Return to Transcripts main page

The Global Brief with Bianca Nobilo

Kremlin Admits "Mistakes" Made In Mobilization Call-Ups; Italy's New PM; Pakistan Floods. Aired 5-5:30p ET

Aired September 26, 2022 - 17:00   ET

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


[17:00:28]

ALISON KOSIK, CNN HOST: Hello and welcome. I'm Alison Kosik. I'm in for Bianca Nobilo. This is THE GLOBAL BRIEF.

Tonight, a Russian exodus. Military aged men flee to Finland and Georgia, after the Kremlin admits mistakes in mobilization call-ups.

Then, Italy elects the nation's most right-wing government since World War II. We look at what that means for Europe.

And CNN traveled with the UNICEF medical team in southern Pakistan, where flooding has caused unspeakable devastation.

It's less than a week since President Vladimir Putin announced a so-called, partial mobilization. Many Russians are angry and afraid. We are seeing

more demonstrations, and police crackdowns across the country. Monitoring groups say more than 2300 protesters had been detained.

Meanwhile, a steady stream of people have continued to cross rushes land borders with Finland and Georgia. The Kremlin's spokesperson admits there

have been mistakes in the mobilization process, and he says, so far, the government hasn't made a decision about closing the borders, or imposing

martial law. Ukraine officials are accusing Russia of using the so-called, succession referenda, and for occupied regions, as a pretense to draft

Ukrainians into the Russian military. Those referenda, which are illegal under international law, will end Tuesday.

The Ukrainian government also says that Russian-backed forces in the regions of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson are already drawing up lists of

thousands of people to be mobilized.

Matthew Chance joins me now from London.

Matthew, great to see you.

I know there is a massive backlash, and protests as well going on in Russia, following Putin's order of increased military conscription for his

war in Ukraine. What's the latest that you're hearing?

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that backlash, Alison, it's continuing across various areas and Russia,

particularly in the south of the country, there have been some extraordinary scenes over the past 24 hours or so, in the Republic of

Dagestan, which is a mainly Muslim republic, with an ethnic minority, whilst on the majority of the republic in Russia, really coming out against

this mobilization which they fear has been disproportionately applied against them.

We've seen more than 100 people arrested in these clashes with authorities. People physically trying to block the road to stop bosses filled with men

from the area being taken into the Russian military, as part of this mobilization. And then, in an attempt to calm the situation in Dagestan,

the president of the republic, sort of the local governor of the republic, rather, has said, look, you know, the stakes have been made, we are going

to make sure that anybody who is drafted erroneously will be sorted out. And he tried to reassure people that any mistakes that were made in terms

of old people, people who have lost children, and big families, people who have never served in the military before, these people, hear the government

said, we're not going to be drafted, but there are various examples of them being drafted.

That's one of the things that's caused this outpouring of anger. But nevertheless, across the country, obviously, the stakes are getting higher

and higher for Vladimir Putin, as he attempts to recruit, well, hundreds of thousands of people to go and fight in Ukraine.

KOSIK: Okay, Matthew Chance, thanks so much for your report.

Meantime on the battlefield, Russian artillery and missile attacks has left one person dead and several injured in the regions of Kharkiv and Donetsk.

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh is in eastern Ukraine. He has this report for us.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR (voice-over): When the blasts pause and rare quiet in Toretsk, there are few blessings to count.

But most are bitter.

One is here, a familiar scene of private worlds torn open by a Russian rocket two days earlier, but a place that might persuade you to believe in

miracles. Nineteen people were trapped up here when rubble blocked the stairs. But somehow not one of them was even injured.

A fiber grade ladder getting them all out. Not even survivors like Natalia know how.

NATALIA, TORETSK RESIDENT (through translator): A noise, I blinked twice and couldn't see. The balcony door flew open and trash blow in. I'm

terrified of flames, and I realized we're on the 7th floor and it's collapsing.

And someone screamed don't come out as there's no way. It's a miracle. I can't call it anything else.

WALSH: As Putin's fake referenda just a few miles away threatened yet worse here, just now, the shelling has finally become too much for some.

NINA, TORETSK RESIDENT (translated): I am so much trouble.

WALSH: Rescuers are evacuating Nina, 73, after six months living alone without water or help.

