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International Journalists Released From Rixos Hotel in Tripoli; Battles Continue Between Moammar Gadhafi Loyalists and Rebel Fighters Near the Tripoli International Airport; Rebels Claim 80 to 90 Percent of Tripoli is in Their Control

Aired August 24, 2011 - 11:00   ET

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

HALA GORANI, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: So, I'm Hala Gorani, from CNN INTERNATIONAL, along with Suzanne Malveaux, as we broadcast to our viewers around the world.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: And obviously, this is a very significant development. I mean, a great sigh of relief.

You and I have been talking to Matthew Chance for days now. You could really tell how very tense the situation was, how difficult that was for him and for the other journalists, just the fact that we were not really able to share the full story, that Matthew was not able to share the full story, because he was under the control, being held by those Gadhafi loyalists who were armed, who -- we understand the conditions, just horrific. No electricity, a lot of times in the darkness.

Just last night -- we understand that we have more sound from Matthew Chance, but he was saying just last night that they had to break in, that they were able just to get some food, candy bars, to be able to survive.

Let's listen in. I think we have some more sound from Matthew.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Well, they just couldn't, after 42 years nearly of Gadhafi's rule, comprehend the idea of a Libya without him. But when they finally understood it, and took it in and embraced it -- I mean, at one point a Kalashnikov assault rifle was thrown across the room, into the kitchen -- into the kitchens in the restaurant area, and the whole situation changed.

All of the guards there, the two guards that were in the lobby of the hotel, Gadhafi loyalists, right up until the end, right up until beyond the end, you could say, they basically came over to us and they said look, you know, we're not going to stop you from leaving anymore. All we had to do then was arrange some kind of transport out of the hotel, and thankfully, the ICRC, the International Committee of the Red Cross, came up for us.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: Matthew Chance there just a bit earlier.

And Suzanne, these journalists saw themselves in this surreal situation of having to report, essentially, on their own imprisonment. They weren't allowed to leave. There were armed guards and gunmen all around them. Yet, you usually don't get tweets from people who were being held against their will, and we were able over the last few days, as worried as we were, at least to get updates on how they were doing.

MALVEAUX: And thank God. I mean, that really gave us a totally different picture of how they were living during these days.

I think we have the latest one here. He says that, "The crisis ends. All journalists are out." That was his most recent tweet, but he had tweeted before.

It was just yesterday there were tweets about how worried he was, how frustrated he was. And you could tell in one of his reports, too, that he was so concerned of one of those guards behind him, that he was going to anger one of those guards, that he moved around the corner. He looked very worried. At least when he was able to tweet, he was able to give a better picture, a clearer picture about what was actually taking place inside of that hotel.

GORANI: And one of my favorite set of tweets from him is when he announced, "We're going to now send out personal tweets to people who may have loved ones in the Rixos." And so, through him, people who may not have Twitter accounts, or may not have access to phones, were able to update their loved ones on how they were doing.

And thankfully, once again, to all our viewers who are joining us now, these journalists who have been trapped for five-plus days at the Rixos Hotel, in the five-star prison, as it was known in Libya, are out, headed to a safer location. So great news, as far as we're concerned. But the battle for Tripoli and perhaps other parts of Libya continues. It's still an uncertain situation -- Suzanne.

MALVEAUX: And we really don't know at this point. I mean, the big question here is, where is Moammar Gadhafi in all of this?

I mean, you saw the compound yesterday, the dramatic pictures, the scene that was unfolding throughout the day, the last 24 hours of that compound being taken over by rebels. But we really have no idea at this point where the leader, the supposed leader of the country is. And that sets a scene, a stage for something that is very tense.

We saw urban warfare playing out yesterday. We're now looking at these pictures here.

Obviously, this was not far from that compound, from Gadhafi's compound, where these journalists were working under really quite strenuous conditions here, much of the time without light, in darkness. And a real sense of uncertainty whether or not and how long they would actually be there trying to report this very difficult conflict, this story, under those kinds of conditions. GORANI: And Matthew was telling us, here's what clinched it. It's when these gunmen, when these individuals who thought they were still fighting for Gadhafi, realized it's over. There's nothing left to defend anymore. And that's when they told the journalists gathered in the hotel, all right, we're not going to keep you from leaving. Just arrange for your own transportation out of here.

MALVEAUX: I understand that we've got some sound from Matthew that we want to play. This was when he was first released from the hotel.

