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At Least 49 Killed In Terror Attacks On New Zealand Mosques; Facebook Removes Graphic Video Believed To Show Mosque Shooting; North Korea Says It May Suspend Nuclear Talks With U.S.; Israel Retaliates After Rockets Fired From Gaza; Senate Rejects President Trump's National Emergency. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired March 15, 2019 - 05:30   ET

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

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[05:30:07] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACINA ARDERN, PRIME MINISTER OF NEW ZEALAND: We believe that 40 people have lost their lives in this act of extreme violence.

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DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: A terror attack targeting two mosques in New Zealand. At least 49 dead in Christchurch. Three suspects in custody.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN ANCHOR: Also breaking North Korea threatens to suspend nuclear talks with the United States. A stern warning overnight from the foreign minister.

Welcome back to EARLY START. I'm Alison Kosik. Good morning.

BRIGGS: Good morning, Alison. Good morning to all of you. I'm Dave Briggs, 5:30 Eastern time.

We start with that breaking news overnight. At least 49 people killed in a terror attack in New Zealand. Police say the mass shootings happened at two mosques in Christchurch, the country's third-largest city. Nearly 50 are in the hospital and much of the city remains on lockdown.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARDERN: It is clear that this can now only be described as a terrorist attack. From what we know, it does appear to have been well planned.

MIKE BUSH, POLICE COMMISSIONER, NEW ZEALAND: We are currently dealing with an unprecedented situation in New Zealand. It's very grave.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: They have raised the terror threat level from low to high in New Zealand.

Officials say three people connected to the attack are in custody. Police are not aware of others involved but cannot rule out the possibility more shooters are at large.

Here's what an eyewitness told CNN.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOHAN IBN IBRAHIM, WITNESS TO MOSQUE ATTACK: The barricade (ph) was there. We had to jump out of the wall and still we were like hearing the sound of the gun. They just continued the shooting for maybe 10 to 15 minutes. And later on, we used the backside and then came out on the other street.

And since then, the police -- we called the police and I went to live (ph). And when I came to the shooter I saw that one person got the shot on his chest and the ambulance came and the police came there. The doctor was taking care of him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Jackson Williams of Sky News Australia is in Christchurch at this hour. He joins us live on the phone. Jackson, what can you tell us?

JACKSON WILLIAMS, NEW ZEALAND REPORTER, SKY NEWS AUSTRALIA (via telephone): Good evening from Christchurch. It's good to be with you.

I arrived here in the city in New Zealand's South Island in the past two hours. I'm currently outside the Christchurch Hospital. Inside, just under 50 people -- 48 people who are being treated for gunshot wounds and around 20 of those people have very serious injuries.

As it currently stands, the death toll is at 49. That was revised in the past hour. Earlier we were told it was 40, but tragically -- sadly, it has been revised. That death toll currently sitting at 49.

Forty-one of those people were killed at one mosque very close to Christchurch's City Centre on Deans Avenue that were killed across town on the other side of Christchurch in Linwood. And then, further, one person died in a hospital from their -- from their injuries.

Also, authorities here in Christchurch told me that, as I say, 48 people are currently being treated for their gunshot wounds at 12 operating theaters currently in use, given the magnitude of this event, described as unprecedented by the New Zealand prime minister Jacina Ardern.

As you can imagine, the health authorities here in Christchurch -- at Christchurch have their resources reached to the limit. This is such a tragedy not just for Christchurch -- it goes without saying -- but for all New Zealanders with 49 people confirmed dead. That death toll, sadly, could yet rise.

Jacina Ardern, the New Zealand prime minister -- she has described today as a very dark day for New Zealand.

BRIGGS: Indeed, New Zealand's darkest day.

Jackson Williams is live for us -- Sky News reporter from Australia outside the hospital. We'll check back with you with any updates.

Let's go now to Anna Coren who is live for us in Hong Kong. She's been following this story.

Anna, what can you tell us about this video posted online on Facebook, streaming this deadly mass shooting?

ANNA COREN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is one of the most gruesome things that I've ever seen, Dave. It goes for some 17 minutes.

