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President Trump Addresses North Korean Issue; New Zealand Plans to Kill Invasive Mammals; Harvard Art Museums Catalogues Pigments

Aired November 09, 2017 - 04:00   ET

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


CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: We welcome our viewers worldwide to CNN, your daily objective explanation of what`s going on in the world. I`m Carl

Azuz.

Today`s show starts in eastern Asia, where a recent speech by U.S. President Donald Trump was closely watched around the world. Speaking in

front of South Korea`s national assembly, its lawmaking body, President Trump addressed the international standoff over North Korea`s nuclear

program.

The day before, he`d said that it, quote, makes sense for North Korea to come to the table and to make a deal that`s good for its people and others

worldwide. But in his address Wednesday, the American leader warned the north whose border is 35 miles away from where he was standing, not to

underestimate or try the U.S.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The weapons you are acquiring are not making you safer. They are putting your regime in grave

danger. Every step you take down this dark path increases the peril you face. North Korea is not the paradise your grandfather envisioned. It is

a hell that no person deserves.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ: For their part, North Korean government officials said, quote, we don`t care about what that mad dog may utter because we`ve already heard

enough. They said the United States was threatening them with three American aircraft carriers and a submarine currently positioned off the

coast of the Korean Peninsula. After his stop in South Korea, President Trump headed for China, a country that accounts for 95 percent of North

Korea`s trade.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ (voice-over): Ten-second trivia:

Which of these letters is not found in the Greek alphabet?

Omicron, Mu, Upsilon or Zed?

While Zed appears in the English alphabet, it is not part of the Greek alphabet which contains Zeta.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ: Today`s it`s tradition for American fraternities and sororities to use Greek letters and all of those organizations have been suspended,

independently, from Florida State University. The reason: a 20-year-old pledge to the Phi Kappa Phi fraternity died after going to a party last

Thursday night.

An FSU school spokesman says Andrew Coffey was a junior who transferred to the university this semester. He was studying civil engineering. Police

say alcohol might have been a factor in Coffey`s death, but they`re waiting on an autopsy to know for sure.

But the university banned all fraternity and sorority events and meetings, and it`s president says there needs to be a new normal and a new culture

for the suspension to be lifted. He wants students to participate in solving the issue.

Coffey`s death isn`t the only problem to come up at fraternities at FSU and beyond. Several fraternity pledges across the U.S. have died in recent

years. The CEO of Phi Kappa Phi says the organization`s thoughts and prayers are with Coffey`s family and friends.

A highly toxic poison is being spread across the South Pacific islands of New Zealand. It`s laced in the carrot chunks in cereal and it`s intended

to kill every wild mammal with teeth instead of a beak and fur instead of feathers.

Scientists believe that New Zealand has no native land mammals, that only birds and a couple of species of bats existed there when humans arrived.

Some birds were apparently hunted to extinction. Others were decimated by animals like rats that arrived on ships. So, the government wants to get

rid of its predators.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL WEIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: What`s this guy?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is a pretty special opportunity. This is a takahe. They were (INAUDIBLE) high in the mountains in Fiordland in 1948,

and they`re one of our most endangered birds. There`s only 280 left in the planet.

WEIR (voice-over): And it`s not just the birds on the brink here. The tuatara is New Zealand`s most iconic reptile native. Looks like a lizard,

but it`s really the sole survivor of an order that goes back to the dinosaurs.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They`re entirely endangered.

WEIR (on camera): Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So, the problem for these guys is again, they evolved in the presence of avian predators, not mammals.

WEIR: Right.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So, when their response when threatened, you know, from above, when threatened at all, is to freeze. And if you freeze and

you`ve got a rat or a dog (ph) or a cat behind you, it`s game over.

WEIR (voice-over): So, Zealandia is one of the last few places that tuatara or a takahe can relax.

But Kiwis are not content with just predator free parks. They want to make New Zealand a predator free country.

(on camera): It is a plan so audacious in scope, it`s been called New Zealand`s Apollo Project, that is wipe out every rat, every mouse, every

possum, every weasel. Hundreds of millions of predatory mammals by the year 2050. And to pull it off, they`ll have to spread millions of tons of

poison all over this incredibly beautiful country.

(voice-over): But as much as Kiwis love the kiwi, not everyone thinks this is a great idea.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: While most New Zealanders have said they support protecting their island`s native species and the killing of the predators in uninhabited

areas, there are concerns about spreading poison around. For one thing, it can kill pigs and deer, which aren`t native to the islands, but aren`t

targeted predators either. For another, experts say the poison won`t work on its own and neither will things like fences.

Some scientists have proposed genetically modify certain predators to keep them from breathing. Technology for that doesn`t even exist now and some

members of the public don`t support using it anyway.

This project is massive and so is the cost, estimates to carry it out range from tens of millions of dollars to several billions. And keeping other

invasive species from arriving in the meantime is also a challenge.

Next, a great big story about pigments, substances that become paint or ink when they`re mixed with liquid. The Harvard Art Museums have more than

2500 pigment samples. Their collection started over a hundred years ago when a museum director notice that the medieval paintings he brought home

were quickly deteriorating. So, he started collecting pigments as well as paintings.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NARAYAN KHANDEKAR, DIRECTOR, STRAUS CENTER, HARVARD ART MUSEUM: It can be beetles that come off a cactus. It can be the dried urine of a cow.

Little insects that grow on an oak tree. A chunk of lead that`s soaked in vinegar. It`s truly amazing.

SUBTITLE: Collecting the world`s colors.

KHANDEKAR: We`re in Harvard University outside the Forbes pigment collection.

Pigment is a very small particle of colored material that is mixed in with the binding medium. The pigment gives paint is color.

The Forbes pigment collection is being brought together over several decades. We have around 2500 pigments. We have a lot of very unusual and

very rare colors.

So, this is I think one of the more unusually named pigments. It`s called dragon`s blood. It doesn`t come from dragons. It comes from rattan palms

and it gives a very bright red pigment.

The unusual aspect of mummy has to do with its source rather than the color itself. And that comes from Egyptian mummies. And it`s the resin that`s

applied to the outside of the bandages.

I think the rarest color that we have is actually an entire bowl of Indian yellow, and this is a pigment that is made from the dried urine of cows

that are fed only on mango leaves.

If you`re looking at the work of art and you want to understand what is original and what`s a restoration, you will take a tiny supple of pigment

and analyze it. A lot of the pigments are actually toxics. You don`t want to handle the pigments and then go out to lunch.

There`s a green called emerald green that has an arsenic scent to it. We can`t use them for telling if something is real or not. People will say

this is by a certain artist and we can look at the materials that he used, and decided if those materials were available during that artist`s

lifetime. If not, then we have to look at who might have painted that picture.

I can`t pick a personal favorite. It`s like asking to pick a favorite child. No, the other 2400 would feel left out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: A UFO has landed in someone`s yard in Boise, Idaho. But what`s stepped out was completely unexpected. This is a chicken. It`s actually a

chicken coop. And while it didn`t fall out of the sky, the couple who built it loved space stuff. So, they took satellite dishes, added some

flashing lights and even climate control to keep the animals warm, and voila, a chicken coop that`s said to be out of this world.

Now, some of the animals appeared to be a little hesitant to climb back in. You can say they were (INAUDIBLE). But others were plucky enough to call

it home, it`s like their star chick enterprise, their millennium chicken, their USS defowlant, a truly tasteful place to be coop up, up, and away.

And we`re glad you peck CNN 10 and hope you`ll be back again tomorrow. I`m Carl Azuz.

END