Let's listen in.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE: And we've got all the journalists into these four cars, plus a civilian car, and we're now driving out of the Rixos. We're driving through the deserted streets, I'd have to say, of Tripoli to our freedom, essentially.

It's been an absolute nightmare for all of us. You know, there are journalists who have been, as a result of this emotional release, the fact that we've got out of the hotel, are crying, emotions are running very high.

We went through a rebel checkpoint. The rebel checkpoint all along was just about 150 meters down the road from the Rixos Hotel. They hadn't approached the hotel, presumably because they didn't want a big gunfight to take place where all those international journalists had been holed up over the course of the past five days.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: And it's been a while since -- that's OK, Matthew. And you let me know if it's not safe to talk. I mean, you've finally been able to get out of this hotel.

I want to ask you, though, were you ever threatened? Were you ever told to say or not say anything? Give us a feel for what was being said to you and also a feel for your safety.

CHANCE: Well, frankly, we've been living in fear for the past five days, because we've been really being held against our will by these, you know, crazy gunmen who were in the lobby of our hotel wearing green bandanas, waving Gadhafi flags, wielding around their Kalashnikov assault rifles. They've been very hostile towards us at times. They've often told us about they think we're spies, NATO spies, and, you know, set on, bent on destroying Libya.

One of them shouted up to me just yesterday. We all corralled ourselves away from them because we didn't want to make too much contact with them because there was such hostility.

One of them shouted up to me yesterday, "I suppose you're happy now, aren't you, now that Libyans are killing Libyans?" You know, once again, underlying that idea that Gadhafi loyalists who were under control of the Rixos Hotel really held the national media, for some reason, responsible for the crisis in Libya. And so I can't tell you how pleased we all are and how relieved we all are, and how relieved our families will all be, that we've finally managed to get out of that place.

PHILLIPS: And Matthew, just to reiterate, you said that all the journalists were freed. So are you telling me that everybody is OK, everybody is alive, and everybody --

CHANCE: Everybody's OK. There are no injuries.

You know, perhaps some emotional scars, but apart from that, nothing visible. It's really been an incredible couple of hours.

I mean, we've been up all night. We've been up for all nights, for the past five nights, frankly, trying to go through every possible scenario, trying to negotiate our release, trying to get out of this situation by using whatever means.

And, you know, we're confronted with these guys in the lobby of the hotel who were -- they're basically, you know, the kind of diehard Gadhafi loyalists, except for one. And he was always really nice to us, and he was a bit of an older guy. And, you know, I saw this incredible scene today. I don't know quite what happened, but some of our Arab-speaking colleagues were speaking to him, presumably convincing him that history is being made around him, that the world has changed outside the gates of the Rixos Hotel.

He was following orders, basically being told to keep us there. He didn't realize that, or he didn't believe that Tripoli has basically fallen, for the most part, to the rebels.

And so when he was convinced of that, you know what? He surrendered his guns. Two of them surrendered their guns. Those guns were disabled and cast aside.

And, you know, the whole atmosphere became one of, finally, finally we think we're going to be able to move out. Because previously, to a few minutes ago, we've been asking every day, every hour, every minute, almost, in some capacity, to get out of there. And we've always been told no, we're keeping you there for your safety, it's not safe for you to go outside, you're not allowed to leave.

Every time somebody has tried to leave, there's been gunshots. There have been ferocious battles as well outside the Rixos Hotel, particularly because it's so close, remember, to Gadhafi's main compound, where there have been fierce clashes between these opposition fighters and the remnants of Gadhafi's forces.

But I'll tell you, in the end, it seemed to us -- and I don't know whether this is an accurate fact or not, but it seemed to us that we were sitting, we were trapped on the last pocket of Colonel Gadhafi's control in Tripoli, if not in the whole of Libya. So it was a very, very frustrating experience. And again, we're immensely relieved, all of us, that we're out of there and we're driving -- essentially, we're driving to our freedom now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: Matthew Chance, just a bit earlier.

All the journalists in the Rixos Hotel freed after five days in virtual captivity. They were keeping us up to date through tweets and phone calls, but we all were very worried about them because there were gunmen on the perimeter outside the hotel, and gunmen roaming the hallways and the lobby of the hotel as well.

Arwa Damon is at Tripoli's International Airport. It is not a functioning airport, but she made it there. It's one of the areas, of course, that rebels fought hard for.