The gunman, an Australian citizen in his late 20s, had a camera strapped to his helmet.

He drives to the mosque, he gets out of his car, he picks up several semiautomatic weapons. He walks into the mosque through the gate and starts firing at people standing outside, walks in those front doors and just mows down every single person in his path.

[05:35:00] You can hear these people screaming, moaning, crying out for help.

He reloads in a corridor, walks back out, and his killing spree continues. He is methodical, he is calculated, he is extremely calm. There wasn't an urgency. There was no panic from what you could see in the way that he moved.

He then walked outside the mosque on the pavement, starts firing in either direction at people who have obviously come out after hearing this rapid gunfire. He reloads at his car, walks back inside the mosque and continues his massacre.

There were bodies lying everywhere -- dozens of bodies lying everywhere. And he walks up to those bodies and at point-blank range executes each and every one of them.

He then walks out, sees a woman on the pavement. He shoots her. Walks up, fires at her head.

And then gets into his car and drives off. He is firing out the window screen, he is firing out the passenger window.

This is the behavior, obviously, of a madman -- of a deranged man, and yet he is just talking normally. He laughs at one point.

And then he reaches a pedestrian crossing and stops allowing these pedestrians to walk across the road. We presume from there, Dave, he has been driven to the second mosque.

The killing spree lasts six minutes in total. The video that was streamed live on Facebook went for 17 minutes. The New Zealand prime minister, Jacina Ardern, has asked that this

video not be shared and not be shown. Police have reinforced this because it obviously is so gruesome, so graphic. It is not something that people want to see and it is also not a message that wants -- they want to be -- to be spread -- Dave.

BRIGGS: That's right. Anna Coren live for us in Hong Kong at 5:36 p.m. there.

And folks, Anna's from Australia but she told us earlier having spent a lot of time in New Zealand, it's one of the most peaceful and welcoming countries in the world. I can say the same thing, having spent several weeks there. The nicest people you will ever meet. That country will never be the same.

Anna, thanks so much for your insight.

KOSIK: A country where it's rare to have gun violence at all.

BRIGGS: Extraordinarily rare.

KOSIK: All right, let's bring in CNN law enforcement analyst and retired FBI supervisory special agent James Gagliano.

You know, now, officials are calling this massacre a terror attack.

JAMES GAGLIANO, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST, RETIRED SUPERVISORY SPECIAL AGENT, FBI: That was pretty unique -- I mean, last night for us. Obviously, it was during the daytime in New Zealand.

But, the P.M., Jacina Ardern, said with no equivocation, this is a terrorist attack. Now, why is that important?

We're always very careful about assigning motive to a crime in the immediate aftermath. We don't want to get ahead of things. We want to follow the evidence.

Well, they had enough evidence. They had an 87-page screed, which some of us have seen on social media. They had the video. They have the gunman's own words in the live streaming.

What is terrorism? Well, terrorism is violence or intimidation in pursuit of political or social goals. And obviously, if you go through -- Dave, as we talked earlier --

BRIGGS: Yes.

GAGLIANO: -- that 87-page screed, plenty of politics in there. So that's why it's being called terrorism.

It's important to note, too, that New Zealand is one of the Five Eyes in the intelligence community. We call the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada -- five English-speaking countries that share this type of information.

Military information intel-related to terrorism and the like. So I'm sure that we've been talking to them and trying to figure out is this a localized plot or is this something that's bigger and broader.

KOSIK: Yes, or was there any indication or was there any chatter before this happened.

GAGLIANO: Most importantly here, are there any other further follow- on attacks. Now, it's important to note last week I spoke to a senior FBI official at FBI headquarters who said that currently right now in the U.S. we have 5,000 open terrorism investigations. I'm sure across Europe it's probably similar numbers.

BRIGGS: The investigation clearly goes to this manifesto you mention, which we cannot confirm at CNN was that of the shooter. But it sure reads like it, talking about an attack planned two years in advance in Christchurch.

It has a mention of the president, Donald Trump. It has a mention of Candace Owens, a Trump supporter. It has a mention of being inspired by Fortnite, the video game that so many millions of Americans play. And a lot of references to the United States and our Second Amendment.

