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At This Hour

Kerry News Conference on Ukraine; Israeli Air Strikes Rain Down on Gaza; John Kerry Faces Obstacles in Mideast Ceasefire

Aired July 29, 2014 - 11:00   ET

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

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: The site has to be cordoned off. The evidence has to be preserved, and Russia needs to use its considerable influence among the separatists in order to be able to help ensure this basic approach of common decency.

Well beyond the crash site, the fighting is continuing and has President Poroshenko has made repeatedly and as Foreign Minister Klimkin made clear to me just a few minutes ago, the Ukrainians are ready to accept a cease-fire now, not in the future -- now. They have proposed a peace plan with Russian-backed separatists. They understand this is the only way that this crisis is going to come to an end.

This morning, I talked with Foreign Minister Lavrov and raised these concerns and agreed there is a way to try to put some very specific proposals on the table to try to move forward but the Russians and their so-called volunteers are continuing to ship arms and funds and personnel across the border. We see this. There's clear evidence of it.

We now have clear evidence of artillery and rocket fire from Russia into Ukraine, and while the Russians have said they want to deescalate the conflict, their actions have not shown a shred of evidence that they really have a legitimate desire to end the violence and blood shed.

As a result, the Russian-backed separatists refuse to lay down their arms and be part of the political process. They continue to fire on Ukrainian forces, even in the area just around the crash site, and they have displayed an appalling disregard for human decency, and evidently the separatists will continue to do unless they can feel some pressure, something real, from their Russian backers.

President Putin can make a huge difference here if he chooses to, and we and our European partners will take additional measures and impose wider sanctions on key sections of the Russian economy if that is what we must do.

We hope that it will not be necessary and if Russia continues to go down this path, how far, Russia will leave the international community with no choice.

What is unfolding in Ukraine has already gone on for far too long. It's well past time for the violence to stop and for the people of Ukraine to begin the process of rebuilding their country and rebuilding it in a way that it can have a relationship with Russia, with the West.

I think Foreign Minister Klimkin will affirm today that we're not asking them to choose between the two, and I think Ukrainians understand that they have strong ties to Russia.

They are prepared to have a relationship with Russia, and they understand that the future of Ukraine depends on having a strong relationship with Russia. So it's well past time for this violence to stop.

That is why yesterday Vice President Biden announced nearly $7 million in rapid assistance to be deployed immediately. Specifically, these funds will go toward rebuilding eastern Ukraine, including the cities, where people celebrated in the streets recently when they were liberated from separatists' control.

We are also asking Congress for approval to provide financial support and mentoring to small businesses throughout Ukraine. Through mechanisms like the public-private partnerships and export promotion initiatives, we are hoping to inject additional resources into Ukraine's economy so that together all Ukrainians can rebuild their lives along with their cities.

Over the past few months, Ukrainian government has taken a number of steps to try to bring about a better future for its people and to reform the government that had failed them so much in the past, including signing an historic association agreement with European Union and also finalizing the vital stand-by arrangement with the International Monetary Fund.

We strongly urge Ukrainians to continue the process of reforming their democracy, even if not particularly during this memo of crisis, because this is a troubling time where everyone is looking for those reforms to be implemented and they can make a huge difference in rebuilding confidence and also in providing a sense in Russia that the concerns expressed by the separatists are in fact being listened to and being incorporated into the political process of Ukraine.

The United States stands ready to support our Ukrainian partners in this effort because we know ultimately a strong, democratic government and a strong economy are the keys to providing the Ukrainian people with the stability and the prosperity that they want and that they deserve.

So, again, I thank Foreign Minister Klimkin for joining me today for this meeting, and I have pledged to him that we will continue to work closely together.

We're talking about the possibility of when we can find time for a visit to continue this discussion more directly with the prime minister and with President Poroshenko.

I think we share high hopes for the possibilities of what a resolution of this crisis with the separatists and Russia could bring, a strong Ukraine, the respect for their sovereignty, and the possibilities of stability for the region. Mr. Foreign Minister, please?