Arwa, what do you make of this release?

ARWA DAMON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hala, it's so incredibly relieving to hear that --

GORANI: Well, in three words she managed to say what we're all thinking. It is a relief. That's for sure. We were very much concerned for the safety of our colleagues there, and the other individuals in that hotel as well.

Arwa is back.

Arwa, you were starting to tell me, what a relief. Go on.

DAMON: Well, it seems as if what Matthew was saying would be correct in that those that were holding them in the hotel perhaps realized that there was no longer anything to hold on to. The regime in Tripoli was beginning to fall.

That being said, we are still continuing to witness battles between Gadhafi loyalists and rebel fighters around the Tripoli International Airport, mostly coming in from the east, where there are two military compounds. And the battles have been pretty fierce.

There were all day sounds of artillery, heavy machine fire, rockets being fired at the airport complex. And the commander here tells us that he believes that the intensity of fighting is actually directly linked to Gadhafi's whereabouts. He believes that Gadhafi loyalists are trying to clear a route for Gadhafi to either move from Tripoli to other areas in the country, possibly Sirte, where there are many individuals loyal to him, who would potentially protect him, or he believes that Gadhafi is already moving around to the east in those various farmlands.

Yesterday, at around sunset, when the rebels were breaking their fast, perhaps not necessarily as alert as they would have been, he says that some of the fighters spotted what they are identifying as being an official convoy that had an armored Mercedes in it. He says he believes Gadhafi could have been traveling in that vehicle. They did alert NATO about that, passing on all sorts of information, but we're still seeing a fair amount of resistance from Gadhafi forces here at the Tripoli International Airport -- Hala.

GORANI: All right. And let's talk about the situation at the airport.

You were reporting yesterday and over the last few days, since you arrived in Libya, that there was some fighting not too far from the airport. Now, what is the situation as far as the capital is concerned? Are the rebels pretty much in control of the whole city?

DAMON: Well, they say that they are in control of most of it, but I can tell you that they are not in control, for example, of the highway that leads directly from the airport to Tripoli that would go directly to Gadhafi's Bab al-Aziziya compound. They've only managed to push up a few kilometers, a few miles on that highway. They are not still in control of these farmlands to the east.

And so while they might have been able to gain control of critical locations in Tripoli, rebel commanders say that they actually believe that the battle is shifting its focus to the airport and its vicinity. They were telling us last night that they believe that this is possibly where we could be seeing the final stance between Gadhafi forces and these rebel fighters.

They've really been struggling to try to take control over this area, even though they did manage to get their hands on a significant amount of weapons that they found buried right next to the tarmac here. They say that it seems as if Gadhafi units planned on putting up quite a fight.

They have fortified themselves. There were all sorts of defenses being put into place. They did come across some resistance when they were taking over this airport, and now it seems that the battle has shifted to the periphery of the airport itself. There's still incoming rocket fire, artillery, heavy machine gun fire being exchanged -- Hala.

GORANI: All right.

Arwa Damon is at Tripoli's International Airport, in the Libyan capital.

It appears as though the vast majority of the city is in rebel hands. The big question, of course, is, if there are pockets of resistance, how -- I suppose with how much enthusiasm will pro-Gadhafi forces fight back? That question still unanswered -- Suzanne.

MALVEAUX: I want to go to Dan Rivers. I understand that he's at Martyrs' Square in Tripoli.

And Dan, you know Matthew very well. You know the guys that he works with. You've seen this video here, you've heard his story. What do you make of what's actually taken place?

DAN RIVERS, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's obviously a huge, huge relief that Matthew's out.

I've just come from a briefing from a senior member of the Transitional National Council, Abdul Hafid Galani (ph), and he's given me a bit of a kind of overview of what's happening in the city right now. He says, basically, south of the Ring (ph) Road is still fairly dicey with pockets of resistance. Zawiya, itself, to the west of Tripoli, is now completely secure, according to this man.

The districts of Mayir (ph) and Jansoor (ph) are now secured. Siahia (ph) is also secured. Gilgaresh (ph) and other two districts they say are secure.

But south of that Ring (ph) Road, down towards the airport, they say is still very dangerous. They said that the situation is getting better. And I asked how many causalities they've suffered since Sunday. He gave me the figure of 400.

And worryingly, in light of what's happened to Matthew, he told us that Colonel Gadhafi had issued orders to kidnap foreigners. Now, we don't know if that is rebel propaganda, or if that is true, but clearly, it's obviously a huge clear relief that Matthew is out of that dicey situation.

