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Southern U.S. Ripped by Storms; Indian PM Visits Pakistan; Iraqi Forces Close In on ISIS; Learning from ISIS; New Life in the U.S.; Life at a Dogsled Camp. Aired 3-3:30a ET
Aired December 26, 2015 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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NATALIE ALLEN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): The dangerously wrong kind of holiday weather. More violent storms on the way for parts of the southern U.S. At least 15 people have died across three states.
Also, writing history: we'll look at the significance of the first meeting in more than a decade between the leaders of India and Pakistan.
And a new life for Syrian refugees. What it's like to be taken in after fleeing war.
Hello, everyone. This is CNN NEWSROOM, live from Atlanta. Thank you for joining us. I'm Natalie Allen.
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ALLEN: And we begin in the southeastern U.S., where the threat of more severe weather is looming over many people who spent Christmas Day with their homes and streets and cars flooded.
Alabama is under a state of emergency; at one airport there at least 50 centimeters of rain fell in less than a day. And in the city of Birmingham, what may well have been a tornado caused this damage.
At least 15 people, as we mentioned, have died in three states this week. Derek Van Dam joins us with more now on this freakish weather.
It is warm and it's stormy and then it is going to get cold and stormy.
DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It all depends on what part of the country you're in. And it certainly has been devastating and a very difficult Christmas season for many across the South.
Take a look at the visuals coming out of Huntsville, Alabama. This is the moment when two women and an infant were rescued because of rapidly increasing floodwater. This is known as a flash flood, was threatening these individuals. Fortunately, they were rescued just in time. No injuries reported out of this particular scenario. But you can imagine just how -- you can see the reaction right there
on your TV screen, just how grateful they feel to be alive because those situations can get very, very scary very quickly.
Now the amount of rainfall that has fallen across the Deep South of the United States is extraordinary. We've had over 250 millimeters of rain in the Huntsville area. And that is just in a 24-hour period. And it is already a very saturated environment. So any additional rainfall means flooding will be the potential. And that was he scene for many other locations, not just in Huntsville.
We had four confirmed tornadoes, several reports of wind damage and hail. Remember, the United States only gets 24 tornadoes on average. And just this week alone we have seen nearly 40 tornadoes.
And we have a very complex weather system taking shape across the central parts of the U.S. This is for Sunday and into Monday. This low pressure system will bring heavy snowfall from New Mexico into the Texas Panhandle. Blizzard conditions expected there. In the warm sector of this storm, the Gulf of Mexico side. This is going to allow for the potential for severe weather once again.
Damaging winds, isolated tornadoes, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas, Little Rock and into St. Louis. That is for Saturday and once again into Sunday.
I want to take you to the other part of the world where we have some breaking news coming out of Australia. This is in Victoria State, just outside of Melbourne. About 150 kilometers southwest of that particular city over 100 homes have been scorched. This is the highest tourist season right now in this particular part of the world.
Strong winds fueling these bush fires that rapidly spread and some of these homes, we are talking multimillion-dollar homes, Natalie. There was some rain that helped douse the fires but it's just not enough. And you just -- your heart breaks for these people because they have come to a holiday season where they have no home.
ALLEN: Yes. Extreme weather. Different parts of the world.
All right, Derek, thank you. See you later.
Well, India's prime minister Narendra Modi has become the first leader of his country to visit Pakistan in almost 12 years. During a trip home from Afghanistan Friday he made a surprise stop in Lahore and met with his Pakistani counterpart, Nawaz Sharif. The leaders talked about restarting a dialogue and increasing contact between their nations but the countries have much to overcome.
As I discussed earlier with Aparna Pande, she is with the Hudson Institute, a U.S. nonprofit think tank.
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APARNA PANDE, INITIATIVE ON THE FUTURE OF INDIA AND SOUTH ASIA, HUDSON INSTITUTE: It's a diplomatic breakthrough but it's also something not new. Mr. Modi's not the first Indian prime minister to extend a hand of friendship to Pakistan. Every prime minister for the last six decades has sought to make peace with Pakistan, their legacy. So in one way Mr. Modi's simply continuing an old policy. What is new, however or different, is the style of (INAUDIBLE).