PAVLO KLIMKIM, UKRAINIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: Good morning, everyone. Mr. Secretary of State --

(END LIVE FEED)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR: You are watching Secretary of State John Kerry delivering a news conference along with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin at the State Department.

Secretary of State Kerry says it is well past time to stop the violence in Ukraine, he condemned the pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine for not allowing investigators to reach the crash site of MH-17 and do the work that they need to do nearly two weeks after that plane went down, and he talked about also the fact that the world right now is on the precipice of perhaps installing serious sanctions, the most serious yet, against Russia for their actions in and around Ukraine.

I want to bring in Elise Labott right now at the State Department. Elise, if these sanctions happen, they would be a total game-changer in the U.S. and the West's relationship with Russia.

ELISE LABOTT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, certainly, they would be a game-changer with the European relationship with Russia, John.

The Europeans have been really reluctant to pass sweeping sanctions on Russia, because they are the ones who will be feeling the pinch.

Those economic ties between Russia and Europe, particularly some of the major countries like Britain, France, Germany, they are really interdependent economically.

And so when you talk about the British, or the French, or the Germans hitting Russian financial companies, energy companies, maybe a ban on arms sales, that is very significant and really shows that the U.S. and the Europeans are growing increasingly united on how to deal with President Putin.

BERMAN: Is the secretary getting what he wants right now from the Europeans and from the Ukrainians?

Look, Secretary of State John Kerry is very busy right now. He's had some issues in the Middle East. We're going to talk about that in a little bit.

But how is he forging ahead in dealing with the Ukrainian crisis?

LABOTT: Well, it's really difficult, and it's not that he can't put all of his attention -- spread it out a little bit, but when he's dealing with the Middle East, as he was last week, it's really hard for him to focus really intensely on Ukraine.

Listen, basically, the thing -- the daylight between the U.S. and the Europeans is the U.S. doesn't feel it as much. They think it's OK to put on these sweeping sanctions on Russia because the U.S. economy isn't really going to be hit that hard.

The Europeans are saying, listen, we have economic interests, and we want to make sure these sanctions hurt Russia, that they don't hurt the Europeans, but I think as they continue to talk, the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 I think was very significant in turning the tide of European support for some of these sanctions.

And I think that, you know, as there is more evidence that Russia is continuing to supply these separatists with arms, to continue to give them support, rather than withdrawing it as the international community had demanded, I think that they will be more consensus on how to move forward.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN CO-ANCHOR: Yeah. And of course the secretary of state also reminding people that they are very mindful of the fact that 298 families are waiting for some sort of closure, calling for a thorough and overdue investigation, unfettered.

Elise, we're going to ask you to stand by. We want to bring in our Barbara Starr.

It's very interesting, Barbara, as we bring word of what the secretary of state is saying about the fact that Ukrainians are ready for a cease-fire, your intelligence is telling us that there's been reports of a missile firing upon the Russian separatists from the Ukrainian side.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: From the Ukrainian government forces, indeed, Michaela, John.

U.S. officials now confirming to CNN what dug out, what we learned ourselves here, which is that U.S. intelligence saw through its satellite systems Ukrainian forces launching short-range, surface-to- air -- pardon me -- surface-to-surface ballistic missiles from Ukrainian government positions into the separatist-held areas.

This happened over the last 48 hours. This is a game-changer on the battlefield. These weapons, these short-range ballistic missiles have warheads up to a thousand pounds. They can go 50-plus miles.

They fired them apparently against separatist positions, looking to take out separatist capability. The question is, why aren't we hearing very much about it?

Even a minute ago, you saw Secretary Kerry talk about the Russians sending heavy weapons across the border so the separatists could attack. This time it's the units that the U.S. supports, the so-called good guys, escalating the force on the battlefield, ratcheting all of this up at a time when the U.S. is looking for de-escalation.

PEREIRA: That's exactly the point, Barbara. The secretary of state talking about, just moments ago, the need for a cease-fire now and that the U.S. supports the Ukrainian call for cease-fire, yet the Ukrainians obviously escalating things on their own.

So it almost seems like people are talking about both sides of their mouths.

STARR: It often happens on the battlefield. You know, that's -- everybody looks to create their own strongest position.