But again, we cannot confirm that is of the shooter, but there were links to this Facebook stream of the killing.

What can you tell us from watching that disturbing video, the type of ideology here?

GAGLIANO: The level of depravity and inhumanity. I've seen a lot of things in 25 years in the FBI and eight years in the military, but the level of inhumanity -- the way it was such an antiseptic manner of just -- and it was described earlier by one of the reporters "a madman." There's no other way. A sociopath or psychopath that could walk into a house of worship and just so blithely execute people.

Make no mistake about it, 59 (sic) people were executed. And unfortunately, as we know in these type of incidents, in the immediate aftermath that death toll could climb. There are a number of people in the hospital as well.

[05:40:06] KOSIK: Yes, 49 people killed.

It is chilling when you hear Anna Coren describe the video. He was calm, he was calculated, and he even laughed during --

GAGLIANO: Yes.

KOSIK: -- this execution.

You know, let's talk about the gun laws in New Zealand. You know, in all of 2017 there were just 35 murders countrywide. Gun violence is rare.

Talk to us about the gun laws in New Zealand.

GAGLIANO: Thirty-five murders but less than double-digits in murders by guns there. So we know that New Zealand is a country of 4.6 million people. There is an estimate of about 1.2 million guns there, so one gun for every four people there.

Now, in the wake of a 1990 mass shooting in New Zealand, 13 people were killed and they tightened up some of their gun laws. But, New Zealand is -- it's obviously much more lax than Australia, as most countries are --

BRIGGS: Right.

GAGLIANO: -- but it's also one of the most permissive non-U.S. countries in the world. Yet --

BRIGGS: But tighter than ours.

GAGLIANO: But tighter than ours.

You have to be over the age of 16, you must be licensed. You don't need to register the weapons but you must be licensed. You have to have a criminal history background check, mental health review, attend a safety program.

You've got to give authorities an explanation of how the gun is to be used. Your residence must be visited by authorities to make sure you've got a secure storage facility there. You've got to get testimonials from friends and associates.

That's more than we have here. So, I mean, in that sense, yes.

But to your point, 35 homicides there last year. And again, I think three years ago there were 11, but most of the time it's in single digits by gun violence.

BRIGGS: A day like this can and will undoubtedly change everything as we know it in New Zealand.

Needless to say, though, they're not all that familiar with terrorism -- counterterrorism. Do they seek U.S. help on an investigation like this, and where does it go now?

GAGLIANO: They have to. And again, they're part of the Five Eyes so we do a lot of intelligence sharing with those other four countries. It's going to be very important getting out in front of this because was this a plot that was just localized or is this something part of a broader or bigger terrorist profile.

BRIGGS: A lot of questions as we move forward.

KOSIK: All right, James Gagliano. Thanks so much.

GAGLIANO: You got it.

BRIGGS: Jimmy, thanks.

KOSIK: All right. Breaking overnight, North Korea announcing it may suspend nuclear talks with the United States. This is the largest fallout so far from last month's fallout -- failed Hanoi summit.

Let's go live to Seoul and bring in Paula Hancocks. What are you learning?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alison, this was a press briefing, effectively, to those reporters in Pyongyang by the Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui. And she said that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is now trying to figure out if he wants to continue diplomatic talks with the United States.

Also saying that he is trying to figure out if he is going to keep that moratorium on testing of nuclear -- nuclear tests and missile weapons. Now, we know that the U.S. president, after the Hanoi summit, had said that Kim Jong Un gave his guarantee he wouldn't be doing nuclear and missile testing. So the fact that his has come up now is quite interesting.

One thing she did say was, quote, "We have no intention to yield to the U.S. demands put forward at the Hanoi summit in any form, nor are we willing to engage in negotiations of this kind."

Now, once again, she did point out as well that even though Mr. Trump said they were asking for all sanctions to be lifted, they say that is not true. They were only asking for ones related to the people of North Korea.

She also went on to say, "The U.S. were too busy with pursuing their own political interests and had no sincere intention to achieve a result."

So this has really added to the playbook of North Korea, putting pressure on the United States on the other side.

