to know is, the way Jonathan and the rest of the offensive line and how our teammates, how we communicate, it's vulgar. It's not right. When the words are put in the context, I understand why a lot of eyebrows get raised, but people don't know how John and I communicate to one another.

TURNER: Incognito talked of his use of the "N" word to locker room rapport.

INCOGNITO: I'm not a racist. And to judge me by that one word is wrong. There's a lot of calls for words thrown around the locker room that we don't use in everyday life. The fact of the matter remains, though, that that voicemail was left on a private voicemail for my friend, and it was a joke.

TURNER: Incognito says he and Martin have exchanged 1,142 text messages in the past year and continue to communicate as the scandal plays out. INCOGNITO: He text me and said, "I don't blame you guys. I blame some stuff in the locker room. I blame the culture. I blame what was going on around me." And when all this stuff got going and swirling and bullying got attached to it and my name got attached to, I just texted him as a friend and it's like "what's up with this, man,"

And he said, "It's not coming from me. I haven't said anything to anybody." And I'm like, you know, "OK." As his best friend on the team, that's what has me miffed, how I missed this, and I never saw it. I never saw it coming.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TURNER (on-camera): Now, the Dolphins play Monday night football tonight, and we did reach out to the organization to see if they had any comment on the Incognito interview, they did not. Interesting though, the Incognito interview was done in Los Angeles that's also reportedly where Jonathan Martin is right now.

We haven't heard from him. That's kind of the next phase in this, Kate. But what we do know that the NFL network is reporting is that league investigators are in Los Angeles and they will probably meet with Jonathan Martin later on this week.

BOLDUAN: Because right now, it sounds like we have two completely different stories being told. So, we'll have to see.

TURNER: Absolutely. You've only heard from Jonathan Martin's attorney, so it would be nice to hear his words.

BOLDUAN: Good point. Great to see you, Nischelle. Thank you -- Chris.

CUOMO: And Incognito saying that Jonathan Martin texted him that this wasn't coming from him. So, we need to do more reporting on that, but what a provocative discussion.

We'll get a take break now. Coming back on "NEW DAY", no deal in the nuclear talks with Iran. That left the future of talks uncertain and our allies angry. We'll tell you what may come next.

And the jury has spoken. Martin MacNeill killed his wife. Later this hour, the victim's sister and niece give us their reaction now that this long legal battle is finally over.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: Welcome back to "NEW DAY".

There was apparently almost a deal for Iran to suspend its nuclear program in exchange for lighter sanctions. Talks went into overdrive this weekend with Secretary of State John Kerry, saying the west was willing but Iran balked. Now, the administration is on the defensive, allies including Israel, very angry.

Let's bring in chief international correspondent for CNN, Christiane Amanpour, also the host, of course of CNN "Amanpour". Christiane, great to have you with us this morning.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Let's start with the news segment of this discussion. You spoke to Iran's foreign minister late last week. What did he say to you about the possibility of a deal and what that would require?

AMANPOUR: Well, without going into the details, he said that he felt that there was the possibility for an understanding or an agreement this weekend. Now, there are many who believe that that was maybe an overly optimistic assessment, believed even as he was saying it, hoping that this would actually create momentum to having a deal.

On the other hand, as you could see, over the weekend, Secretary Kerry came to Geneva, the British and the German and the French foreign ministers came. The Russian foreign minister came and so did the deputy Chinese foreign minister. So they must have thought that something was very, very close -- didn't go over the edge, and they're coming back November 20th to go at it again.

CUOMO: All right. Now, the fundamental tension seems to be whether or not this deal is too sweet for Iran, because when you talk about those collective powers, certainly Israel, the majority opinion seems to be they need to move first. Will that happen?

AMANPOUR: Well, here's the thing. The United States was telling a senior U.S. officials on Thursday and Friday that if Iran makes certain steps, then the U.S. has put reversible -- reversible lifting of sanctions in certain areas on the table. And they did say that, yes, we require Iran to move quickly and we require them to make a first step.

So that was already a known going in. What's happened apparently is everybody now is doing like this, blaming each other, the whole echo chamber is alight with all sorts of chatter about why it didn't happen, was it the Iranians who couldn't accept it? Was it the French held who out for something beyond what the Americans and the others have thought? What was it?

Or what is the Israelis who said even before knowing what the deal was, Prime Minister Netanyahu said this is a bad deal. In fact, his quote was, "This would be the deal of the century for Iran." So a huge amount of opposition and difficulty amongst Israel and also the U.S. Congress. So we're not quite sure what it is, but certainly, there are issues that the U.S. and the others want.

They want to see, for instance, the Iraq, the Iraq plutonium facility, which has not yet come online, possibly not come online, or be suspended. They want a certain amount of suspension of the program for a period of several months.

And Iran wants to have its right to nuclear enrichment enshrined. So there may be a problem there with having its right to enrichment enshrined, although, the U.S. has said that that is something that they would go for.

CUOMO: All right. Christiane, help me here. The weeds are too tall. They are too deep. I can't see through this anymore. I got Rouhani supposed to be a moderate, potential change agent, he's tweeting. It's supposed to be good. Kerry's got optimism. He goes in. Netanyahu says you're crazy. This will never happen.

And now, there's enshrining. Just break it down for us. Where are we really in this process? Is there anything going on here that measures as progress?

AMANPOUR: I think there is, and certainly, everybody will say that. Here's what you need to know. Remember the years of Ahmadinejad, awful, horrible, hostile, belligerent, no progress over several years or very spotty nuclear talks? Well, now, it has changed. The face has changed, the tone has changed, and the progress has changed.

Even the United States negotiators said in Geneva that they had never seen Iran act so seriously, be so meticulous and specific and be so rapid in coming back with proposals. So, yes. Things have changed and even now the foreign ministers are saying that we may be able to do it in a few weeks. We'll see. We'll see. It is incredibly difficult, but here's the thing.

Israel and the U.S. Congress, certain members of the U.S. Congress, wants to see Iran completely eradicate its nuclear program. No enrichment, no nothing. Just if they want to have a civilian program, then we'll, you know, buy it from abroad and be very heavily monitored. Iran has said look, 19 years of sanctions have not made us say no to our nuclear program.

That is our right under international law and we're willing to do what you need for transparency and to prove what we're saying is that we're not going after a nuclear weapon. So, what you have here is still a massive wall of mistrust between all sides, plus the fact that the Israelis do not want to see any deal. Certainly, the government of Prime Minister Netanyahu don't want to see any deal short of Iran basically bending over and crying uncle and capitulating.

And most people think that, listen, if that hasn't happened yet, it's not going to happen in the future.