It may well be that what the Ukrainians are trying to do it to continue to push the separatists out, push them back, push them back to the border, take territory away from them and recapture key areas in eastern Ukraine.

The problem, the battlefield problem, is what will the Russians do about this? How will they react? Because they have been sending heavy weapons across the border to bolster the separatists, so the separatists can counterattack against the Ukrainians and keep a hold of the territory they have.

This battle is really turning into just all-out ground combat, and of course the concern is that it will be Ukrainian civilians once again caught in the middle.

BERMAN: All right, Barbara Starr, at the Pentagon, Elise Labott at the State Department, thanks so much.

Let's go to the ground now in Ukraine. Our Nick Paton Walsh, who has been with these inspectors over the last several days, trying to get to the crash site, but turned away, at least yesterday, because of all the violence. The investigators didn't even get going today because of all the violence.

And, Nick, it hasn't been particularly clear who's responsible for the violence, and we're hearing now from Barbara Starr that there are ballistic missiles being fired by the Ukrainian government itself.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Look, it's clear investigators themselves aren't really sure who is behind the violence. It's hard to tell who is shelling who, at times.

We were at a town called Shakhtars'k. It's key. It's on the road here from Donetsk where the inspectors are basing themselves and the crash site. It was where they had to turn back yesterday. They didn't even get out of the hotel. It seems so far today, as far as we're aware, real concerns about safety.

We went to Shakhtars'k today, heavy shelling. We think it some of it coming from the towns from probably were Ukrainian positions, but also some coming back, so both sides to blame in some capacity.

A lot of heavy weaponry, John, in the four months we've been covering this story, at the start, people were pointing guns at each other, now it is heavy weapons. We stood here last night, 2:00, 3:00 in the morning, hard to define what the very loud explosions we were hearing in the distance actually were, but deeply troubling.

But John Kerry, I think, in that speech, interesting but treading a very difficult line, he's asking for the site to be cordoned off. It's a massive 14-kilometer square area, very hard to hermetically seal in some way on another. He's talking about the need for a neutral cease-fire between both sides. No doubt about it, the Ukrainian army is on the offensive here, unstoppably so, and I think it's fair to say they have the upper hand in some way, certainly in many of the areas we're seeing. They are not moving very fast, but they are certainly moving.

And the separatists themselves, well, there's a little distance between them and Russia, increasingly. Yes, there is evidence, says the U.S., that they are getting support, but we saw Igor Strelkov, kind of the leading militant of this movement yesterday, give a very hastily arranged, extraordinarily brief press conference, which he ended by saying the support he was getting from Russia is moral.

So I think there's a feeling perhaps among some separatists they are not getting the support they wanted from Russia. Certainly, Washington blaming the United States.

The key issue with the sanctions, though, John, is to a degree they have to be played at the right time. Play them too early then you take away one of your major reasons for preventing further Russian intervention. Don't play them at all and the Russians, you might say in Washington, feel they're getting away with it.

So we're seeing in the next 24, 48 hours that these sanctions are coming to a head. If they hit the Russian economy extraordinarily hard, there are some analysts Putin will say, damage has been done, I may as well save some geopolitical face by trying to keep hold of some parts of Ukrainian, some say, maybe , his end goal. It is a very fragile situation here. It had been bad for a number of weeks The crash site simple makes more focus upon the war here. You've got to bear in mind the feelings of the relation of MH-17 in all of this. That crash site now is caught between two sides who are deeply uncompromising, John.

PEREIRA: So many things going on here. Not only the struggle for Ukraine, and to get some stability there in that region. But even just to get investigators into that crash site, all of the economic sanctions being leveled at Russia, as you say, on the precipice of being leveled at Russia.

Nick Paton Walsh, thank you so much for covering all of that for us.

BERMAN: We have a lot more to discuss. This is only one of the major complicated hot spots in the world right now. Coming up we're going to go to the Middle East, and deal with what's happening in Gaza. A major escalation there over the last several hours. Stay with us.

