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United Nations Unable to Deliver Aid to Syria; Turkish Border Remains Shut; Inside the Tokyo Game Show; Government Witnessed Accused President Duterte of Orchestrating Death Squads

Aired September 15, 2016 - 08:00   ET

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

ANDREW STEVENS, HOST: I'm Andrew Stevens in Hong Kong. A very good evening to you. We're going to step away now from CNN's election coverage

and turn instead to the situation in Syria.

Now, the United Nations says that it's still unable to send emergency aid into Syria now

three days into a cease-fire. This is video from the Russian ministry of defense, which says

it's monitoring the truce with a drone.

And Turkey's border, meanwhile, with Syria, gates remain shut. Syria says only aid shipments coordinate between itself and the UN will be allowed

into Aleppo. But the UN says it's still waiting for permission from the Syrian government.

Well, five years of war in Syria have transformed countless lives. Among them, a 10-year-old girl whose home was hit by a barrel bomb and the man

who saved her life.

CNN's Arwa Damon has this report with footage from the activist group Aleppo Media Center. And you may find -- be warned -- some of this is

disturbing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ARWA DAMON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Before the bombs, the siege, and the war, Mohammed Alaa Al- Jaleel was an electrician.

MOHAMMAD ALAA AL-JALEE, ELECTRICIAN: The plane dropped the barrel bombs.

DAMON: Before the death, the violence, and the hunger, 10-year-old Doha Al- Mohammed loved going to school.

DOHA AL-MOHAMMED: This stone that I am standing on used to be the roof of my bedroom.

DAMON: This is their story. Forever bonded together. For the last four years, Mohammed has been part of a volunteer emergency response unit in

Aleppo.

AL-JALEEL: We know the area that was targeted was a residential area, where civilians lived.

AL-MOHAMMED: I remember that there was a plane striking when I was peeling oranges for my siblings. After that, all of a sudden the house was blown

up.

AL-JALEEL: We were running, looking around, when we found the children who were thrown off the balcony onto the street. I looked back and saw Doha on

the ground.

DAMON: She had gone unnoticed in the chaos until Mohammed happened to glance back.

AL-MOHAMMED: I was really afraid, my body was really hurting me from all the debris that fell on me.

AL-JALEEL: I carried her, running to the ambulance as fast as I could trying to save her life, as I felt she was still alive.

DAMON: Barely alive, drifting in and out of consciousness. Doctors were able to stabilize her, but her younger sister, Yasmin, ended up in Turkey

for treatment. The siblings communicate by Facebook messenger.

DOHA: What are you doing?

YASMIN: I don't want to come back.

ABDULLAH, BROTHER: Why don't you want to come back?

YASMIN: Because there are air strikes. You come here, join me.

DAMON: But that is not an option for Doha and the rest of her family. Turkey only opens the border for medical emergencies. Doha says she feels

lost, her life in pieces. And that is where Mohammed, her savior, comes in again. He has built a playground for children and created a sanctuary for

stray cats.

AL-JALEEL: I felt like she was my own daughter, my own child. That I would all my life care about her. That's why every now and then, I check on her

and I bring her here to my garden.

DAMON: It's where we hear her laugh, where in Syria's battlefield, a child's gleeful cries are stolen moments.

Arwa Damon, CNN, Gaziantep, Turkey

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS: And we are going to be staying with this story in the hours ahead. Our Fred Pleitgen is actually now in Aleppo and will be making

contact with him and he'll be sharing what he's seen there, and particularly what it means to the residents who are trapped there that this

aid convoy is still not getting where it's most needed.

But right now, we're going to move to southeastern China where the remnants of an enormous typhoon are now dumping heavy rain on mountainous areas in

Fujian Province. Typhoon Meranti hit mainland China as the equivalent of a category 4 hurricane. It knocked down power and telecommunications lines.

And before it -- before that it sideswiped southern Taiwan. At least one person was killed

there, 44 others were injured.