(GUNFIRE)

RIVERS: You can hear there's still a hell of a lot of celebratory gunfire around here.

One other nugget of information. He said that General Albrani Eshkar (ph), who was in charge of the special guard who was charged with protecting Gadhafi, had actually been working undercover for the rebels since the beginning of this month. And he had ordered the revolutionary guards to lay down their weapons and surrender.

Now, they are not sure who is now resisting, whether it's pockets of that guard who have disobeyed that general's order. Obviously, this is all comes from the rebels. We have no way of checking any of this, but that's what we've been told at the moment.

The big picture here is that south of that Ring (ph) Road still remains dangerous. I said to them, "You said you've got 80 percent or 90 percent of the city." I think there's a bit of going back on that now, but certainly they are feeling pretty confident. And as you can see, certainly here there's people driving around, firing guns in celebration.

MALVEAUX: Dan, tell us a little bit about where you are and what's taking place, because we hear gunfire a lot of times. It sounds very ominous, but you say that these are people who are simply celebrating. Are you seeing any kind of a firefight, or this is really an area that is clear, where the rebels are in charge, where people are actually celebrating?

RIVERS: It's clear that this TNC spokesman said there are snipers around. So I can't be 100 percent sure that everything you're hearing is celebratory, but it feels that way down here.

There are people walking around, you know, looking at the kind of debris and the damage that has been caused to this square. It's such a contrast with when I was last here back in June, when, of course, this was still firmly the heart of the Gadhafi regime. Now it's -- well, it's the heart of the rebel regime.

They are driving around and round, looting off guns and so on. But I think the situation to the south, down towards where Arwa is, down at the airport, that does remain dangerous. And certainly, they steered us well away from going anywhere south of that main Ring (ph) Road.

They were asked about, for example, a port area, can boats come in? They said at the moment, they feel they have the port, but no boats are docking at the moment.

MALVEAUX: Dan, just to be clear, I understand what you're getting from this council, this transitional council here, is that there is one area in particular that is still a dangerous area where the rebels do not have control. For the most part, they do have control, but the area near the airport where Arwa Damon is, is not yet safe.

RIVERS: That's right. Yes, he said it was south of that main Ring (ph) Road that sweeps around the south of Tripoli, sort of cutting it in half, if you like. South of the zoo. All of that area down towards the airport remains unsafe.

Up here, we're in the northern half of the city. The sea is just back behind us there, and they are claiming this is an area they feel happy with, happy for us to come to. And clearly, the fact that we can broadcast here and -- as you can see, there are cars driving around here, lots of people beeping their horns in celebration -- gives you the sense this area, at least, is much safer than it was.

MALVEAUX: And Dan, for those of us who don't really know the area, the area that you're talking about where the rebels don't have control, is that a big region next to the airport? Do you have a sense of scale or size, the kind of battle that they might be undergoing if they actually take on that region?

RIVERS: I'm afraid I don't know. I mean, the map we were looking at had no scale on it, so I'm just sort of going off this map that he showed us, which looked like a sizeable chunk of the city that he was gesturing at, saying down here is dicey.

Now, whether that means that the entire area is dicey, or whether they just can't guarantee people's safety wasn't really clear. But the impression I got was it was a good kind of chunk of the southern half of the city that does remain certainly volatile and dangerous, and not somewhere that they were saying that we should go at all.

As I say, we have reports of snipers and pockets of resistance down there. Even while we were there, they left in several jeeps to go out on another sort of mission to that southern area. So I got the impression there is still active fighting going on down there.

MALVEAUX: You had mentioned something. I want to ask you about this, Dan.

Just to be clear here, you actually said that there was a general who was in charge of the special guards that were in charge of protecting Gadhafi, and that one of those generals had actually been working undercover for the rebels since the beginning of the month, and that he had ordered the revolutionary guards to lay down their weapons and surrender.

Do you know anything more about that, the possibility they had a spy or someone who was undercover?

RIVERS: Well, this is just, you know, one account of someone who is in the council who, you know, claims to be seen here. They are saying that General Albrani Eshkar (ph) ordered his special revolutionary guards to lay down their weapons. He said the general had been working with the rebels undercover since the beginning of this month. So, for a couple of weeks, three weeks now, and have been trying to encourage them to lay down their weapons.