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PEREIRA: Israeli air strikes and artillery rain down on Gaza, the death toll shoots up on both sides of conflict. Palestinian official confirm more than 1,100 people have been killed, most of them civilians, including hundreds of children. Meanwhile, Israeli death toll has jumped as well to 56 now, 53 are soldiers, including ten kill in battle just yesterday.

BERMAN: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warning now of a protracted campaign in Gaza.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, PRIME MINISTER OF ISRAEL (via translator): Even in this hour, we continue our operation to neutralize the terror tunnels. We will not finish the mission, we will not finish the operation without neutralizing the tunnels which have the sole purpose of destroying our citizens, and killing our children.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Our Karl Penhaul is in Gaza, has been in the middle of this bombardment for hours, not really for days. He joins us now. Karl you were live with us on Early Start this morning when an Israeli air strike hit, looked like 200 yards behind you. What's it been like this morning in Gaza?

KARL PENHUAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I mean, you saw that and, you know, quite a surprise because it was just about to explain how a few minutes before coming on air there had been an air strike at a building possibly 300 yards away from our building and, lo and behold, that strike came in just a very short distance away.

But that really has been the pattern, that's been the apparent through the night when I will illumination rounds were falling on Gaza City and that's been the pattern throughout the day, because what the drones in the air have been doing is trying to look for targets on the ground and then engaging those targets.

Now the Israelis military says it has hit mosques the they believe weapons have been stored in. It has hit the homes of senior Hamas official and it has also, this afternoon we believed, gone after tunnel complexes there on the eastern border of Gaza towards Israel. And that I say because we have seen a series of 2,000 pound bombs going in, huge explosions, so very heavy pounding across there as well, John.

PEREIRA: Karl, you talk about the targets that Israel is focusing on, the munitions, the leaders of Hamas, and even some of the mosques that are doubling as storage for some of those munitions and obviously those tunnels, which has been a key aspect of this Israeli offensive. We understand that a there is word thought that a power plant was hit today. Give us a sense of what kind of effect that's having in Gaza.

PENHUAL: Yes. Absolutely. When I mention incidentally those Israeli targets, such as mosques that the Israeli military suggested is being used as munitions dump. I must stress that we have no independent confirmation of that. That's the Israeli militaries version of events. Hamas has not commented on that. We have no independent confirmation.

But absolutely right on the power issue. That was an Israeli tank round that hit one of the fuel storage tanks according to one of the heads of the Gaza power company. That then set on fire another of the diesel storage tanks and that has basically taken the whole of the power generator out of action. Some energy is imported from Israel into Gaza but those power lines were blown up three or four days into this war, so that has essentially left Gaza without any means of power. It was limited and rationed before and so the situation has just taken a turn for the worse.

We have also heard from U.N. organizations, as well as the international Red Cross, that water systems have also been hit in air strikes. We've seen evidence of that on the street as well as neighbors try and dig into the sidewalks themselves to try and repair the water mains. So as these basic utilities go off line, power and water in particular, that really is bringing extra suffering on the civilian population that has already been massively displaced by this fighting. 180,000 of them already sleeping in United Nations shelters because their own homes have either been destroyed or in the combat zone, Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. Karl Penhaul reporting. We ask you to do your best to stay safe. It's so important for us to have the reporters on the ground to tell the story. But we also want to make sure they are out of harms way.

BERMAN: He's one extremely calm and collected reporter, Mr. Karl Penhual, right there. Our hats go off to him.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as we said, is warning of a protracted campaign of Gaza. This statement followed the death of ten Israeli soldiers killed in combat against the Hamas militants. Right now, the death toll on the Israeli side is 53 troops, 3 civilians while more the 1,100 Palestinians have died. Most of them reporting to the United Nations have been civilians, including many children.

PEREIRA: Fatah Central Committee member Nabil Shaath joins us right now from Ramalla in the West Bank. He is a former Palestinian Foreign minister.

Sir, thank you for join us @THISHOUR. We know the Palestinian Authority offered a peace, a 24-hour truce earlier today that was quickly rejected by Hamas. One would wonder, from an outside perspective is Hamas interested in peace?

