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The Amanpour Hour
Interview with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun; Interview with "Ask E. Jean" Filmmaker Ivy Meeropol; Artist JR Turns Pont Neuf Into Giant Cave; Interview with "The Nuremberg Women", Author Natalie Livingstone; Hurricane Katrina's Legacy of Destruction. Aired 11a-12p ET
Aired June 06, 2026 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:00:38]
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to THE AMANPOUR HOUR.
Here's where we're headed this week.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: In a worldwide exclusive, Christiane sits down with the Lebanese president in Beirut. He sends a message to the U.S. and beyond as his country is battered by war.
Then a closer look at E. Jean Carroll, the columnist who became a target after accusing President Trump of sexual assault. I speak to the director of the documentary "Ask E. Jean".
IVY MEEROPOL, DIRECTOR, "ASK E. JEAN": I didn't expect her to be as funny and as brave and inspiring as she turned out to be.
GOLODRYGA: And the oldest bridge in Paris transforms into a cavern of wonders. An exclusive look inside the new artwork reimagining the Pont Neuf.
Also on the program, the forgotten women who fought for justice at the trial of the century. Natalie Livingstone sits down with Christiane in London to discuss her new book, "The Nuremberg Women".
NATALIE LIVINGSTONE, AUTHOR, "THE NUREMBERG WOMEN": It was a big ecosystem that comprised of so many women who were there in so many vital roles.
GOLODRYGA: And as scientists warn rising seas could swallow New Orleans, from Christiane's archives, how Hurricane Katrina made the world painfully aware of just how vulnerable the city is.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Bianna Golodryga in New York, sitting in for Christiane, because this week she's been in Lebanon conducting an exclusive interview with the country's president, Joseph Aoun.
Now, he rarely speaks with foreign media, but is taking this step to send a message to the world and his own people about the state of his nation.
Parts of Lebanon have been severely damaged by Israeli airstrikes, as well as from Hezbollah and the Israel Defense Forces trading fire.
With some shocking destruction in the capital city of Beirut, the violence has reportedly made President Trump furious, fearing attacks on Beirut could undermine any deal with Iran.
So is the fate of the region and the world tied to the fate of this country?
Christiane asked the man leading Lebanon, President Aoun.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: President Aoun, thank you so much for being with us. Welcome to the program.
JOSEPH AOUN, LEBANESE PRESIDENT: Thank you for coming, please.
AMANPOUR: This is a very crucial moment for your country, for you, in fact, for the region. The latest ceasefire has been announced late this week, and yet, as we speak, the Israeli Prime Minister says Hezbollah has not agreed, so he will not recommend a ceasefire to his cabinet. Therefore, it doesn't exist, according to Israel, at this moment.
And in any event, they're always being violated by both sides. Do you think this is going to be any different?
AOUN: It's difficult, I know. The only way -- for me, the only way to end this conflict is through negotiation. The Israelis, Prime Minister Netanyahu, and Hezbollah, they have to understand that they are waging a futile war.
The strategy that they are following is short-sighted, counterproductive, and believe me, it will never lead to the desired outcome.
War, it's a bloody negotiation, whereas negotiation is a bloodless war. We have a great opportunity to end the state of hostility between Lebanon and Israel.
We have a great opportunity for both the Lebanese and the Israeli people to live in safety and security. They are both, I think, fed up with war since 1948. This is a huge opportunity.
So, both sides have to choose, war or negotiation or diplomacy. Believe me, diplomacy, this is the best way forward. As a military man, I understand and I've lived the atrocities and the hardship of the war. The best way is through diplomacy.
[11:04:42]
AOUN: Wars, normally, historically speaking, end either way. There is a victor and a vanquished, or through negotiation. Both sides will never be able to achieve their objective.
AMANPOUR: Why do you say that? Because clearly Israel believes, and it is the superior power, conventionally speaking, that it can keep pushing Hezbollah back. As long as Hezbollah keeps firing into Israel, it can -- it's the whole mowing the lawn strategy that they have.
And you're right. Every time there's a ceasefire, there are violations, there have been these incursions, these wars periodically over the last, you know, at least since 2000 with Hezbollah and Israel.