ALLEN: And tell us about the style.
PANDE: The style is --
[03:05:00]
PANDE: -- Mr. Modi's foreign policy, his first act on building relations (INAUDIBLE) was to invite all South Asian leaders, including Mr. Nawaz Sharif, to his inauguration. For the last one and a half years, Mr. Modi was on foreign policy in which he travels to countries and builds personal ties with leaders.
He has also emphasized that South Asia is very important for him and that India can not become a leading par without his neighbors rooting for India.
So it's part of foreign policy paradigm that he's trying to set up and push forward. And part of that is the boosting of Pakistani civilian government and pushing for creating commercial ties with Pakistan, (INAUDIBLE) may give the civilian government a leverage against the Pakistani military.
ALLEN: Is that --
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ALLEN: I'm sorry to interrupt you.
But I just want to say, is that what has kept these two countries from moving forward, the mistrust and the fact that the military is so involved in the government there?
PANDE: Yes. I believe that, at the root of India and Pakistan relations lies mistrust, mistrust between the two establishments, I mean, the political military establishments and the fact that the Pakistani military intelligence establishment still sees India as an existential threat and therefore is unwilling to allow anyone, even its own military (ph) (INAUDIBLE) earlier, who changed the paradigm and to allow a paradigm shift and to allow better ties.
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ALLEN: Aparna Pande joining us there with her analysis.
A top Syrian rebel group confirmed that their leader was killed. Syrian state media report that this man, Zahran Allouch, the general commander of a rebel group called Jaysh al-Islam, died after airstrikes hit a suburb of Damascus.
State TV aired this video which they say shows the airstrike that killed him. It's unclear if it was Syrian or Russian aircraft which dropped the bombs. This rebel group has no affiliation with ISIS or Al Qaeda but the Syrian government still referred to Allouch as a terrorist when reporting his death.
The Iraqi military is closing in on an ISIS-held government compound in Ramadi in its attempt to retake this key city near Baghdad. And the U.S.-led coalition is lending its support for the final phases. CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr reports.
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BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: As Iraqi forces continue to press against ISIS positions in the center of Ramadi, the fighting is growing more intense. Both U.S.-led coalition and Iraqi aircraft overhead continue to pound ISIS positions in the city, Iraqi forces moving very carefully, very cautiously through fields of IEDs, mines, tunnels, all kinds of barricades and weapons that ISIS, over the months, has laid in the city.
In just one round of airstrikes, U.S.-led coalition bombers exploded seven houses on the ground near Ramadi that were wired with explosives. The only way to get past them was to blow up those buildings. That's the level of fighting that we are seeing.
This is really becoming a must-win for Iraqi forces to demonstrate that they can actually take territory back from ISIS. And everyone is watching to see what the next step will be.
If the Iraqis can get Ramadi back, will they be able to hold on to it without a new round of sectarian violence breaking out and will the Iraqis be able to take the next step, head north, clear some villages there, begin to control supply lines and move on into Mosul and get Iraq's second largest city once and for all back from ISIS? Barbara Starr, CNN, the Pentagon.
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ALLEN: ISIS has not always been consistent in its recruitment strategy or how it's carried out attacks. CNN's Jim Sciutto has more on what we have learned about the terror group this past year.
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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF U.S. SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Early on after ISIS' emergence, the focus among U.S. law enforcement, U.S. counterterror officials has really been potential ISIS recruits here in America, who attempt to travel to the war zones in Iraq and Syria, join the fight there and then possibly come back and bring jihad home.
But more and more the focus is on potential recruits, who never leave the U.S. homeland or Europe or anywhere else in the world, never go to the war zone but stay at home and carry out jihad really on their doorstep.
Now that change could be due in part to those tougher controls, the efforts to identify and stop potential recruits, here in the U.S. or elsewhere in the West, from joining the fight in the Middle East. But it is also because ISIS --
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SCIUTTO: -- has changed its message; more and more, it is calling on people around the world to carry out jihad right where they are, whatever they can do, take up a gun, make a bomb and carry out terror attacks, particularly with the focus on the West more and more.