Interestingly though, they're not actually pointing out Mr. Trump as being at fault, saying there's still a good relationship between the leader of North Korea and the United States. Pointing out that John Bolton, the National Security adviser, and the U.S. Secretary of State were more to blame -- Alison.

KOSIK: Certainly running counter to the optimism from the U.S. on how talks were going -- all right.

CNN's Paula Hancocks, thanks so much.

BRIGGS: And again, that mention to the chemistry of Kim Jong Un and President Trump described as "mysteriously wonderful."

All right, we have breaking news in New Zealand, in North Korea, the Middle East, and new information on the Ethiopian Airlines crash, and much more. Stay with us.

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[05:48:33] KOSIK: The latest on the breaking news out of New Zealand.

Police in the city of Christchurch confirm 49 people were killed in a terror attack at two mosques. Forty-eight more have been wounded. Muslims were gathering for prayer services when the gunman walked in and systematically murdered as many as he could.

Police charging one 28-year-old man with murder. Two others remain in custody.

Two IEDs were found attached to one of the attacker's cars.

Stay with CNN for updates as we get them.

BRIGGS: Israel retaliating overnight after rockets targeted Tel Aviv for the first time since the 2014 war with Hamas. Israel hitting targets in Gaza following the attack, and there's reporting in the last few minutes Israel Defense Forces think the attack may not have been sanctioned by Palestinian leaders.

CNN's Melissa Bell at the Israel-Gaza border. Melissa, what can you tell us about that reporting?

MELISSA BELL, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Dave, what we're hearing -- this is from the Israeli media who are suggesting that that's the IDF's assessment at this stage. And we're really getting a sense that after that flare-up of tensions that you were just talking about overnight, there is a willingness on all sides to really see a de-escalation along this border just behind me at this stage.

On one hand, we're hearing from inside Gaza that those weekly Friday protests have now been canceled. They've been going on for a year now. Today, they were due. They've, in fact, been canceled given what happened overnight.

[05:50:00] We've also been speaking to a spokesman for Islamic Jihad, one of the groups that functions inside Gaza, suggesting that perhaps it was time that the -- there should be some sort of de-escalation to what had happened over the course of the last 24 hours.

I think everyone was really taken by surprise by the fact that those rockets should have made their way to Tel Aviv, not intercepted by the Iron Dome system. But no fatalities, no casualties at all.

Some surprise, really, that they should have come as quickly as they did when no one had really expected at this stage, Dave, a flaring up of the tensions along this particular border.

So on all sides, we're really hearing that there is a sense -- we're getting a sense, rather, that perhaps everyone is looking to put the lid back on this and really keep this flare-up from becoming any more serious than it has been already.

BRIGGS: All right. Melissa Bell live for us at the Israel-Gaza border at just about noon there. Thanks, Melissa.

KOSIK: Our first glimpse this morning of the final moments in the cockpit of a doomed Ethiopian Airlines jet that crashed on Sunday, killing all 157 people on board.

"The New York Times" reports the captain called controllers in a panicky voice three minutes into the flight as the plane accelerated to abnormal speed.

BRIGGS: Someone who reviewed air traffic communications tells the "Times" the captain radioed, "Break, break, request back to home" and then asked for a route back to the runway.

Controllers saw the new 737 MAX 8 was climbing and plunging hundreds of feet in just seconds, a clear sign something was very wrong.

Today is veto day at the White House. President Trump expected to hold a public ceremony to mark the first veto of his presidency after suffering a humiliating defeat in the Republican-controlled Senate. Twelve members of his own party joining forces with the Democrats to reject the president's national emergency declaration for border wall funding.

President Trump responding quickly to the vote with a one-word tweet, "VETO!"

If the current totals hold, there will not be enough votes to override the president.

Let's bring in "Washington Post" congressional reporter, Karoun Demirjian, a CNN political analyst. Good to see you this morning, Karoun.

KOSIK: Good morning.

BRIGGS: Twelve Republicans -- a stunning rebuke but arguably, it could have been a lot higher.

If Thom Tillis had stuck with his words in "The Washington Post", if Ted Cruz would have backed up his rhetoric, if Ben Sasse would have stuck the Constitution, it could have easily been 15 or 16.