And it keeps coming back to the same place. Hezbollah keeps doing the provocations, keeps doing Iran's work. So, maybe this is what suits them. Maybe you will always be in the middle of this.
AOUN: You're absolutely right. That's what they think. But that's what I said, that their strategy is short-sighted. They've tried it before in 2000, in 2006, in 2023, 2024, and in 2026 now.
But honestly, they can invade the whole country. They can flatten the whole country, but they will never be able to achieve their objective. Because dealing with non-state actors is different than dealing with the conventional forces.
When you have two conventional forces, you have -- the one that possesses more capabilities will defeat the other side.
So, Hezbollah, it's not -- it's an idea. It's not an objective that you can see. It's not a geographic objective.
It's war amongst people. The battlefield is the people. They are hiding among the people.
So, how you measure your success? You count bodies? They've tried it in Gaza. Hamas still exists or not?
AMANPOUR: It does.
Let's just take Hezbollah, non-state actor, backed by Iran --
AOUN: Exactly.
AMANPOUR: -- a state.
You go into ceasefire agreements as the head of state with Israel. But the non-state actor is not party to this.
In fact, the latest comments from Hezbollah to your government, and to you, basically says that this is a farce. The talks between your government and Israel, they call a farce.
They say that, you know, that they're not bound by this. And they don't believe in this right now.
So, do you have any reason to believe -- because you don't negotiate directly with Hezbollah --
AOUN: Exactly.
AMANPOUR: -- that they can be persuaded? What are the steps to make this happen?
AOUN: Hopefully they could --
(CROSSTALK)
AOUN: -- hopefully, and eventually they'll be persuaded, but the cost will be high, unfortunately.
I will try. Actually, nothing is impossible. And I will keep pushing for it. At the end of the day, I have two choices, as I said, either to sit idle doing nothing, or trying to negotiate and to reason with them.
Definitely, IRGC has a major influence on Hezbollah. And they have to remember what they said yesterday. I totally reject their statement.
AMANPOUR: What -- who said?
AOUN: This is --
AMANPOUR: Who said?
AOUN: IRGC --
AMANPOUR: The Iranian --
AOUN: -- the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, that they don't agree with -- they don't approve this agreement, what happened.
It's not your country, it's our country. It's our obligation. It's not your job to interfere into our country.
I reject the statement totally, because our people being killed, our people being -- our houses being destroyed. They are using Lebanon as a bargaining chip in their negotiation with the United States. It's unacceptable.
And here also, Hezbollah must understand that. Hezbollah must understand that no other way but to sit and talk.
No other way to solve this problem and to save what's left, except through negotiation and diplomacy.
AMANPOUR: So, the Hezbollah leader here, Naim Qassem, has warned you all against confronting them. As I said, he also said these talks with Israel under U.S. auspices in the United States are a farce.
And he also basically said, quote, "The people have the right to take to the streets and bring down the government in confronting the American-Israeli project."
Whoa. That is a direct challenge to what everything you're just saying right now.
AOUN: I don't want to comment on that. But let me tell you that the majority of the Lebanese people are fed up with wars. I'm seeing many of them across the board -- Christian, Sunni, Jews, even Shiite -- they said, we are with you. We are fed up. We need you. We need your help.
AMANPOUR: To you?
[11:09:45]
AOUN: Yes, yes, exactly. I met many people from the South and the same conversation took place. We are fed up. Since 1969, we want to live in peace. And they deserve to live in peace and in dignity. They deserve not seeing their homes being destroyed every five to ten years.
Since March 2nd, more than 3,500 people in Lebanon killed. On average, 13 children have been killed by Israeli every day since the escalation began. More than 10,000 people have been injured or wounded. More than 1 million people have been displaced from their homes.
20 percent of the population. Can you imagine that? 20 percent of Lebanon's population. Entire families have been wiped out.
This is one family, Fahour (ph) family. This is the Nimr (ph) family, Hamdan (ph) family. These are the Red Cross. This is a funeral of 13 members of the state security were killed in one airstrike.
AMANPOUR: And this is all -- one Israeli airstrike.
AOUN: Exactly. And this is a three-month-old baby.
AMANPOUR: You know --
AOUN: Is this imminent threat?