And whether all of them had or not, that was what they were trying to ascertain at the moment. But I must stress, I have absolutely no way of verifying this. This is all just from one source in the council, an Abdul Hafid Galani (ph), who claimed to be a senior member of the council.

It seems quite a kind of chaotic organizational structure, if you like. We were actually waiting for another figure to turn up, a colonel who didn't turn up. And so this gentlemen, Galani (ph), gave us a briefing on his behalf.

I have no way of verifying whether his claims are true or not. I think it's important to stress that is just from what one person in the council, who obviously, you know, comes with a particular pint of view.

MALVEAUX: Certainly, Dan, if it were true, this would not be good news for Gadhafi, if there are actually rebels who are able to infiltrate his guard, the protection around him. That certainly would indicate or signal that he's in big trouble, potentially big trouble here, if there are rebels who are able to get that close to him and potentially turn the others around, turn on him.

RIVERS: Absolutely, yes. I mean, this is potentially disastrous.

I get the impression that guard was -- he's kind of a hard-core bastion who would fight to the death to protect him. And the general, if this is true, in charge of it is apparently being turned to the rebel cause. You know, it is a massive blow to Gadhafi.

His whereabouts is unknown. We asked repeatedly. They have no idea. His exact words were, "God only knows where Gadhafi is." And they are obviously fanning out across the city trying to ascertain that now.

MALVEAUX: All right.

Dan Rivers, there in Tripoli, at Martyrs' Square.

Thank you so much, Dan. We appreciate the update.

Obviously, Hala, a very tense situation. He specifically talked about how the council said there was one region where the rebels were not in control, where they are still fighting Gadhafi loyalists, where it is a very dangerous situation. And that is near the airport where Arwa Damon, our own Arwa Damon is. And a lot of questions, still, where is Moammar Gadhafi, and how dangerous is the situation?

GORANI: The dust hasn't settled. We don't know how the next few days will unfold as far as fighting is concerned.

It does appear, however, that really a vast majority of Tripoli is in rebel hands. The question is, it doesn't take many armed men to create a very difficult and bloody situation in a relatively -- in a relatively big area. So that's not going to go away, that possibility that there might be more bloodshed in Tripoli.

We are going to speak hopefully with Matthew Chance on the other side of this break, who was freed just about an hour, a little less than an hour ago, from the Rixos Hotel, along with our colleagues and friends who had been trapped there for several days.

Don't go away. We'll be right back on CNN and CNN INTERNATIONAL.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: All right. Well, welcome back, everyone. We are covering breaking news out of Libya and Tripoli.

I'm Hala Gorani, along with Suzanne Malveaux.

Well, just about 45 minutes ago, those reporters who had been trapped/held captive in the Rixos Hotel in Tripoli were freed. Our Matthew Chance spoke to us on the phone shortly after being released. He was in an ICRC, an International Committee of the Red Cross, vehicle on his way to a safe location. This was what he told us immediately after being released.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHANCE: And we've got all the journalists into these four cars, plus a civilian car. And we're now driving out of the Rixos. We're driving through the deserted streets, I have to say, of Tripoli to our freedom, essentially.

It's been an absolute nightmare for all of us. You know, there are journalists who have been, as a result of this emotional release, the fact that we've gotten out of the hotel, are crying, emotions are running very high.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GORANI: Well, we have Matthew Chance with us live on the phone.

Matthew, it's been about an hour. How does it feel?

CHANCE: It feels great. It feels absolutely great. We've come back to another hotel in Tripoli. There's been loads of people here to meet us, loads of, you know, press who have obviously been following this terrible, horrible situation at the Rixos Hotel for the past week or so.

Everybody's been hugging each other -- people who we have been sort of living cheek to jowl with for the past five days, sleeping in the corridors, wondering whether we were going it make it. You know, it's all very emotional. We were kind of hugging each other, congratulating each other, shaking hands, kissing.

It's a great thing to come out of a situation like this. You know, in one piece, there's been no injuries, nobody's been killed. And it's just a huge, huge relief that we -- that we came through it like that, Hala.

MALVEAUX: Matthew, can you -- this is Suzanne.

Can you tell us again how it was that you managed to escape this hotel, how this actually happened?

CHANCE: Yes, Suzanne.

