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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Prince Abdullah and Bush Meet and Discuss the Mideast; New Allegations Regarding Cardinal Law Emerge
Aired April 25, 2002 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: And, Larry, you're one of my favorites too. We never miss you. Thanks. We'll see you tomorrow night. Good evening. It has been called a tragic accident, something that probably wouldn't even make it into a national news program, except for one fact, where it happened.
Explosion in New York was the headline early this afternoon, the kind of headline that had a way of stopping you cold. It was a blast that struck in the heart of Chelsea, just miles from where the Trade Center once stood.
Those on the ground this afternoon gave us the picture of a city still very much on edge. People on nearby street corners watching a string of fire trucks and emergency vehicles stream toward the scene, looking confused, concerned and reaching for their cell phones.
A father and his toddler turning around and heading home, after hearing about the incident. One woman crying and saying, enough explosions. The people outside didn't have the benefit of what we were hearing inside the newsroom, and that was that there was nothing to suggest terrorism, and with that came the strange sort of relief that didn't seem to exist before September the 11th.
Relief, but still a lot of sadness and rightly so, because dozens were hurt today, some of them critically, in a blast that seemed to have been caused by volatile chemicals. More bloodshed in a city that certainly didn't need any more of it.
So on now with the whip around the world and that begins in Crawford, Texas, the President's meeting today with the Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah. Our Major Garrett is in Crawford tonight for us. Major the headline.
MAJOR GARRETT, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good evening, Judy. The crown prince pressured the United States President to do more to get Israel out of the Palestinian territories. For his part, the President pressured the Saudi leader to do more to stop Palestinian terror. In the end, there were no breakthroughs, but the leaders spent five hours together, two hours more than scheduled, and many months from now that may be the thing that creates the biggest headlines around the world -- Judy.
WOODRUFF: All right, Major, we'll see you in just a moment. The view now from Israel. Matthew Chance is in Jerusalem, Matthew the headline.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Judy, as we've come to expect here a lot of activity here in Israel and, of course, in the Palestinian territories. A makeshift court inside Yasser Arafat's compound in Ramallah has sentenced four Palestinians for the killing of Israel's tourism minister last October.
Also in the other besieged building in the West Bank, the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, nine Palestinian youths have been allowed to come out. A lot more activity here as well, a lot of bitterness and a lot of anger, I can tell you.
WOODRUFF: All right, Matthew, and we'll get caught up on that in just a moment as well. An update from Boston on the sex scandal and the Catholic Church. Jason Carroll covering that tonight, Jason the headline.
JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Judy, Cardinal Bernard Law is facing more trouble here in Boston. New documents have been released, relating to a priest accused of sexual abuse, this as Cardinal Law tries to rebuild his credibility -- Judy.
WOODRUFF: All right, Jason, and we'll see you in a few moments as well. Well more on that scandal coming up on NEWSNIGHT, a man who says a priest abused him and thinks the proposals that emerged from Rome will do nothing to protect kids in the future.
We'll also meet one of the best known critics of the Castro government in Miami. Her program is called simple Alenao except there's nothing simple about it. Alena has a perspective on Castro, unlike anyone else.
Also, a story about some high school underdogs and the contest that put all their skills to use, kids trying to build a better robot. And, a debate about the workplace, feminism, and fairness, should it have been just daughters who are taken to work once a year? We'll talk with essayist Anne Taylor Flemming.
Well, all that's coming in the hour ahead, but we begin with a Saudi visit, with Saudi grievances over the Middle East and reportedly a Saudi threat, if U.S. policy doesn't change. It may have simply been brinksmanship or spin or something else, but one palace insider laid it out this way, telling the New York Times: If that means we move to the right of bin Laden or embrace Saddam Hussein like a brother, so be it.