AMANPOUR: -- well, we see this kind of pictures coming out of Gaza, coming out of the occupied West Bank. We hear the Israeli defense authorities and others saying, we are going to turn this part of Lebanon into Gaza. I mean, it's said -- that is what they say.
Again, here we are in the presidential palace, one of the areas of Beirut that have been struck. You can feel it here in this palace, you told me, when the bombings happen. You can see it from your balcony here. Are you powerless?
AOUN: As I said, nothing is impossible. My duty -- my duty and I'm committed to save the country. I'll do whatever it takes. When there is a will, there is always a way. I'm not saying that it's very easy. It's easy.
Can you imagine, or have you ever seen a 40 years conflict or 50 years conflict end in one day or overnight? So, but we have to struggle in order to save what's left of the country.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Coming up next, the columnist who took on the president, won, and now may face a Justice Department probe because of it.
We get a sneak peek at the new documentary on the woman behind the famous cases, E. Jean Carroll.
And later in the program, how one photographer is transforming an iconic Paris bridge into a cavernous artwork.
[11:12:49]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GOLODRYGA: Welcome back to the program.
Magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll stunned the world in 2019 when she wrote in a memoir that Donald Trump had raped her in the 1990s, allegations the president has consistently denied.
While Carroll successfully sued him in civil court for defamation and sexual assault, it seems the case is nowhere near over.
CNN sources revealing now that the DOJ is investigating Carroll for possible perjury during her testimony, something the U.S. attorney has strongly denied but CNN sources have reaffirmed.
It's an extraordinary saga. And a new documentary, "Ask E. Jean" is looking at the woman at the heart of it all.
Here's a short clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LISA BIRNBACH, AUTHOR: If you were concerned about being dragged through the mud, why would you choose to sue Donald Trump?
E. JEAN CARROLL, MAGAZINE COLUMNIST: Because he called me a liar and I couldn't let it stand.
BIRNBACH: I called you right after the attack. I was very disappointed that you wouldn't report him.
CARROLL: They never would have believed me.
BIRNBACH: You were more famous than he was.
Here comes a huge attorney, Robbie Kaplan. She laid out the case.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: And the film's director, Ivy Meeropol, joined me to talk about it.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Ivy, welcome to the program.
You describe this documentary as a wildly uncertain and at times terrifying ride. Just tell us what drew you to this story and to E. Jean in particular.
MEEROPOL: Sure. Well, so in 2019, when E. Jean first published the excerpt from her book, "What Do We Need Men For?", I read it in "New York Magazine", as many people did, and I did not know anything about E. Jean Carroll particularly.
And I was so struck by her voice, how unapologetic it was, and how she was kind of refusing to be flattened in the way that women who come forward with these stories often do.
And I just -- I reached out to her, and I was just -- I didn't expect her to be as funny and as brave and inspiring as she turned out to be.
So, that's really -- that was the hook for how I first began this long, over six-year journey with her.
[11:19:48]
GOLODRYGA: As a popular advice columnist, E. Jean Carroll took a tough line in telling women to let go of all of their guilt if they came to her and spoke of the abuses that they experienced. And she told them to press charges.
But I want to play a clip from the documentary when she was speaking with her friend Lisa Birnbach, who was a writer and humorist and who E. Jean turned to immediately after this experience that she says occurred with the president or with Trump at the time.
She raised this. You know, why are you telling people to do certain things and you, in fact, didn't for so many years? Let's play the clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIRNBACH: I was very disappointed that you wouldn't report him.
CARROLL: But, Lisa, they never would have believed me. I would have lost my -- I would have been fired. I didn't have money to get an attorney. Everything I had worked for would be dissipated.
BIRNBACH: You said, don't ever speak of this again. Don't ever tell anyone this story as long as you live. Do I have your word? And you did. And that was that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: So, what did you end up learning, Ivy, about what ultimately led her to come out and speak her experience and her truth?
MEEROPOL: So, it was really the MeToo movement that galvanized E. Jean. She was just -- she was so moved by the stories that were coming out and that they were actually gaining justice, that men were being held accountable, which is something E. Jean hadn't experienced and didn't expect. And I think it really -- it moved her so much.
But it was also her own readers coming to her at that time and saying, we -- you know, what do we do? We have similar stories, similar experiences. What do we do now?