It was remarkable actually because we found ourselves in a situation where we were essentially in the -- virtually, one of the last remaining pockets of control of territory for colonel Gadhafi. He's left that area in the hands of a few, you know, loyalist fighters wearing green bandanas carrying (INAUDIBLE) weapons. They're die- hards. They really believe that Gadhafi was coming back, that he could -- he was beating the rebels, that's what the government line has been on this all along.

But obviously as the days went on, as Tripoli fell to the rebels, as it became more and more obvious that there was nothing really outside of the hotel that was in Gadhafi control, the reality slowly dawned on these people until today, a couple of hours ago, they essentially just capitulated to the 36 journalists or so that were inside the Rixos hotel, they handed over their weapons. Those weapons were sort of put out of use. And they said we're going to let you go. It's no problem, but you need to get cars to come and fetch you.

So we organized with it with the ICRC, the International Committee of the Red Cross. They came and picked us up, which was a huge relief. It was fantastic of them to essentially go through the checkpoints and to come and pick us up, all of the journalists in four cars, we had to get another car, as well, a civilian car, to cram the journalists in. We were literally crammed in. It was like seven or eight people in the small little ICRC car that I was in. And we had a short drive to a location in another part of the city, going through multiple rebel checkpoints. And, you know, just the feeling of the weight, this pressure lifting off us as we drove further away from the Rixos hotel, and it's just really incredible.

Everyone's really happy now, obviously, very, very happy and relieved this situation has come to an end.

GORANI: Matthew, I don't think -- if someone had told you a few days ago you'd be happy to see a rebel checkpoint with men armed to the teeth, I don't think you would have believed them.

What was your worst fear when you were essentially being held against your will at the Rixos, you and your colleagues.

CHANCE: Hala, sorry. Could you repeat that?

GORANI: What was your worst fear when you were held there against your will at the Rixos?

CHANCE: OH, we had all sorts of paranoid scenarios that we were playing in our minds from everything is going to end fine, we're going to wake up one morning and everyone's going to be gone and we can walk out, to this awful worst-case scenario that we were going to be used as human shields, we were going to be taken prisoner and executed by some lunatic hard liner.

And in all of the scenarios in between as well, and we've exhausted, we've expended such a lot of physical and emotional energy, all of us, just focusing, trying to work out what we can do to get out, looking at every possible -- we've worked out escape plans if things get really bad, we were thinking and people start shooting at us, we were going to climb over the wall and run down a ditch and, you know, escape to a hospital across the road.

We had all sorts of plans we were going over again and again. We created a safe room in the hotel. It was a mosque, it was a prayer room, which we commandeered because it didn't have any windows so there wasn't any possibility of shells coming through, bullets coming through, at least.

And we went around the hotel sort of gathering food and water and tried to corral it in a certain area so that we could have some supplies. We were running pretty short on those supplies. We had enough food and water for a couple of days, but, you know, we went through all the kitchens, all the meat had gone off, it stank. It was -- you know, absolutely.

And again, all this while we were absolutely terrified that, you know, the mood was going to change and we were going to be shot. I think that gets to the nub of it. I mean, that's what we were worried about. We were worried about being shot. But happily we weren't shot, we weren't even injured. We were absolutely fine and we've all come out.

MALVEAUX: Were there any of these Gadhafi loyalists, these gunmen, that you could talk to, that you could reason with? Were they listening to your live reports, listening to what you were saying or the other journalists?

CHANCE: Did they what? Sorry, I'm having real trouble hearing you on this telephone line. I'm so sorry. MALVEAUX: Sure. Were there any of these gunmen that you could talk to, negotiate with, work with? Were they actually listening in on your live reports?

CHANCE: Well, I mean for the past several weeks we've been at the Rixos, remember, when there's been more, sort of full government control there, full government presence there. All that time, we worked under the assumption that our phone calls were being listened to, our e-mails were being tapped into.

But, of course, at some point last week all the government officials and minders, the media spokesperson for Gadhafi abandoned the hotel, all those other sort of Gadhafi hanger-oners, they were at the hotel because it was a safe place in Tripoli with their families. They all left it. They all abandoned it. They went somewhere else. They left the hotel in the hands of these young Kalashnikov-wielding gunmen.

Those gunmen we couldn't really negotiate with, no, for the most part. First of all, they were very angry. As I mentioned earlier, they blamed the international media, i.e., us, for the crisis in Libya. One of them shouted up to me just yesterday, hey, I hope you're happy now that Libyans are killing Libyans, really kind of bringing across that point that, you know, they felt that we were responsible for what was happening (INAUDIBLE).