But what does this rebuke mean for the president's national emergency?

KAROUN DEMIRJIAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: It means, basically, that you've seen now play out in real time and in an actual vote the frustration that exists in the GOP about the way that Trump is approaching border security and has been for a long time.

There has never been complete support for his strategy of prioritizing the wall. And yes, I know that we've been -- we've heard various descriptions of what it actually is over the last several months as this debate has been playing out in various stages.

But the GOP has never been fully behind what the president wanted to do. And yet, when push came to shove, not everybody who had been very critical of him and very critical of this kind of power grab of the authority to be able to divert funds away from Congress. This is kind of the most sacred power that the Legislative Branch has.

And they didn't fight back in as large numbers as you might have excepted, listening to the way that members of the Senate, members of Congress, and the GOP were talking about this being an overreach. It's also interesting that of the 12 who voted against the president, only one of them is up for reelection in 2020, and that's Susan Collins who has often broken with what the -- with what the president wants to do, anyhow, in the past. And so that tells you maybe a little bit of something about what the competing motivations are.

Trump still wields a lot of power in the GOP --

BRIGGS: Yes.

DEMIRJIAN: -- even if people don't like what the policy issues are that he espouses.

BRIGGS: It could come back to haunt one Cory Gardner up for reelection in Colorado --

DEMIRJIAN: Yes.

BRIGGS: -- and now, a very blue state. Thom Tillis also up for reelection. Perhaps that's why he shifted.

It now goes to the courts. And you wonder how much the words of the president saying, "I can do the wall over a longer period of time. I didn't need to do this." You wonder if those words come back to haunt him. We shall see.

KOSIK: Yes. Let's completely switch gears and talk about North Korea --

BRIGGS: Right.

KOSIK: -- because we have Kim Jong Un considering suspending talks with the U.S.

BRIGGS: According to his foreign minister.

KOSIK: According to his foreign minister -- and rethinking a ban on missile tests. This, despite all the optimism coming from the U.S.

So was all that talk about Trump and Kim Jong Un being buddies much ado about nothing?

DEMIRJIAN: Well, I think that you've seen this talk about 'oh, we are fine -- it's just the situation around us is not that great' coming from both sides. And I think that that's been -- and both of these leaders have egos that need to be buoyed and the relationship between the two of them is what they've billed this entire process on.

They got to the stage of actually having these summits before a lot of the groundwork. It seemed like it was at a point at which you could actually shake hands on a deal. So this bipartisan relationship between the two individuals has been critical for how they've actually tried to sell the potential of there being a deal around North Korea's nuclear weapons.

[05:55:02] But it's interesting that you see this sort of play right now. I mean, it's been a while since the summit and yet they're saying -- now the North Koreans are coming out and saying yes, we might do all of these drastic steps. I mean, that seems like it's a push to force the United States to make greater concessions or more forcefully back to the negotiating table.

The North Koreans were the ones who were left behind in Hanoi and so it seems like this is a calculated move to saber-rattle and get the United States to move closer to their position or to give Kim the same opportunity basically that they have twice before in the original summits, which did buoy his negotiating position and his position at home with his people.

BRIGGS: Yes, interesting to see them stroke the president and talk about this wonderful chemistry between Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump. A lot to cover.

Karoun Demirjian, thanks so much for being here.

KOSIK: Thanks so much.

BRIGGS: We await a reaction from the president on both North Korea and, of course, the shooting in New Zealand. Thanks, Karoun.

KOSIK: We've yet to hear.

All right, thanks for joining us. I'm Alison Kosik.

BRIGGS: I'm Dave Briggs. "NEW DAY" has breaking news coverage continuing right now.

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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It's Friday, March 15th, 6:00 here in New York.

And breaking overnight, a horrific terror attack. A despicable act of hate -- a mass murder in two houses of worship. At least 49 people are dead and dozens have been injured in mass shootings in two mosques in New Zealand. This happened in the city Christchurch on the South Island as Muslims were gathering for Friday prayers.

The details are developing. Some are murky at this hour. We know that one person has been charged with murder and three other people are in custody.

END