And so, it felt really pressing to her to tell her own stories, share them with her readers. And, you know, I look at it now as always like caring about herself.
GOLODRYGA: On May 9th, a jury found that Donald Trump was liable for sexual abuse and defamation and awarded E. Jean Carroll $5 million in damage.
He has denied all of these charges and accusations to this day, calling this a fake story, a made-up story. And he didn't testify in the first trial and he did testify in the second. And here's what he said about why he didn't testify in the first.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, THEN-U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: My lawyer said, sir, you don't have to do it. I actually said, I think I should. It would be respectful.
They said, sir, don't do it. This is a fake story, and you don't want to give it credibility. That's why I didn't go.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One thing you did do in this --
TRUMP: And I swear, and I've never done that, and I swear to -- I have no idea who the hell -- she's a whack job.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, you did not testify --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: And it was comments like this, both in interviews and on social media, that ultimately led E. Jean to sue Donald Trump again. The second jury verdict was announced at $83.3 million in damages. I don't believe -- has any of that been paid yet?
MEEROPOL: No.
GOLODRYGA: No.
MEEROPOL: Nothing.
GOLODRYGA: So, then let me ask you your reaction to the news last week of an investigation, perhaps from the DOJ.
Your reaction to that news, and what did E. Jean say if you spoke with her recently?
MEEROPOL: Well, I actually haven't spoken with E. Jean recently. She -- you know, they are really -- she and Robbie and the whole team are really in the midst of -- you know, the two cases heading to the Supreme Court and then this recent attack from the DOJ.
So, I -- you know, I've said -- you know, I found it unbelievable, but not surprising. I did react very strongly and -- but then started to think, oh, you know what, it's consistent, you know?
GOLODRYGA: Yes.
MEEROPOL: Starting with Comey and Letitia James. I mean, I think that, you know, there is some pattern here that's clear. And I think -- you know, I think when you watch the film, what's really important is that this film is the antidote to that.
You know, he is this -- the kind of bullying and trying to silence E. Jean is very clear. And I don't -- as far as I know, I mean, there are no facts that I can cite or any way that give any credence to if -- you know, this investigation, if it is a real investigation.
GOLODRYGA: I do want to ask you, we have a few seconds left here, just the connections here.
Your grandparents were Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. They were the only Americans, civilians who were executed for espionage-related charges during the Cold War. You made a movie about their legacy and one about Roy Cohn, who happened to be President Trump's famous attorney. He keeps on saying, I need my own Roy Cohn.
What was that like? Just the knowing, the connection there, going back so many generations for you.
[11:24:50]
MEEROPOL: Well, I mean, you know, I think I have this, you know, kind of, it's in my DNA to want to expose, you know, abuse of power and also hold people accountable and seek justice.
So, I -- you know, I made the Roy Cohn film right after Donald Trump was first elected because I wanted people to really understand where he comes from and who helped create him.
And this kind of culture of fear that has really infected our country right now and specifically the process of making this film and E. Jean herself comes directly from that lineage.
GOLODRYGA: Ivy Meeropol, thank you so much for the time. Really appreciate it. Thanks for sharing the film with us.
MEEROPOL: Thank you for having me. Thank you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: And "Ask E. Jean" is now playing in select theaters across the country.
Still to come, millions have crossed the Pont Neuf over centuries. Now a French street artist is asking visitors to see it in a whole new way.
[11:25:56]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GOLODRYGA: Welcome back.
In Paris, a landmark that has stood for more than four centuries, is undergoing a remarkable transformation. The city's oldest bridge, Pont Neuf, has become the latest canvas for the acclaimed French artist JR, who has turned it into a giant walk-through cave.
The installation is already drawing huge crowds and evoking memories of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's famous wrapping of the bridge four decades ago.
Here's what Christo told Christiane about the project back in 2018.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTO, ARTIST: I met Jeanne-Claude in Paris. We make love in Paris, and I returned --
(CROSSTALK)
AMANPOUR: So you met -- you met Jeanne-claude, your wife, in Paris.
CHRISTO: Yes. Paris, 1958. We did it that beautiful and September autumn of 1985.
AMANPOUR: And did you get easy permission or did it?
CHRISTO: No.
AMANPOUR: Long time.