The storm is wreaking havoc on holiday travel this weekend in the region as family celebrate the mid-autumn festival.

Let's go now to Matt Rivers. He says that the hotel that he and his crew were in as they rode out that storm in was literally swaying in the wind.

And obviously, Matt, incredibly powerful forces there. It's extraordinary that there has been such little loss of life.

But just describe to us the actual physical damage there.

MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Sure.

Well, I mean, you said it, Andrew, this was an incredibly intense storm for a relatively brief amount of time. So, when we came out of the hotel this

morning, we were perhaps not expecting to see the level of damage that we have. And it's really two things. It's, one, there are downed trees

everywhere; and two, there is flooding all over the place, hence the piles of sandbags like this one behind me.

The flooding means it's harder to get around. The downed trees means a loss of electricity and a loss of power. And that makes the cleanup

process that much harder to begin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: The day after can be a sobering one -- damage, debris, a bit of depression, and yet Ma Win Hua (ph), 72-year-old laughed, when she

described the storm.

She giggles at her unprompted impersonation of the wind, but quickly added that she's never

seen anything like this storm before.

Typhoon Meranti blew in with a swift brutality, driving rain propelled by 175-mile-an-hour gusts. It blanketed the city and forced everyone inside

for cover, including us in our hotel.

So that is what a typhoon coming ashore is the equivalent of a category 4 hurricane sounds

like. This door leads out to the roof, and it is just straining against these winds.

That door is shaking not because of the wind, it's shaking because the entire building is shaking.

Leaks sprang from everywhere, from windows to the elevator. The power went out too, part of outages that affected most in the city.

The peak winds lasted a few hours in the early morning. It felt longer. And when the sun rose in the morning, damage was done.

This building, one of the more dramatic scenes, nearly every window blown out, its splintered glass littering the parking lot below. Falling debris

destroyed this man's car.

"I deliberately picked this spot to park," says Soo Jing Chuan (ph).

I never thought this would happen. Falling glass aside, damage to wealthier areas was manageable. Flooding sporadic and limited.

Most of the city of Xiamen (ph) actually has pretty good infrastructure, able to withstand big storms, but that's not true in poorer neighborhoods

like this one with bad drainage and even worse construction.

Many homes have roofs made only as sheets of aluminum, often the first things that fly away when the rain comes and the winds (inaudible).

Chu Mao Chung (ph) works as a chef in this business. The roof fell and took profit with it.

With all that's been damaged, we've probably lost $2,000 worth of equipment, he says. That's money he'll have trouble making up.

For Ma Win Hua (ph), it's more personal.

"My clothes are all soaked," she says. "There's no power, no water. We just want this fixed for us and our neighbors."

But in the meantime, she remains resiliently cheerful. So when she finished with us, she went back to preparing the fish she was making for

dinner, trying to get back to normal after a night that was anything but.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: And of course, the question for all of these people who don't have running water or don't have electricity is when will they get those

services back. And Andrew, I'll tell you, I don't know if they asked me that question I would give them the answer they want

to hear because we were all over this city today, really, over the last 36 hours nonstop.

And we saw very, very few repair crews, very, very few people cleaning up the streets. That's going to have to happen before this sense of normalcy,

before the lights come back on, and before the water runs out of the tap once more.

ANDERSON: OK. Yeah, thanks for that. Matt, I hear you, though, on that. It is going to take some time, that's what we've been hearing, too, to

restore the services. To Xiamen (ph).

But all in all, no loss of life, perhaps they escaped lightly.

Matt Rivers in Xiamen (ph), thanks so much for that.

You're watching News Stream. We're going to take a short break. We'll be back in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(HEADLINES)

STEVENS: Now, the office of the Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is denying accusations that he directly ordered extrajudicial killings. The

claims relate to when Mr. Duterte was a local mayor and surfaced when a witness testified before a senate committee.

Alexandra Field has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He's been living in hiding, afraid for his life, now he's speaking out -- a government witness testifying against

Philippines' President Rodrigo Duterte says he worked as a hitman for the president back when Duterte was mayor of Davao.