NINA, TORETSK RESIDENT (translated): God let it finish fast before I died.

WALSH: We're told she's the last person to leave her block.

NINA, TORETSK RESIDENT (translated): It's painful to leave but it is also good. I've never been so scared. I am strong but I do not have strength for

this.

WALSH: Two days ago, a rocket hit her building, yet also magically, she was unscathed and just sat here under the gaping hole.

The lonely agony of the struggle before this moment lying around. The pictures of life left, of her A student daughter who died of meningitis

aged 40, of the choices of what to leave and what to take, of how hard just eating, washing and drinking has been.

Winter will rip through here. And this may be the last time the lights go out on this home.

She's taken to the courtyard where dozens of similar agonies are gathered, waiting for the evacuation bus and that are baffled by the heaviest

question, why?

NINA, TORETSK RESIDENT (translated): I just want to ask, why did you (Russians) come to us? Who asked you? Or are we that silly that you wanted

to liberate us? I think we will come home soon. Home will wait for everyone of us. It will wait.

WALSH: Then the guns pick up again.

Artillery firing from near where we are. That's been responded to by the Russians and a shell landed over here. They're trying to get people on a

bus as fast as they can to get them out of here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (translated): Come on, come on faster! No time to relax!

WALSH: Dozens of lives with everything left behind them and nothing certain here.

Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Toretsk, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSIK: Officials in western Russia say 11 children and four adults were killed in a school shooting on Monday, 21 more people were injured.

Investigators say the shooter wore a black T-shirt, with a Nancy symbol on it, and killed himself after opening fire. The Kremlin is calling the

shooting, quote, inhuman terrorist attack.

Italy's far-right party, Brothers of Italy, claimed victory in the country's general election on Monday. Its leader, Giorgia Meloni, it is on

course to becoming the country's first female prime minister and head of the nation's most right-wing government since World War II. Europe's right-

wing politicians have cheered the results, why representatives of Italy's key allies, such as France and the U.S., have said that they respect the

outcome of the election, calling for further cooperation on key issues, such as the war in Ukraine and economic growth.

Barbie Nadeau has this report from Rome.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The leader of Italy's center right coalition Giorgia Meloni will now likely become the first

female prime minister of Italy. Despite low voter turnout, she was able to secure the majority, together with far-right leader Mateo Sylvania, and

central right politician Silvio Berlusconi.

As Italians woke up on Monday morning, they grappled with a new reality. It was clear that the result wasn't to everyone's taste.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I am not really happy with the actions they want to take. I think the main problem of my generation, next generation,

environmental problems, it's not fully a priority for them. We have a lot of problems now, economic, social, with that energy crisis. So, we want to

see what they want to do, and I'm not really that confident.

NADEAU: Italy, like the rest of Europe, is in the midst of an energy crisis. Everyone is feeling the pinch. This coffee bar in central Rome has

been Lorenzo Vanni's family since 1929.

LORENZO VANNI, OWNER, VANNI CAFE: The biggest problem, where this cost of the energy, because we have an increase of five times more than before,

from 15,000 now, we have a bill of 54,000.

NADEAU: Vanni wants a government that puts people first.

VANNI: We have to see if they will plan an agreement among the three, Berlusconi, Salvini and Meloni to make things for Italy.

NADEAU: Giorgia Meloni has become a symbol of hope for that change.

This woman tells me that even though Meloni as a very strong character that could intimidate some, she likes her and she hopes that there will be

changed.

We met Antonio Musca (ph). He told us it was others that led to Meloni's victory.

Brothers of Italy were able to understand voters' discontent, he says, but he also tells me, in Italy, we change our mind very often. We are very

divided country and very different from North to South.

Today, Meloni had 24 percent, but that could be 10 percent in a couple of months.

Meloni's coalition won a clear mandate not seen in Italy for decades. She campaigned on traditional family values against irregular immigration and

on giving dignity back to Italians.

There are a lot of expectations on Georgia Meloni. The Italians had 67 governments and 30 prime ministers in the last 75 years. In 2018, Italians

voted for the anti-establishment Five-Star Movement. But that was before the pandemic and before the war in Ukraine. This time, they voted for a

very precise political election. Now it's up to Giorgia Meloni to unite the country and make good on her campaign promises.