It is a clear challenge to the Bush Administration, which is looking to line up a coalition against Iraq and trying to fight a war on terrorism, both of which depend heavily on Saudi cooperation. Here again, CNN's Major Garrett with the President in Crawford.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARRETT (voice over): The Crown Prince arrived in Crawford to deliver a blunt warning, get Israel out of Palestinian territories or face what a top Saudi official described as, grave consequences. The Saudis say the U.S. can't expect Palestinians to negotiate security, peace or anything else while their leader remains under siege in Ramallah. For his part, the President intensified his now repeated calls for complete Israeli withdrawals.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I made it clear to him that I expected Israel to withdraw, just like I made it clear to Israel, and we expect them to be finished. He knows my position.
GARRETT: The President also told Abdullah, suicide bomb attacks against Israel had to end.
BUSH: We discussed a need for Arab states to condemn terror, to stop incitement of violence, and as part of a long-term peace, to accept Israel as a nation and a neighbor.
GARRETT: The Saudis chief complaint is that the U.S. doesn't use the leverage of more than $3 billion in annual aid to Israel to restrain its military.
PRINCE SAUD AL-FAISAL, SAUDI FOREIGN MINISTER: And if there is any frustration, it is a frustration when they see that this influence is not being used.
GARRETT: Aside from the Middle East, the President also sought a guarantee from the Saudis that they would never withhold oil exports to change U.S. policy in the region. The President got it.
BUSH: Saudi Arabia made it clear, and has made it clear publicly, that they will not use oil as a weapon, and I appreciate that, respect that, and expect that to be the case.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GARRETT (on camera): The Saudis gave the President few specifics about what they mean by grave consequences, but top U.S. officials got the picture, not only the prospect of more suicide bombings in Israel, but wider anti-American sentiment in the Arab world, which could undermine the war on terror, and the prospect for little or no Arab support for any U.S. military confrontation with Iraq. Judy.
WOODRUFF: So, Major, does this mean the tensions are all gone between the United States and the Saudis?
GARRETT: It doesn't mean they're all gone, but it does mean that there was a very open and frank, and I just don't use those words because they're diplomatic speak, dialog between the two leaders on these key issues in the Middle East. Clearly the Saudi Crown Prince pushed the President on Israel. He pushed right back on Palestinian terror, and the two basically came to an agreement, understanding that they have their positions.
For domestic political consumptions, they need to press them hard in public, but the President said in their five hours together, they forged a very strong personal bond, and for the President of the United States that personal bond often defines diplomatic possibilities.
The White House believes a lot got done here in this meeting in Crawford. Many things that may transpire in the future, at some future date, will probably be traced back to this five-hour meeting here in Crawford. Judy.
WOODRUFF: All right, Major Garrett reporting, thanks very much. And now for lack of a better way to put it, the flipside, how Israel is seeing the rest of the world. There's a sense there of a double standard at play regarding the entire conflict, and especially regarding Jenin. Once again, Matthew Chance.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE (voice over): The battleground of Jenin, thorn in the side of Israel's relations with the rest of the world. Already European delegates are visiting the devastation. By the weekend, a U.N. team could be investigating how many Palestinian militants and civilians were killed here. Israel's President told me double standards were behind this Security Council sanctioned inquiry.
MOSHE KATSAV, ISRAELI PRESIDENT: The volume of their action is not same. To investigate what happened in Jenin is OK, but to ignore from the backing of the Palestinian Authority to this bloodshed I can not tolerate. You can not accept it.
CHANCE (on camera): These are very serious accusations you're leveling against the international community. What possible motivation could there be for that?
KATSAV: Maybe lack of information. I can not say that they are innocent, this international community by their actions toward us, but I prefer to say that it's a lack of information.
CHANCE (voice over): And these are more than just presidential views. On Ben Yahuda (ph) Street in West Jerusalem, repeated targets for suicide attacks, not hard to find anger at the outside world and at the U.N. in particular.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are Jewish. We want to live here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): The United States is anti-Semitic.
CHANCE (on camera): It's the international community. Its the representative of the international community.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Well, there's a problem. The United Nations is a circus. That's what the United Nations is. It has never been objective about what is going on in the Middle East.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Anti-Jewish United Nations. Anti-Jewish.