Now sometimes those attacks are entirely self-directed, pure lone wolves, as we've heard that term so often. But we've also seen ISIS direct and supply and train. We saw that in Paris. Also suicide attacks in Beirut.
There have already been a number of lone wolf attacks here in the United States, even predating ISIS. In 2009, the Fort Hood attack inspired, it was believed, by Anwar al-Awlaki, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
In Garland, Texas, a shooting at a convention for cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, that believed inspired by, possibly even directed by ISIS.
And then, of course, San Bernardino, believed to be inspired by ISIS as well.
One particular challenge with lone wolves is that they're harder to detect. If there's no initial conversation between the new recruit and a known terror subject, there's no conversation to intercept, there's no meeting to observe before that terrorist is recruited and carries out an attack.
This means a near constant state of alert -- what has been described to me repeatedly as an alarming new normal.
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ALLEN: ISIS is a big reason thousands of people, as you know, are fleeing the Middle East. Next here we will meet a Syrian refugee who has resettled in the United States. But you'll hear why he says he wants to go back.
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ALLEN: Despite a recent backlash against refugees in the United States, roughly 85,000 people from around the world are expected to be resettled in the U.S. in the coming year.
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ALLEN: That includes at least 10,000 refugees from Syria.
Yasmin Vossoughian spoke with a young man, a Syrian refugee, about his new life in the state of Maryland.
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YAMI KAHLIL (PH), SYRIAN REFUGEE: I go to school, I come back home by myself every night. Every day, I'm alone.
YASMIN VOSSOUGHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Your dad's here.
KAHLIL (PH): Yes. But he be working. He come back at, I think, 11 o'clock every day. So from 5:00 to 11:00, I stay home by myself every day.
I always want to go back. I just don't want to stay here.
VOSSOUGHIAN: You don't want to stay here?
KAHLIL (PH): No. I always want to go back.
VOSSOUGHIAN: Even now?
KAHLIL (PH): Even now.
I'm Yami Khalil (ph), I'm a Syrian refugee.
VOSSOUGHIAN: What was it like back at home before you came here?
KAHLIL (PH): We hear like shots and everything a month or less (ph). Keep away from windows, from doors. Just stay in the house. No school.
I remember like two nights we couldn't sleep. My mom was awake for two days, just make sure we are safe.
I'm from here, Tartus, in 2011, I walk from Tartus to Lebanon and got my visa with my family. Then we move back to Syria. Then we move to Egypt.
VOSSOUGHIAN: And then where did you go?
KAHLIL (PH): I moved to U.S., United States.
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KAHLIL (PH): Education is my future. I never miss a class.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He knows what's expected of him and his family is always on his mind and everything he does is with the knowledge that he's got family back home counting on him to succeed. So that's a heavy burden, I think.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) sodium and then Na+.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So many of these refugee kids have similar stories to a lot of the American kids in this school. Maybe the American kids didn't spend five years in a refugee camp but they're coming from homes where they only had one parent there or they're living with their grandmother and their siblings are in another state. They actually have a lot of similarities.
Do you guys try and integrate in that way?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that is something seriously lacking and the more kids we get from other countries, the more important this is to do.
American kids have trauma. Urban youth have a lot of trauma in their lives, too. No, they didn't spend their life in a refugee camp. And, no, maybe there isn't a war going on. But in some ways, there is.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How's school going?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good. This is in the last year.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, last year was hard.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is it easier because your English is better?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think -- yes. I think that's why.
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VOSSOUGHIAN: Where is your mom?
KAHLIL (PH): She's in Turkey now with my youngest brother. And I have oldest brother in Germany.
VOSSOUGHIAN: Why aren't they here?
KAHLIL (PH): They didn't give my older brother a visa.
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KAHLIL (PH): And here's my mom.
VOSSOUGHIAN: She is very pretty.
KAHLIL (PH): Thank you.
VOSSOUGHIAN: You look a lot like your mom.
KAHLIL (PH): Everybody say that.