And so it's been very difficult to negotiate with them. We've even tried to avoid any contact with them at all, in fact, because there was such hostility at various points during our captivity, I suppose, if we could call it, in the Rixos hotel. You know, we had them sort of kicking down our doors. My room was smashed into, my door was kicked in, my stuff rifled through by Kalashnikov-wielding hoodlums essentially.

They walked through our corridors where we corralled al the journalists together and, you know, with their guns cocked, behaving in very threatening fashion, (INAUDIBLE) around the hotel and things like that. So there were these real debts that we had to sort of live through. I mean, some of the worst ones being there was this ferocious battle, of course, just a very short distance away which sort of then came into the hotel periphery for the control of Gadhafi's compound a few nights back.

I mean, the artillery shells coming in, the machine guns fire. I mean, we spent -- you know, I spent at least 36 hours, you know, on and off lying on my belly in a dark room with no air conditioning in a very hot country, of course. It was like sweating, you've got no food and water, or very little food and water. There's shells coming in. There's snipers shooting through the hotel.

It's been an absolute nightmare, an absolute nightmare.

GORANI: Matthew, I want to ask you, because so many people are wondering, how do keep it mentally -- I mean, psychologically, how do you keep it together when you're on your own and when you're with the others? How do you get through it?

CHANCE: I don't know. I guess what I do is I try to -- I guess I've been trying to sort of remain focused on gathering whatever news I can. Thinking about work is a good way of getting through it.

We're also very lucky to have a great bunch of journalists that were there so it was a very collegiate atmosphere. We were all looking after each other's backs. We all did things together. We all made sort of collective decisions about what our next steps were going to be.

And, you know, there were some times when we laughed and joked, as well, and had some pretty good times. This is, you know, there's a whole gamut -- one of the amazing things about this experience, incredible things, is there was this whole gamut of emotions from massive lows to thinking we're not going to get out of this, not going to make it through the hour, to these incredible highs where, you know, we're really optimistic that it was all going to come to an end, and then, of course, it did.

And so thankfully it ended on a high, which is great.

MALVEAUX: Matthew, I understand in order to just report you were at sometimes in the basement and you had to make your way up to the top so you could get a signal out to talk to people, to file these reports. You were also tweeting.

Was this your lifeline essentially to get on air to tell the story?

CHANCE: I think so for me, yes. I mean, I really -- what I said all along to my management is I've been so grateful. This network has been so grateful to -- and so dependent on the other networks that were in the hotel.

We were caught off guard in some ways on this story because we didn't have a cameraman there. We didn't have the technical staff there we'd normally have on a story like this because the road was cut off from the neighboring country Tunisia. We were bringing these people in. They were on the bus on the way in. The road got cut off and they all turned back.

And so we were left there. It was just me, just a couple of other staff members as well, a field producer Jomana, who was fantastic. She speaks Arabic, she was doing a lot of the negotiating with the -- with the, you know, the security staff downstairs.

But yes, I really, you know, I think stretch, my colleagues would agree with me, I really stretched the good will of other news organizations through its breaking point at times. Borrowing their satellite phones, trying to do interviews on the phone like this one. I was trying to tweet as much as possible because sometimes we had the internet, which was good. I mean, could tweet as normal and do Skype live shots. Other times the internet was down and we had to look for other means of broadcasting and other means of tweeting. So one of the things I've been using three methods. I've been kind of doing the normal on my iPhone, normal signal through the Wi- Fi. I've been using a satellite phone to uplink to the internet and do tweets on there. And then finally, I've been using this last-case, worst-case scenario method of tweeting, which is good old-fashioned dictation, where you call up somebody on some phone and say, hey, listen, log into my account, tweet this right now. And that's been very effective, and it's been a really good way, I think, of getting out, you know, the message of what's been happening inside that hotel for the past five terrible days.

GORANI: We've relied very much on your tweets, Matthew, and we're all thinking of you and Jomana, all of our friends and colleagues and people we've met along the road out in the field. It's just a very difficult situation. Thankfully it ended well.

But Matthew, the city is still not a safe city. It's still not a stable situation for you, so you went from essentially being held captive, to now kind of a volatile environment in Tripoli itself.

CHANCE: Yes, well I've been so cut off from what's been happening over the course of the past week, I really don't know what the situation is in Tripoli in general.