CHANCE: The impression that we have is that when Jews are massacred, the word massacred, in a hotel on the satyr evening, which you know is a holiday, a very special day when Jews, Passover. When you see the Jews are bombed in a bus, we don't hear the world screaming and crying or turning to the Arabs saying, you know --
CHANCE: If --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, let me finish. If you don't stop it, we're going to do X, Y, or Z.
CHANCE (on camera): There are, of course an array of different opinions in this country, but it's true to say that many Israelis honestly believe the rest of the world is unjustly against them right now. Jenin, they say, is just one example of that, and a bitter illustration of just how isolated many people in this country feel they have become.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE (on camera): Well, Judy, as that report indicates, there's a lot of bitterness and a lot of resentment amongst, not just the politicians of Israel, but also ordinary people as well. Now, the United Nations has announced that it's adding two military representatives to its investigative team that's being sent to Jenin here at the weekend.
But really what's crucial, as we heard, there from Crawford in Texas, what may be crucial for the U.S. relationship with Israel is how quickly and how smoothly Israeli forces are pulled out of remaining areas in the West Bank. In the words of President Bush, he wants them pulled out in a non-violent way. Judy, back to you.
WOODRUFF: And, Matthew, just quickly any better sense now of when the troops are going to be completely out?
CHANCE: Well, Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister has made it quite clear that he's waiting in the West Bank town of Ramallah where there's a siege around Yasser Arafat's headquarters, for Yasser Arafat to turn over the four Palestinians who he sentenced today of killing the Israeli tourism minister and to demonstrate that he's willing to start, in the words of the Israeli Prime Minster, start fighting terrorism.
Of course, in Bethlehem around the Church of the Nativity, he's waiting to negotiate the future of the 30 or so Palestinian militants still holed up inside, along with a couple of hundred other people inside that very holy shrine to Christianity. Judy.
WOODRUFF: All right, Matthew Chance reporting. Thanks very much, Matthew. A lot to talk about and we're now joined by Robin Wright, who's the chief diplomatic correspondent for the Los Angeles Times. Robin, welcome again to NEWSNIGHT.
ROBIN WRIGHT, "LOS ANGELES TIMES": Nice to be with you always.
WOODRUFF: Let's take everybody back to the meeting in Crawford today, between the President and the Saudi Crown Prince. Before this meeting, just how strained were U.S.-Saudi relations? WRIGHT: Well, there's been a long history of tension over issues involving terrorism, including the 1995 Kohbar bombing, when several Americans were killed and the United States not having access to several of those people.
I think that it's probably epitomized by a letter that the Crown Prince wrote to President Bush shortly before 9/11, putting it on the line that the relationship really was at a turning point, and appealing to the Bush Administration to do more on the Arab-Israeli crisis. This remember was at a time that the administration was doing virtually nothing.
WOODRUFF: And since then, of course since 9/11, we've seen strains because the U.S. was looking to the Saudis to crack down more on the militants they saw operating in Saudi Arabia. But today, coming out of this meeting, how do you read these statements? Does it look as if where there's any more agreement between the two in terms of approach?
WRIGHT: The interesting thing about both men, the Crown Prince and the President, is they are both very hands-on leaders, and the personal relationship means an inordinate amount, and what was so interesting about the meeting today was they spent almost three hours one-on-one, and this is the kind of --
WOODRUFF: President Bush, in fact, driving the Crown Prince around the ranch for at least an hour or so.
WRIGHT: Yes, I would love to have seen this, this is a man --
WOODRUFF: In his truck.
WRIGHT: In his truck, in his pickup truck. The Saudis believe that there was a bond established and the Americans are using the same kind of language, but I think that there are probably some real points of tension, and it will depend on what the United States does in the next few weeks about the situation in the Middle East as to whether that bond, that relationship, goes anywhere.
I think the Crown Prince laid it on the line, first of all that it's not just the Arab-Israeli or Palestinian-Israeli issue that's at stake. Its the whole region now. The issue is so volatile that a lot of America's friends are in real trouble, and they could end up paying a big price.