CHRISTO: Terrible. That was another incredible play. The mayor of Paris was Mr. Chirac --
AMANPOUR: Yes.
CHRISTO: -- who liked to become president and the president of France, because the bridge is national treasure, was controlled by the state of France.
Mr. Mitterrand, Mr. Chirac and Mitterrand do not talk to each other. And we need enormous effort to convince them to agree on one thing.
AMANPOUR: That's just amazing. You got them to agree on that.
CHRISTO: Yes.
AMANPOUR: The very conservative mayor of Paris and the socialist president of France.
CHRISTO: Exactly. That was the really very difficult.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: Melissa Bell takes us inside the new work for an exclusive early look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: For weeks it's been the talk of the town.
It's often said that Paris is just an open-air museum. But here, the city's oldest bridge, the Pont Neuf, that has been brought to a new level by the French artist JR. and this monumental grotto. Let's have a look inside.
The idea also is that we're all kind of wrapped up in algorithms. We're all slightly separate. As you walk through here, and it takes 15 minutes to get to the bridge.
JR, ARTIST: Yes.
BELL: Everyone who walks through here is doing it together. There's something about that.
JR: Yes. Because for us, the main ingredient for that project is for sure the visitors.
We had to inflate it like two weeks ago. And then for us, it was really to create that expectation. And we want people to be surprised.
BELL: This holds --
JR: Yes.
BELL: -- because of air pressure.
JR: Exactly. So there is no structure. There is no strings. There is nothing that holds it.
BELL: Wow.
JR: Just like changing the pressure behind those walls --
BELL: Yes.
JR: -- that would make it rise.
BELL: And hold.
JR: Yes.
BELL: Wow. That's amazing.
It was in 1985 that the Pont Neuf was wrapped in fabric by the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude. 3 million people visited then.
Another of Christo's ideas was realized in 2021 with the wrapping of the Arc de Triomphe. It's an artistic legacy that JR's cave honors and evolves.
JR: It's almost like a living organism because it moves with the wind so you really feel the weather around you, but still deep inside something that you never experienced before.
BELL: It looks like you're walking through a cave. That's how it feels.
JR: You want people to feel that they're going deep in a cave -- very, very, very underground while we're still outside and we're still on the bridge.
BELL: A chance for visitors to lose themselves in space and time in one of the most famous places on earth.
Melissa Bell, CNN -- Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Still to come, untold stories from heroines of history, the forgotten women who helped bring the Nazis to justice at Nuremberg. That's after the break.
[11:34:13]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GOLODRYGA: Welcome back.
Now to the women hidden from view in the most important criminal cases of the 20th century, the Nuremberg trials, where after World War II, top Nazi officials were prosecuted for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The chief of which, of course, was the Holocaust, where 6 million Jews were slaughtered.
In a new book called "The Nuremberg Women", author Natalie Livingstone looks at the extraordinary women who helped reshape Germany after the war, from lawyers and journalists to aristocrats and artists. She told Christiane some of their stories.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Natalie Livingstone, welcome to the program.
LIVINGSTONE: Thank you so much for having me.
AMANPOUR: It's an amazing book. The idea, the concept is amazing. I know you do a lot of threads around women. What made you focus on the Nuremberg women? Why?
[11:39:47] LIVINGSTONE: So, Nuremberg has always been central to my life. I'm the granddaughter of Hungarian Holocaust survivors. So, when I was growing up, it really loomed large, the trial.
And I thought I was pretty familiar with the trial. I thought I knew about it. And I had unquestioningly digested this cast of all men.
It is, you know, the mendacious charisma of Hermann Goering, the wonderful speech of Robert Jackson --
AMANPOUR: Who was he?
LIVINGSTONE: He was the chief American prosecutor.
AMANPOUR: Got it.
LIVINGSTONE: And basically, Nuremberg was his -- was his idea and practically his idea and what a representation of the hopes and the dreams that he had for the future of international relations.
So, I thought that Nuremberg was a story about men. I thought Nuremberg was photographs of men, paintings of men. And I don't know if you saw recently, there was that movie with Russell Crowe and Rami Malek.
AMANPOUR: Yes.
LIVINGSTONE: "Nuremberg," again, all about men.