Edgar Matobato said he killed 50 people between 1988 and 2013 on Duterte's orders. Matabato claims to be a former member of the Davao death squad, a

300-person group, which he says killed drug pushers, rapists, and thieves every day.

During his testimony, Matobato said Duterte had also ordered the group to attack mosques and kill Muslims, retribution for the 1993 bombing of the

Davao cathedral.

In gruesome detail, Matobato described their killing methods, saying they mutilated the bodies of their victims, cutting them up and dumping them on

the side of the road, wrapping them in masking tape sometimes to avoid identification, even feeding one body to a crocodile.

EDGAR MATOBATO, GOVERNMENT WITNESS (through translator): We throw them out to the sea. We cut open the boy, sometimes we put sand or sometimes hollow blocks.

FIELD: More than 1,000 people were killed in Davao by death squads during Duterte's terms as mayor from 1988 to 2013, according to Matobato. Duterte

didn't address Matobato's allegations during a public event where he spoke after the hearing, but his spokesman responded to reporters' questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think the president is capable of giving such directive?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Do I think he's capable? No, I don't think he's capable of giving a directive like that.

FIELD: He's also noting that the government human rights commission investigated

reports of extrajudicial killings in Davao but never brought charges against Duterte. Matobato says he's risking his life to testify. So far,

no other witnesses have corroborate his claims made to a senate committee that's investigating the alleged killings as part of the president's war on

drugs.

The president has publicly called for police and even civilians to kill drug pushers if they're threatened. More than 1,100 people have been

killed in police operations since Duterte's term started in July, another 2,035 deaths are currently under investigation, according to the national

police chief.

In Hong Kong, Alexandra Field, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS; The UK anti-doping agency is condemning the latest release of athletes' confidential medical records. The World Anti-Doping Agency said

on Wednesday that Russian hackers leaked medical data of about 25 more Olympic athletes. Earlier this week, the same

criminal group posted records of four Americans. Agency officials say athletes from eight countries were targeted in the latest attack. They

include ten from the U.S., five each from Germany and Britain, and one each from the Czech Republic, Denmark, Poland, Romania,

and Russia.

Still to come here on News Stream, shaped like a full moon and chock full of calories -- join us in the kitchen as we celebrate mid-Autumn Festival

with this very special Chinese dish.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STEVENS: Beautiful clear night here in Hong Kong on the eve of the mid- Autumn festival. Welcome back. You're watching News Stream.

Now, Japan's biggest gaming convention is now under way, and fans are trying out all the

latest games and consoles at the Tokyo game show, and some even got to test Sony's new Playstation virtual reality headset.

Now, Will Ripley has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Welcome to the Tokyo game show. From the moment you step in here, (inaudible) Activision Center, you are literally

surrounded by the sights and sounds of the gaming industry.

The organizers of this event, which has been going on for the last 20 years, are quick to

point out all of the records being broken this year -- 614 exhibitors from 37 different countries and regions, 1,000 new video games on display, and

several hundred thousand people are expected to attend.

Yet, two of the biggest names in the gaming industry are noticeably absent, Microsoft and

Nintendo. They are holding their own separate events, which means that the main attraction here in

Tokyo is just down this way at the enormous Sony exhibit.

You're seeing right now a demonstration of the next big thing for the Playstation brand, it's the virtual reality headset that users of

Playstation 4 will be able to buy beginning next month. Whether or not it will be in commercial success is yet to be seen, but certainly this product

generating a lot of interest here.

Also the PS4 Pro. This is the first time that someone has tried to upgrade a console in the middle of its life span. This product, the Pro, is

designed primarily for people with 4K televisions, looking for an ultra high-definition gaming experience.

Nintendo may not have a display here, but you can still find some people playing Pokemon Go.

Of course, Nintendo and Sony are still major players in the gaming world, but for a lot of Japanese gaming companies, this really is a fading

business. Take, for example, Konami, or Sega just down the way there. They're no longer what they once were, much like the Tokyo game show

itself.

