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Manhunt for Brussels Bombing Suspects; France Foils Terror Plot; Turkey Claims Europe Ignored Warnings; European Ministers Call for Airport Plan. Aired 4-4:30a ET

Aired March 25, 2016 - 04:00   ET

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

[04:00:14] VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: New terror raids and arrests across Europe. Investigators hunting for the two surviving Brussels bombers as an advanced terror plot is thwarted in Paris.

Good morning. And welcome to EARLY START. I'm Victor Blackwell.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Nice to see you this morning, Victor. I'm Christine Romans. It is Friday, March 25th. It is 4:00 a.m. in the East.

Our breaking news this morning in the battle against terror in Europe. Overnight, new raids -- new raids in Belgium leading to six new arrests. As we learn, investigators now know of several additional ISIS plots in Europe, possibly linked to the Brussels and Paris terror networks. Meantime the manhunt intensifying for these two suspects who survived the Brussels bombings. One man who dropped the bomb off at the airport and ran. The other who police say participated in the Metro bombing.

This as security forces thwart a planned terror attack in France. And we learn of new intelligence failures this morning. Top Belgian officials admitting mistakes were made.

We are covering the story the way only CNN can with correspondents around the world. I want to begin this morning with senior international correspondent Frederik Pleitgen. He is live for us in Brussels -- Fred.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Christine. Yes. It was a very active night here for the Belgian police around the Brussels area. There were raids right here where I'm standing. This is the Schaerbeek district, which of course is also the place where the terrorists who participated in the bombings of the airport and the Metro had that safe house from where they were building the bombs to hit those places. This is exactly the same area.

The raid here went on for several hours throughout the night. Large parts of this area were actually cordoned off. The latest that we're getting from the police is that apparently at this specific location, there were no arrests made. However, they did search at least one house and did have forensic units on hand as well.

In total last night, in this very active night, there were six arrests that were made. Three of them apparently in front of the federal prosecutor's office. There were three suspicious people in a vehicle there. It's not clear whether or not those people will remain in custody or whether or not they could be released throughout the day at this point.

There was also a raid in a place called Jette where apparently two arrests were made there. Again unclear in what relations that stands to the plot. However, the authorities here are telling us that the raids that were conducted throughout Brussels last night were all in relation to the attacks that happened on Tuesday at the airport as well as the Metro station.

So once again, very active night here on the part of the police as they continue to search for those two people who are unaccounted for. The one on that surveillance tape, the other one from the Metro where there has now also been a sketch that's been put out of that person who apparently was acting suspiciously before the bomb went off there -- Christine.

ROMANS: You know, Fred, quickly, there have been -- there have been some concern and frankly criticism of the Belgium government that they hadn't been doing overnight raids. That there was a moratorium on raids from like 9:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. Has something changed?

PLEITGEN: Yes. Yes, that has actually changed. You're absolutely right. There's been a lot of criticism of the Belgian police, of the Belgian Security Forces, also be Belgian intelligence services, quite frankly. The moratorium on night raids was something that was lifted after the Paris attacks. Shortly after the Paris attacks. That has since changed.

However, there certainly is still that criticism out there, also in the run-up to the attacks that happened here in Brussels where apparently at least one of the people who later became a bomber was deported from Turkey where the Turkish officials -- where Turkish Security Services went to the Belgians and said listen, we picked up this guy, we believe he could be related to terrorism. And apparently the Belgians said no, we don't have him on anything terrorism related. So instead the Turks then deported him to Holland and he was able to come here to Belgium.

There were also of course raids in other buildings that nearly captured the people who later took part in the attacks on the airport and at the Metro where the police was close to capturing them. However was never able to do that. By and large, there certainly is a lot of criticism of the intelligence sharing that goes on here.

ROMANS: Sure.

PLEITGEN: The intelligence gathering that goes on here, and quite frankly the police work as well.

ROMANS: All right. Thanks so much for that, Fred Pleitgen, for us in Brussels this morning.

BLACKWELL: Overnight in France, a terror plot foiled. A Paris suburb on lockdown as police conducted a major raid. They arrest a high- level militant who officials say was in the advanced stage of planning an attack.

New details are coming in and for the latest let's bring in senior European correspondent Jim Bittermann in our Paris bureau there.

Jim, good morning to you. And I wonder if authorities have revealed what led them to this would-be attacker?

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Victor, they haven't said what precisely led them to him, but they have been looking for him actively since January.

[04:05:06] And in fact, he was convicted -- he is 34 years old, a freshman. He was convicted last July in abstentia in Brussels along with Abdelhamid Abaaoud who is thought to be the ringleader behind the Paris attacks. They were convicted of trying to help young people go off to Iraq and Syria. Again convicted in abstentia. They have been looking for him since then. They found him yesterday in a suburb in southwestern Paris yesterday morning. And after interrogation, they discovered that in fact he had been using an apartment in another suburb southeastern Paris -- I'm sorry, it's northeastern Paris.