AMANPOUR: All men.
LIVINGSTONE: Now, this is wildly misleading. In fact, Nuremberg is so much more than just Courtroom 600, where the trial took place. It was a big ecosystem that comprised of so many women who were there in so many vital roles. Translators, witnesses, journalists, artists, lawyers.
And Nuremberg was about so much more than men in robes administering justice.
AMANPOUR: Ok. So, that brings us to a really important character in this who you profile, Marie-Claude Vaillant-Couturier, first female testimony.
Tell me her importance.
LIVINGSTONE: Absolutely.
Well, Marie-Claude Vaillant-Couturier is the heart and soul of the book for me. If there's one name, if there's one thing that I'd like anyone who reads the book to remember is her name because she changed the course of history.
Marie-Claude is a fearless French resistance fighter. She was arrested in 1942. She was kept for months in solitary confinement.
In 1943, she was put on a transport to Auschwitz, part of 230 other female prisoners from the French Resistance. Only 49 of them survived.
She endured two years in Auschwitz and Ravensbruck. She survived. She opted to stay for three months longer after liberation to look after those who were too sick and too infirm to travel home by themselves.
And on the 28th of January, 1946, she sat on the stand in Nuremberg, this fragile, frail, beautiful French woman. And for two hours, she recounted in unflinching details the horrors of the camp.
She detailed everything she had seen in Auschwitz, the fate of babies, the fate of children, the fate of women. She spoke of sexual violence.
And she was determined to restore names to those who had been reduced to numbers and then to ash. And that is what powered her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARIE-CLAUDE VAILLANT-COUTURIER (through translator): Old couples separated, mothers forces to abandon their young daughters as they entered the camp, while mothers and children were led to the gas chamber.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIVINGSTONE: And the amazing thing about Marie-Claude is after she delivered this devastating two-hour testimony. She got down from the witness stand and she stared off each of the Nazi defendants. She looked at them in the eye with the memory of those they had slaughtered.
And it was a real moment of reckoning for her. And to have that power and that courage, that resilience and that conviction is beyond humbling.
AMANPOUR: Finally, I want to ask you about, I think it's Harriet Zetterberg, the American lawyer --
LIVINGSTONE: Yes.
AMANPOUR: -- who did so much to make the case against Hans Frank, Hitler's personal lawyer and also known as the Butcher of Poland.
LIVINGSTONE: So, Harriet Zetterberg, extraordinary woman, extraordinary legal brain. She's taken to Nuremberg and she is tasked with putting together the dossier to convict Hans Frank, who as you said, Butcher of Poland, one of the most evil characters in the Nazi regime.
And she works night and day. She slaves in freezing cold conditions in the Palace of Justice under 20-watt light bulbs. And it is an absolute labor of love. It is an outstanding dossier.
But when it came to presenting her work in court, she was unable to do so. She had to present -- she had to hand her work over to a man. The reason, in order to have advocated in court at that time, she would have had to have obtained a waiver of disability. And that disability was that she was a woman.
AMANPOUR: Was that a German law or an American law?
[11:44:48]
LIVINGSTONE: No, that was American law.
AMANPOUR: That no woman could present a case in court?
LIVINGSTONE: That no woman lawyer could advocate in court unless they obtained a waiver of disability.
AMANPOUR: Incredible. And on that point, I just wanted to read, in America, CBS News broadcast at the time by Howard Smith -- Howard K. Smith -- warned male listeners of the specter of feminism in Nuremberg, quote, he said, "The rising tide of feminism has overflowed into the intellectual jobs, before mentioning the airtight case that was built against Hans Frank, written by a woman, Harriet Zetterberg."
So, you know, that's the context in which all this was happening. What do you hope people will take away from this? Because there's been a lot written about Nuremberg, obviously a lot written about Nazism, the Holocaust, World War II.
LIVINGSTONE: I mean, my hope very much is that people will look at the stories of these women and get a sense of their resilience, their hope for the future, their desperation to search for truth in a sea of information, and their passion for life and their joie de vivre, and also the sense that just because one isn't in a position of power, it doesn't mean you can't be powerful.
AMANPOUR: That's a great way to end it. Natalie Livingstone, thank you very much indeed. "The Nuremberg Women."