Barbie Latza Nadeau, CNN, Rome.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSIK: The British pound has hit a new record low against the U.S. dollar. Here is how it is doing right now. Earlier, sterling felt 1.035 against the

dollar, after dropping more than 4 percent on Monday. It follows the British government's decision to implement the biggest tax cuts in five

decades, while barring tens of millions of dollars to try to tackle energy costs and soaring inflation.

There's growing international condemnation of Iran. Ten days after the death of a woman in police custody sparked nationwide unrest. Canada says

it will sanction Iran's morality police, believed to be responsible for Mahsa Amini's death. Rights groups estimate dozens of people have died in

protests since then, though Iran has blocked social media and is restricting the Internet, making it hard for us to know what's happening on

the ground.

Jomana Karadsheh has more on some of the stories that have been making their way through.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Regime supporters out en masse, a show of unity against the so-called rioters they say.

Iran's leadership is dismissing the thousands of protesters across the country as a handful of mercenaries. They claim it's all a foreign plot to

destabilize the Islamic republic that is only just beginning to unleash its brutal force to crush the rising voices of dissent.

It's startling the Internet, blocking social media sites, dragging protesters off the streets and using lethal force to silence those rising

up for their rights.

No one really knows how many lives have been lost.

But the gut wrenching scenes of those grieving their loved ones are slowly trickling out.

The heartache, the agony of families burying their dead need no words to explain.

Javad Haida (ph) was 36, shot at a protest last week. His family says he bled to death.

Amir Fouladi was only 15, one of several children killed according to Amnesty International.

Her name is Hadis Najafi, one of countless women who have said enough to tyranny and repression. Hadis never made it back from a protest.

[17:15:00]

Her family says she was shot six times.

Her Instagram posts tell a story of a young woman who loved her country, loved life, music, dressing up and dancing.

Her devastated sister mourning her in this Instagram post. She writes: Sis, how did they have the heart to shoot you? My tears have dried up. I can't

breathe. Forgive me. I wasn't there to defend you.

Hadis was 23.

The threat of bullets, of prison, of flogging hasn't stopped the protests. Nightfall brought hundreds back on the streets, their daring chants of

"death to the dictator" echoing through the dark streets of Iran. A defiant generation risking it all for freedoms they've never known.

Jomana Karadsheh, CNN, Istanbul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSIK: CNN cannot independently verify death toll claims. A precise death toll is impossible for those outside Iran's governments to confirm. Numbers

vary by opposition groups, international rights organizations, and local journalists.

People in Pakistan are still dealing with the unprecedented floods that put nearly a third of the country underwater. More than 1,600 people have now

died, a third of them children.

But aid workers say the disaster is just beginning, because of the growing risk of water-borne diseases. CNN traveled to one hospital fighting to save

these children.

Anna Coren has more on that, and a warning, that her report includes images of children in distress, some of whom don't survive.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the scorching heat, a couple carry their listless child towards a packed wooden boat, ferrying

sick villagers through the floodwaters.

The mother grabs her daughter and finds a place to sit. The eight-year-old is burning up. She's got a high-grade fever and has become unconscious,

explains her mother. Let's go, let's go, yells a villager.

The mother then wets her daughter's brow with the very same water that has made her so sick. Pakistan's month-long catastrophic flood which inundated

one third of the country affecting 33 million people are still causing unspeakable suffering. The monsoonal rains may be over, but the volume of

stagnant water is now causing a health crisis, especially in Sindh, one of the worst hit provinces in the country southeast, cases of cholera, dengue

and dehydration have surged.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've seen families and children consume the very floodwater they are surrounded by, and that is -- because they don't have

access to any of the water source.

COREN: As they reach the shore, it's a race against time. The nearest hospital is hours away by rickshaw and her daughter's condition is

worsening. These young mothers have found medical care, although there are newborns barely have the energy to cry.

They have come to the mother and child hospital where the critically ill or taken to the resuscitation ward.

A baby's chest slowly rises and falls of oxygen, pumped through to, helps us infant to breathe. Lying beside it, the body of another baby that didn't

make it.

For the doctors here, this is agonizing work. Up to one dozen children are dying each day from flood-related illness, which is unheard of in this

small hospital.

This girl has cholera, says Dr. Nazim (ph), their bodies go into shock. We try to rehydrate them with the fluid they've lost.