And in fact, they raided that apartment last night, very late. They, according to reports, police investigators found a small quantity of explosives and some arms in that apartment. The investigation is still ongoing. The Interior minister here, Bernard Cazeneuve, took the very unusual step of going on the air, on television last night at about 20 minutes to 11:00 local time just to say that these raids were taking place, perhaps to reassure people that in fact the French are on the case in case of terrorism. In any case, he said that the prosecutor would have more for us today on exactly the details on what's been found -- Victor.

BLACKWELL: All right. European authorities, of course, concerned that there are more attacks to come.

Jim Bittermann there in Paris for us. Thank you.

ROMANS: And they're also looking at all these mistakes made leading up to this. The Belgian authorities admitting mistakes were probably made leading up to Tuesday's deadly terror bombings. This morning there are new questions about how airport suicide bomber Ibrahim el- Bakraoui managed to slip through the cracks. The terrorist was deported by Turkey, which warned European officials this man was a militant. But after Bakraoui arrives, the Netherlands and Belgians set him free. Turkish president blasting the intelligence failure and saying it wasn't the first time Turkey warned European officials about a terrorist only to be ignored.

I want to go live to Turkey right now, bring in CNN's senior international correspondent Arwa Damon.

Good morning, Arwa.

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. And we're here in Gaziantep which is where Bakraoui was taken into custody. This is a fairly sizeable city located very close to the Syrian border. And over the last few years has become something of a hub for people who want to either move into the war zone, a number of aid organizations. But what it has also become is one of the main areas where foreign fighters come to then eventually cross into Syria. Many of them as we know only too well to join ISIS.

Now according to Turkish officials, Bakraoui arrived in the country first going to one of the touristic resort areas on the coast spending some time there. And then eventually making his way here. Something in his actions, we don't know exactly what it was, raised the suspicions of the Turkish counterterrorism unit. They are constantly on the lookout trying to monitor people they have lists of names. Bakraoui interestingly was not on any sort of list. He is someone who they started trailing of their own accord.

Now they say that they took him into custody. They firmly believe, no doubt in their mind whatsoever, that he was here trying to get into Syria to then join the fight with ISIS. The Turks say that they notified the Netherlands because that is where he was going to be deported to, as well as Belgian authorities shortly before they put him on a plane. Now the Dutch have fired back and said that sure, yes, they were informed of the deportation, but not of the reasons why.

The Belgians are acknowledging that there was perhaps a missed opportunity on their part. But then we have been hearing from some top Belgian officials, perhaps alluding to the fact that Turkey maybe should have been more forceful at how it presented its intelligence.

Turkey at this stage really feeling as if Europe is trying to scapegoat it for Europe's own mistakes because the Turkish president on down are all insistent that they provided the respective European nations with very clear details and very clear warning that this individual who was returning back to Europe had the intent of joining a terrorist organization like ISIS. And yes, not the first time this has happened

Another man who was flagged to the French, then went on to knife attack three soldiers in the south of that country, plus one of the Paris attackers is an individual that the Turks flagged to the French authorities as well.

And Turkey is a country that has been dealing with its own terrorism issues. There have been six bombings here since last summer. Some of them carried out by ISIS. Some of them carried out by the Kurdish separatists group or one of its affiliates. And Turkey's message has been for quite some time now, don't think that the violence is going to remain contained to the region. If you don't work with us, we can't help you protect yourself.

ROMANS: Certainly the terror just goes right through porous borders but the cooperation does not.

[04:10:03] Arwa Damon, thank you so much for that for us this morning in Turkey. BLACKWELL: As we've discussed this morning, officials are admitting

mistakes and the Belgians were even offering to resign. But can Europe fix its terror crisis? What European leaders are now planning as investigators warned new attacks could be coming.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: More now on those intelligence failures leading to this week's deadly terror bombings in Brussels. European leaders are trying to figure out how to plug those security gaps. Once again agreeing to implement a plan to share airport passenger data. It's the same plan they agreed to but failed to implement after the Paris terror attacks.

BLACKWELL: Let's go live to Washington and bring in CNN military analyst and former deputy director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, retired Colonel Cedric Leighton.

And Colonel Leighton, I want to start with what happened overnight in France because we know that this French national was in the advanced stages as described, planning this terror attack. The results of weeks of investigative work. I mean, it's fortunate that this person was not spooked or noticed anything out of the ordinary because we saw in Belgium this week that if they do they can expedite these plans pretty quickly.

[04:15:10] COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: That's right, Victor. And the French police were fortunate that they were able to get the suspect and get him in a way as you described without causing undue notice and without really alerting other members of terrorist cells.

Now we don't know what else is going on with ISIS in France or in Belgium. There may be a lot of them trying to go underground right now. But that very action in and of itself is also an indicator that there is something amiss and that may also lead authorities to those odd patterns of behavior and perhaps more suspects.

ROMANS: You know, we saw raids overnight as well. And there have been some criticism in months and years past that in Belgium, they wouldn't do nighttime raids. It was something that sort of routine in other parts of the world to catch suspects by surprise. Last night, there were some more raids. And this as we're learning more sort of about the missed signals in Ibrahim el-Bakraoui.

He was released early from a nine--year sentence for firing a Kalashnikov at police officers. Released early and then he tried to go -- it looks as though he tried to go to the Syrian battlefield. He was picked up by the Turks. Sent back to the Netherlands. The Turks say they warned European officials and he still got through.