LIVINGSTONE: Thank you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Finally, having their stories told 80 years later, Natalie Livingstone's book "The Nuremberg Women", is out now.
After the break, scientists say New Orleans may be underwater within this century. Up next, a reminder of the city's vulnerability, from Christiane's archive.
Nearly 21 years after Hurricane Katrina, we revisit one family's desperate search for loved ones.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They went up to the second floor, and they said, the water's still coming up, and they lost contact.
AMANPOUR: And this was before the levee broke.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. Yes. (END VIDEO CLIP)
[11:46:40]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GOLODRYGA: Welcome back.
The U.N. is warning the world to prepare for the return of El Nino, the climate phenomenon that can supercharge extreme weather around the globe. Forecasters say there is an 80 percent chance that it will develop before September. And New Orleans knows the risks.
It's been nearly 21 years since Hurricane Katrina devastated the city. Rising sea levels, hotter oceans, and more extreme weather fueled by climate change are making disasters like Katrina even more dangerous.
One recent study warned the region has crossed the point of no return, and that New Orleans could be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century.
In this report from the CNN archives, Christiane returned to the city in the aftermath of the catastrophe as families searched desperately for loved ones.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Lily Nguyen is looking for her in-laws. She left New Orleans before the flood. And now, for the first time in a week, she's come back to try to find her husband's mother, father, sister and his two brothers.
LILY NGUYEN, NEW ORLEANS RESIDENT: You know, I feel so guilty. I feel I didn't know that they were missing.
AMANPOUR: Lily's in-laws, Vietnamese-Americans, insisted on riding out the hurricane. But Monday when it hit was the last time they spoke.
NGUYEN: They went up to the second floor and they said, the water is still coming up. And they lost contact.
AMANPOUR: And this was before the levee broke.
NGUYEN: Yes, yes.
AMANPOUR: Now, six days later, access to the Lakefront Church her family took refuge in is still blocked.
All of this is still under water. Look at that.
We asked two men sitting on their waterlogged porch how to get there.
NGUYEN: I know there's a lake all the way down to the end. That's where my parents lived -- all the way to the end.
AMANPOUR: It doesn't look good, does it? NGUYEN: No.
AMANPOUR: Worse. We can't get information either from the police or from the sheriff.
Do you know anything about lakefront? What's the situation there?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't say. Other than possibly flooding.
AMANPOUR: When we see a body on the road, Lily wants to know who is it. Is it Vietnamese? Is it a man or a woman? But nobody knows.
A few truckloads of National Guard troops pass by. Some helicopters ferry supplies overhead. Most residents have been evacuated now, but those who remain are very much on their own.
With Lily in tears, a firefighter explains there's still at least 12 feet of water in her in-laws' neighborhood.
NGUYEN: Where can we go to get information?
AMANPOUR: He can't tell her where to get more information. Staring at the watery obstacle in her way, Lily says somehow she'll try to come back with a boat.
NGUYEN: I need to know. I need to find -- I need to find them.
AMANPOUR: Christiane Amanpour, CNN -- New Orleans.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GOLODRYGA: Today, almost every resident of New Orleans faces a high flood risk, and experts warn that if a Katrina-scale storm struck again, the damage could be even more severe.
When we come back, we visit the Spanish village that this weekend will see the devil jump over the local newborns. No, really. We'll explain why up next.
[11:54:40]
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GOLODRYGA: And finally, this weekend, one of the world's most interesting and breath-halting, high-stakes religious celebrations takes place in Spain. A small village is preparing for a big event called El Salto del Colacho, or the Devil's Jump.
It occurs every year on the Sunday following the Catholic feast day of Corpus Christi, and sees a man in a brightly colored costume and devil mask making a daring jump over newborn babies.
[11:59:49]
GOLODRYGA: That's right. In fact, all the babies have been born in the village in the past year. And the tradition, which dates back to the 17th century, is meant to protect the young from evil spirits.
Well, wishing anyone taking that leap and everyone lying beneath it good luck or buena suerte tomorrow.
And that is all we have time for. Don't forget, you can find all of our shows online as podcasts at CNN.com/audio and on all other major platforms.
I'm Bianna Golodryga in New York.
Thanks so much for watching. Christiane will be back next week.