BERMAN: I think Nabil Shaath having a difficult time hearing us right now. I think we do have with us Josh Rogan, a writer for "The Daily Beast," who has some done some terrific work lately on the issue surrounding Israel and national security issues.

We've been talking about Secretary Kerry. We saw him a few minutes ago dealing with the Ukraine and the battle going on there. But when we talked about Israel and Gaza, he work around the clock for nearly a week to try to forge some kind of deal. Not only did he came back empty handed, he came back, perhaps, carrying a lot of baggage and a lot of criticism particularly from the Israeli's, Josh.

JOSH ROGAN, SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT, DAILY BEAST: Yes, as if the war in Gaza isn't bad enough, the Israelis perpetrated a war of words against Secretary of State John Kerry by leaking a bunch of quotes, really mean stuff, saying that his diplomacy in Israel amounted to a strategic terror attack on Israel because the deal that he floated, the deal that he proposed to Israel, which was rejected about the Israeli cabinet unanimously, in their view, brought Hamas to the same level of Israel, did not provide for the security of Israel, and would have provided Hamas billions of dollars perhaps from Qatar.

And this was just really the latest in a series of blows to the relationship between the Israeli government and Secretary Kerry who had really not gotten along for the last year or so.

PEREIRA: The Obama administration obviously doing some defensive talking of their own, and sort of defending against the criticism that was leveled at Kerry. Talk about the tenuous relationship between Israel and the U.S. right now. And how they are going to go forward.

ROGAN: Sure, on Monday both National Security Adviser Susan Rice and the Israeli Ambassador to Washington Ron Dermer sought to tamp down tensions by saying that John Kerry was making a good faith effort to come to work in the interest of both countries.

That is true, but at the same time what yesterdays resumption of violence showed is that there is a huge gap between what Secretary Kerry is doing , in terms of his diplomatic efforts and the facts on the ground. Neither the Israeli government nor Hamas seems to be following Kerry's lead. This follows a week of intensive diplomacy In the region where Kerry started by pushing an Egyptian cease-fire proposal that Hamas couldn't accept and ended by pushing his own cease-fire proposal that Israel couldn't accept.

Let's remember here that last week Kerry was caught in an open mic criticizing the Israeli military operations, saying they weren't doing enough to protect civilians. This also follows nine-months of intensive diplomacy where Kerry pushed for a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinian authority and that left a lot of bad blood in Israeli because they felt that he didn't represent their interests sufficiently.

This is pretty much the nail in the coffin of John Kerry's relationship with the Israeli government. That is not to say that the U.S doesn't still have an important role to play, and John Kerry continues to work on this as well as all the other issues facing the United States in foreign policy, but the damage to the relationship is done and it will have some lasting effects.

BERMAN: Josh, this is the backdrop there. Quickly, if you can answer this question. Is it that John Kerry missed an opportunity to find some kind of cease-fire. Let's talk about the last week or two weeks for a second. Did he miss an opportunity? Or is it simply both sides were never going to come to the table because right now both sides think it's in their advantage to keep up this fight?

ROGAN: Yes, most analysts would agree it's the latter. That both Hamas has not achieved its objective and therefore has an interest in continuing to fire rockets and that Israel has not achieved its objectives, namely to destroy the tunnels that they keep finding that were much more extensive then they previously thought. The situation just wasn't ripe for a cease-fire, at least a lasting one. Now that begs the question, since John Kerry must have known that,

what exactly did he expect to achieve? Well according to state department officials, he wanted to produce an immediate cease-fire that was temporary that could lead to a negotiation. But he can't want this more than the parties themselves and I think that's what he realized after several days.

PEREIRA: Yes. That is such an important point. If the two parties who need to agree to the cease-fire don't want it as much as the outside groups that are trying to support them in brokering a deal, then we're a lost cause.

Josh Rogan, always a pleasure to have you with us on air. Senior national security correspondent for "The Daily Beast."

BERMAN: Ahead for us @THISHOUR, with the death toll rising in Gaza, we'll have the latest from there and this conflict. We'll get the Palestinian point of view.

PEREIRA: Also we've been talking a lot about the Ebola virus. It is frightening, it is deadly. Is it also just a plane ride away?

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