One of the four children sharing this bed appears to be going downhill rapidly. Heart monitors are placed on the chest of five-year-old Ikra (ph),

who is severely stunted. Her heart is slowly beating, but her eyes glaze over. Minutes later, she dies.

A nurse prepares her tiny body for an Islamic burial, as her sister and grandmother weep outside.

Of more than 1,500 people who died since June from Pakistan's climate change -induced catastrophe, more than one third have been children.

Millions upon millions remain homeless having lost homes, crops and livestock.

Rani is one of them. She wonders if the waters will also take her youngest, three-year-old Abbas (ph), who is suffering from malaria.

Death is a better option for us, she says.

[17:20:00]

We accept it. One should not have to live like this.

Anna Coren, CNN, Hong Kong.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSIK: Vietnam is preparing for Typhoon Noru. It's forecast to make landfall on Tuesday. The storm hit the Philippines on Sunday, killing at

least five rescue workers, and leaving entire villages in ruins. It blasted the main island of Luzon before weakening to the equivalent of a category 2

hurricane. The U.S. Joint Typhoon Warning Center says the storm is picking up strength again, as it approaches Vietnam.

Coming up on THE GLOBAL BRIEF -- the world's richest man, Elon Musk, is deposed by Twitter's lawyers at a much anticipated trial next month.

Plus, NASA's mission to crash into an asteroid, yes, it's like a sci-fi movie.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOSIK: Welcome back. I'm Alison Kosik.

Let's take a look at the other key stories making international impact today. After a week of closure, banks across Lebanon reopened their doors

to the public on Monday. Banks closed down due to a wave of hikes across the country, as Lebanese depositors, some of them armed, held up branches,

demanding to withdraw their frozen savings.

Elon Musk is facing Twitter's lawyers as part of the social media's platform of a lawsuit to force the world's richest man to complete his $44

billion acquisition of the firm. Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal is also being questioned by Musk's lawyers. A trial on the dispute is expected to start

in mid October.

And Cuba has made history, after legalizing same sex marriage. Cubans voted in favor of a family code that increases protections for minorities, as

announced by the national electoral council. LGBTQ people have faced official discrimination in Cuba for decades.

[17:25:00]

Many were sent to government work camps in the early 1960s.

In less than two hours from now, NASA hopes to deliver, deliberately crash a spacecraft into an asteroid, millions of miles away, to try and change

its course. I know this isn't the plot of the 1998 classic "Armageddon", starring Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck.

The Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART mission, for short, will be the world's first planetary defense test.

Our space and defense correspondent Kristin Fisher is at the DART Mission Operation Center.

It's great to see you. I'm sure you're super excited because this is really so sci-fi. And it seems like a really unique mission, isn't it?

KRISTIN FISHER, CNN SPACE AND DEFENSE CORRESPONDENT: Alison, this is never been done before, right? We are so used to talking about launch days,

launch nights.

What we are witnessing tonight's impact night. This has been in the making for about ten months, ever since the DART spacecraft launched from

Brandenburg, California, that base, launched into space, and for the last ten months, it has been traveling at a speed of about 14,000 miles per

hour, about four miles per second.

And tonight, NASA is going to do the tremendously complicated thing. They're going to try to do this thing, which is, smash this spacecraft,

which is about the size of a refrigerator or vending machine, and they're going to try to smash it into an asteroid called Dimorphos, which is just

about the size of one of the big pyramids in Egypt, the pyramids of Giza.

So that, in and of itself, tremendous, technical undertaking, to get these two objects to collide, when they're traveling so fast in the vastness of

outer space. That's objective number one.

Alison, objective number two, is to see if that impact is able to successfully push that asteroid, Dimorphos, just a little bit off its

current orbit. They don't have to move it by much, but the idea here is that, if an asteroid, and I should be very clear here, Dimorphos, this

particular asteroid, tonight, it does not pose any immediate threat, or any threat to Earth.

But the idea is, if a future potential killer asteroid were coming for earth, we can employ this technology, and quite clearly, save the planet.

So, that's the idea here, Alison. And we'll find out in about two hours, if they make impact.

KOSIK: This sounds so exciting. Kristen Fisher, thanks so much.

And thanks for watching. I'm Alison Kosik.

"WORLD SPORT" is up next.

END