Now in its 20th year, this used to be the epicenter of the global gaming world. This is where all the new products were launched. And that's just

not the case anymore. A lot of these games have already been out for months.

Still, this is a rare opportunity for hundreds of thousands of people, some of them in costume, to come here and test out games months before they'll

be able to play them at home.

At the Tokyo Game Show, Will Ripley, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS: As long as I keep going with the costumes, it's all good.

Now, a few countries obviously are as closely associated with video games as Japan. And Tokyo's presentation at the Rio Games, you'll remember,

actually full of gaming references are, including the appearance of the prime minister, Shinzo Abe, dressed as Nintendo's Mario.

But in some ways, that presentation only highlighted the country's declining influence on the industry. Mario and Pacman, those two gaming

icons featured at the Olympics, were both created over 30 years ago.

Now, the Chinese billionaire who bought out the gay dating app Grindr is shelling out $1.1 billion to his wife in a massive divorce settlement.

Zhou Yahui, chairman of Beijing Kulun Tech, will transfer hundreds of millions of shares to his spouse.

Now, this breakup is more expensive than the $975 million that U.S. oil tycoon Harold Hand (ph) paid his ex-wife last year.

Now, this might not be the latest multimillion dollar divorce settlement in China either. The country's divorce rate has soared in recent years.

But on this day, it's unity that's on everyone's mind in China. Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth month of lunar

calendar. Now, the tradition involves families getting together to share moon cakes.

And Alexandra Field learns how to make this favorite dessert.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARIA CORDERO, CELEBRITY CHEF: This is very traditional. Now you can buy a moon cake just easy to do that.

FIELD: Yeah, it's a big business.

CORDERO: Yes.

This is the lotus seed. Boil it, fry it and mix it with sugar.

FIELD: Or can just buy it.

CORDERO: Yes, or you can just buy it.

FIELD: What does the moon cake symbolize?

CORDERO: Whenever there's Mid-Autumn Festival, the moon is round, definitely, for 1,300 years, it's round. The skin is actually very easy.

It's just flour, syrups, oil and alkaline water.

This is the salted duck egg.

FIELD: So everyone's seen the really fancy moon cakes in those gift boxes. Do you think the homemade ones are really better?

CORDERO: Of course. There's a lot of love there like Thanksgiving Turkey. Is it mom's turkey that tastes better? Yes.

FIELD: Depends on your mom.

CORDERO; We make it little by little.

FIELD: Beautiful.

CORDERO: After baking it, you have to put it there, leave it for three days. If some lady just grab it and eat it, this woman have no patience.

FIELD: You're judging her.

CORDERO: Yes.

(LAUGHTER)

FIELD: These are about a 1,000 calories each.

CORDERO: Yes.

FIELD: Am I supposed to eat the whole thing?

CORDERO: No, you cut. We just cut it into small pieces so everybody take a piece.

So you taste sweet and everybody have a smile on their face and the whole family gather together. So for respect, we get the most to the eldest.

You try it. This is (inaudible).

FIELD: Did I learn something?

CORDERO: Yeah, you learned something.

FIELD: Well done.

CORDERO: Yeah. How do you like it?

FIELD: I like it a lot. Better than store bought.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEVENS: Alex still having a good time there.

Now, one of the other traditions of the Mid-Autumn Festival is moon gazing. Some places had giant models of the moon, like this one, on display in case

cloudy weather from typhoon Meranti actually blocked views of the real moon, only the plan went awry. Take a look at this. This is what happens

when you get winds from a typhoon meeting a giant inflatable moon.

This happened in Fuzhou. It's great vision, this.

Now, the moon, as you can see bouncing around the city, rolling over streets, cars and some pretty confused pedestrians moving very, very

quickly to get out of the way.

And that's News Stream. I'm Andrew Stevens. Don't go anywhere. World Sport with Amanda Davies is just ahead.

END