And here is my oldest brother.
VOSSOUGHIAN: So this is your oldest brother, who is in a refugee camp now --
KAHLIL (PH): Right.
VOSSOUGHIAN: -- in Hamburg?
KAHLIL (PH): That's me and my youngest brother, Jawad (ph).
VOSSOUGHIAN: What happened to your brother?
KAHLIL (PH): The TV fall on his head when he was 3 years old.
(Speaking foreign language).
VOSSOUGHIAN: Can you ask Jawad (ph) if he misses you?
(Speaking foreign language).
KAHLIL (PH): He say yes.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Come on, Yami (ph).
Did you do any foot work?
KAHLIL (PH): Not really.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No?
KAHLIL (PH): Only this.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ooh, whoa!
VOSSOUGHIAN: You seem like you really love soccer.
Why don't you play here?
KAHLIL (PH): I mean, if you have -- play soccer after school, you have to stay after school for sometimes two hours. And I have to catch the bus. I will be home by 8 o'clock. And I still have others, like homework (INAUDIBLE) to study.
So I feel, no, I should study instead of playing soccer in school.
I was lucky to come up here and get education and be in safe place.
VOSSOUGHIAN: If your family were able to come here, would you want to stay?
KAHLIL (PH): Yes, I would stay.
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ALLEN: I certainly hope his family is reunited in the new year.
Well, in case you had no snow for Christmas, we'll show you -- [03:20:00]
ALLEN: -- life at an Arctic dogsled camp, where they have plenty of snow and, as you know, some adorable puppies.
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ALLEN: Welcome back.
After an oddly warm Christmas in much of the world, it's nice to know some places never want for snow. One such place is Norway, where a local guide introduced Arwa Damon to life at a dogsled camp.
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My name is (INAUDIBLE). And I'm a guide, working here on a small boat. And I'm a dogsled guide.
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What I do is I'm bringing in people from all over the world. And wintertime on sleds and in summertime and early fall on wagons.
If you have a bad morning, you get out in the dog yard. It's not possible to not be happy when you meet these dogs because they are always happy to see you.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can we get a puppy?
Oh, god. (INAUDIBLE).
Do you guys like the iPhone?
Will you take a picture of him kissing my nose?
(INAUDIBLE).
Oh, look, this one's in my (INAUDIBLE).
(LAUGHTER)
Oh, my god.
Can I get my hat back?
OK. All right. (INAUDIBLE).
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, I'm being overrun by cuteness. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Excuse me. Excuse me. I'm in the (INAUDIBLE).
Oh, thank you, (INAUDIBLE), thank you, thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does it smell of feet?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Smells of puppy love.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aww.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So this is the dog teams that we are going to use. So I will be driving dog team number one. Then the two of you will be driving dog team number two.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They are bred to do running. It's like a sheepherding dog would love to run, herding sheep. And these dogs, they want -- they love to run and pull a wagon.
You stand on top here. You can steer this like a bike, you see. We got long row of dogs, six dogs now.
When they go to the right, you have to do the same. The dogs are the ones that decided where we are going. We use the brakes like on a bike and we can stop.
We call this harness a cross back harness. Over here. And then over the nose and then when you're walking with them, you walk like this and they are like a two-wheel drive (ph) and they are easy to control.
They always get excited when they are going to run.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I found out that I like dogs here. I always knew that I really enjoy being out in the nature and especially in the wintertime. When you start to work with the dogs, you just get so many friends in the dog yard that it's -- you just have to continue working with them because they are your best friends.
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ALLEN: The humans are freezing and the dogs are just out working up a sweat. So cute.
Well, it is Boxing Day in many parts of the world. People are working up a sweat shopping. And shoppers are hoping to score some deals. This is the day they do that. Australians are predicted to spend $1.77 billion this year. That's up about 4 percent from last year.
In the U.K., analysts see Boxing Day sales topping $4 billion. Online shoppers got a jump on Boxing Day spending an estimated $1 billion starting on Christmas Day. Well, that's it for CNN NEWSROOM. Thanks so much for watching. Up
next here is "OPEN COURT."