Can we assume now that they are more vigilant in Brussels, in Belgium, in other European countries, more vigilant of these people who are criminals who they don't think are necessarily terrorists?

LEIGHTON: Christine, I would certainly hope so. But the problem that you've got is all of these old-fashioned attitudes. A lot of the Western European intelligence services don't trust the Turkish intelligence service and vice versa. So you're running into a situation where all of these different thoughts and ideas and prejudices frankly that have built up over the years are coming home to roost.

So hopefully this has been a huge wake-up call to the European services and frankly all of the intelligence services around the world that they really need to start paying attention in order to make those connections between -- as you mentioned the criminal world and the world of ISIS. That is perhaps a new nexus to examine. But it is something that really needs to be done if they're going to do something about these terrorists and make sure that we can roll up as many of them as possible.

BLACKWELL: Colonel, in the discussion of confidence or lack thereof in some part of the Belgian authorities, there seems to be a bit of an inconsistency here. We're hearing from European officials that there are more attacks planned. We know that there is that travel warning from the U.S. State Department for Americans going to Europe. We also know that there was that raid in France. But at the same time, Belgium has lowered its terror threat warning one notch.

What do you make of that? It seems not to reconcile.

LEIGHTON: You're right, Victor. It doesn't reconcile and so I do wonder if the reduction in Belgium of the terrorist threat level is a bit premature. It seems to me that, you know, at this point when you're going into an investigative mode like this and you're starting to roll up different terrorist elements, it is very important to maintain that very high terror threat level because it allows the police more powers than they would otherwise have had.

ROMANS: The core of all this, Colonel, the core of all of this, Victor, is that you have porous borders in Europe where people can come and go as they please with our without air travel, by the way.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

ROMANS: Can come and go as they pleased. But the governments there, the security services, is, you know, they're not working across borders the way terrorists are. And that is the big disconnect here right now.

Thank you so much for that, Colonel. We'll talk to you again very, very soon.

The race for president gets personal. Tensions between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz reaching new heights. The new name calling next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:23:21] BLACKWELL: Twenty-three minutes after the hour now. And the war of words over wives is escalating to outright hostility between Ted Cruz and Donald Trump. Cruz now lashing out at the Republican frontrunner at a campaign stop in Wisconsin. He called Trump a bully for attacking his wife Heidi.

Trump tweeted he'd spill the beans on Cruz's wife after a super PAC ran an ad, a negative ad in Utah featuring Trump's wife Melania. Cruz angrily telling the billionaire to back off.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have to say seeing him go deeper and deeper to the gutter, it's not easy to tick me off. I don't get angry often. But you mess with my wife, you mess with my kids, that will do it every time.

Donald, you are a sniveling coward. Leave Heidi the hell alone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: All right. A new CNN-ORC poll out giving us a first look at who voters would support if November's election comes down to frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. When voters were asked who agrees with you on important issues, Clinton 48 percent of the vote, topping Trump. The most important issue of all among the primary voters so far overwhelmingly the economy and jobs. But things like government spending, immigration, health care also top issues for some voters.

Remember this poll was done before the terror attacks in Brussels. You can best terrorism and national security are now on voters' minds as well.

Next who is in touch more with the middle class, Clinton a sizeable advantage here, 51 percent to Trump's 36 percent. 12 percent say neither are better in touched with the middle class. It doesn't mean Trump won't get some middle class votes. Trump's favorability rating among non-college grad, 39 percent unfavorable.

Look at this one. One of his highest favorability ratings among -- keep going here, 39 percent favorable, 58 percent unfavorable.

[04:25:10] And when you look at registered Republicans, the number skyrockets to 68 percent, higher than most other demographics.

BLACKWELL: Hillary Clinton getting a little coaching on her campaign speeches from none other than Jimmy Kimmel. The late-night host offering to be the Democratic frontrunner's secret weapon during her appearance on his show last night. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE": Just talk and I'll correct you whenever I feel the need.

(LAUGHTER)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, thank you. It's wonderful to be here with all --

KIMMEL: OK. Hold on one second.

(LAUGHTER)

CLINTON: Already?

KIMMEL: You're shouting. You're too loud. You're -- you don't have to shout like that. It hurts my ears. It comes off as little shrill for men. You know what would be nice? If you smiled then you put a little bit of -- you know, some teeth. Yes.

CLINTON: OK. All right. America is the greatest country on --

KIMMEL: Don't smile like that because it's too forced. It looks like you're faking it. Ask yourself, do I want to be president or do I want to be a Lakers girl?

(LAUGHTER)

CLINTON: It's like nothing I do is right.

KIMMEL: Exactly. You're not doing it right.

(LAUGHTER)

KIMMEL: I can't quite put my finger on it but there -- something is not -- you're not --

CLINTON: A man?

KIMMEL: Yes. That is it. You aren't a man. But that was really cute the way you did it, though.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Point made there.

ROMANS: All right. 26 minutes past the hour. New terror raids. New arrests across Europe overnight as investigators hunt for the surviving Brussels bombers. We've got live team coverage next.