And secondly, that the President's reputation, his credibility, all the political capital gained on 9/11 is being expended because he's not able to get kind of any action on this issue.
WOODRUFF: And the credibility that he needs if the United States is going to take any further steps with regard to Iraq. Specifically, Robin, what does the U.S. need to do in the eyes of the Saudis in the coming weeks, as you just put it?
WRIGHT: Well, they're looking for particular action on resolving the two standoffs in Ramallah and Bethlehem, winning a bit more freedom for Arafat. They have sent a very strong message to the United States as Secretary of Powell heard on his recent trip, that Yasser Arafat is the elected representative of the Palestinian people, and whether you like it or not, you have to deal with him.
You can't buy on to Ariel Sharon's attempts to isolate him, marginalize him, or even potentially even exile him, and I think that then they want to see some much broader action that begins a political process that ends at no more incremental steps, no more phases to the peace process. Get everyone together, one big conference, and settle it finally.
WOODRUFF: But a lot of that you're describing, Robin, hinges on the Israelis, not on the United States.
WRIGHT: That's right.
WOODRUFF: So it's a question of the U.S. leaning on Israel?
WRIGHT: Well, and this is one of the things that's very difficult to actually see happen for a lot of different reasons. Ariel Sharon is first of all his own man. Second of all, the United States, President Bush is under a lot of pressure from his own right wing, opposed to taking any squeeze or making any squeeze on the Israeli government and you have elections coming up in October.
So, it takes the kind of leadership decisions that are going to be very difficult in what is now an existential conflict. We're down to the end game about the existence of the State of Israel and whether you can craft a Palestinian State out of the same land.
WOODRUFF: All right. Some very,, very tough questions facing all five. Robin Wright, great to see you again. Thanks for coming by.
WRIGHT: Thanks.
WOODRUFF: We appreciate it. And as NEWSNIGHT continues, we will have the story of some high school kids who built a dream. And up next, reaction of Catholics to the meeting of cardinals in Rome.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: There's a phrase you hear sometimes to describe Catholics and their relationship with the church. They pray, pay and obey. Well, that old mantra is surely being tested this week.
Many Catholics openly challenging the Vatican, for what they see as half measures proposed at the Rome meeting to deal with abusive priests. The bitterness is running especially high at the epicenter of the scandal in Boston, where the latest revelations today only heightened the anger. Here again, Jason Carroll.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARROLL (voice over): Boston's embattled Cardinal Bernard Law is back from the Vatican meetings and will have to face new troubles here at home. The Archdiocese of Boston released new documents relating to Father Paul Shanley, an accused sex abuser. There are about 800 pages, which archdiocese officials say they overlooked.
FATHER CHRIS COYNE, ST. JOHN'S SEMINARY: It's terribly embarrassing to come out and say that, that at this late a date they found files like that.
CARROLL: The files include some of Shanley's writings on subjects such as counseling the young about how to take drugs without overdosing. He writes: Much of my life these last few years has been choosing not twixt good and evil, but the lesser of the two evils. My God, I've even taught kids to shoot up properly.
Another page is titled Venereal Disease. Shanley says: One of the first things I do in a new city is to sign up at the local clinic for help with my V.D. The documents do not indicate how he would have contracted such a disease, or whether he got it before priesthood.
RODERICK MACLEIGH, ATTORNEY: But these are the writings of a perverted monster, who was sent out into the field unsupervised to be with alienated youth, with children.
CARROLL: The documents also show clergy were warned about Shanley and allegations he spoke at the opening session of NAMBLA, the North American Man Boy Love Association.
PAULA FORD, VICTIM'S MOTHER: This is the church that we are talking about. It is the most twisted story. If I read it, I wouldn't believe it.
CARROLL: It was fallout from the Shanley documents released a few weeks ago that sparked calls for Cardinal Law's resignation. Those documents showed Law and other clergy move Shanley from parish to parish despite accusations of sexual abuse.