I mean, I've just driven through the streets of Tripoli on the way to this location where I am now. It was virtually deserted. There were a lot of burned-out cars, green flags of Colonel Gadhafi had been torn down. The pictures of Colonel Gadhafi which had been everywhere had been torn down. There were rebel checkpoints here in C (ph) checkpoints every couple of hundred of meters along the way.

And every time we went past those checkpoints, they'd look at us, they'd give us the victory sign and wave us on.

Jomana, the producer on this assignment, who's been so great, told me in the car that what was different for her about Tripoli is that it seems all of a sudden such a happy city. It has been such a grim place, such a place where people looked down, didn't want to make contact with you.

Whereas driving through the city now, the point she made to me was that everybody's smiling. Everybody's looking at us and waving and they feel like they're happy. That was her point of view. I expect you'll hear more from her later on. But, you know, but yes, a remarkable drive we've just taken through these very volatile streets of the Libyan capital -- Hala.

MALVEAUX: Matthew, is your producer Jomana with you? Is she able to talk to us by phone?

CHANCE: Let me have a look around, I'm not sure she is. I think she may have gone to freshen up. We've all been -- oh, no. She is here, she is here. I'm going to ask her to join us. One second.

I'm going to hand it over to her right now. It's Jomana. Hala and Suzanne.

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN PRODUCER RELEASED FROM HOTEL (via telephone): Hello guys, hey.

GORANI: Jomana, Jomana. Nice to hear your voice.

KARADSHEH: Hi Hala. Good to be out, it's good to be free.

MALVEAUX: Tell us how you're doing.

KARADSHEH: I cannot explain to you, Hala, what an emotional roller coaster this has been. It's been unbelievable, you know, especially today it was really hard.

One of the most difficult things to me was speaking the language, you know, speaking Arabic. I was involved in most of the negotiations between those guys who were holding us there and also trying to talk to people on the outside, trying to secure a safe passage for us or getting us out like we did today. It was a team effort.

We had an amazing group of journalists and an experience like this we did all really bond together and work as a team and made sure we all got out of there together. It's amazing.

And walking out of the hotel, Hala, I didn't really know what was going to be out there. And I came out here, a new Libya. I was actually shocked, it's a new Tripoli. I didn't see any green flags, it was the rebel flags. I saw children waving the flags. It felt like a happy Tripoli. It was a very, very different one that I saw about a week ago before we were taken hostage.

GORANI: That's just unbelievable. I mean, you go to -- you enter a hotel one day and you exit five days later and it's a brand new country, brand new environment.

I asked Matthew this question, I want to ask you, Jomana. We worked together many times in the past, and I know how strong willed you are and how determined you are. How, though, do you get through five days of uncertainty? Whereas Matthew was telling us you don't know, you're going through crazy scenarios in your mind that include just the worst possible outcome. How did you keep it together psychologically?

KARADSHEH: I think, Hala, a lot of it was just us talking to each other, finding a coping mechanism for being in there, you know trying sometimes to just crack jokes and make the best out of, you know, what is one of the worst scenario one can be in.

And definitely, there were times when you really couldn't control it, that you would space out and you were thinking about the things that could happen to us. We're hearing from the guys who were holding us, you know, I was confronted a couple of times by the guys with guns, but you know, it was really scary, but we survived that. And it's just really good to be out right now, Hala.

GORANI: I can imagine. MALVEAUX: Jomana, this is Suzanne, who is also with Hala.

Can you explain to us, I know you speak Arabic, this whole process of the negotiations, how did that come about? What was your role? Why did you even think that you could negotiate with these gunmen?

KARADSHEH: Well, Suzanne, I've spent quite a bit of time in Libya over the past few months, and, you know, even in a place like the Rixos Hotel, even in a place where we were so restricted and, you know, most of the time the relationship wasn't the best with the government minders, but it's still also you build this relationship with one human being to another. I think this was a continuation to that.

Some of the guys who were there we knew and they knew some of us, so you were still able to sit and talk to them from one human being to another. And I think this is what it was at the end, just an emotional plea to one of the last men who was standing there.

And he actually, Suzanne, he felt that he wanted to protect us. He was totally convinced that, you know, it was armed gangs on the streets of Tripoli. Like us, he really did not know what the scenes on the streets of Tripoli were like.

And in the final moments when him and another armed man, you know, were about to put down their guns, he asked the guy, he told him, you were out there, tell me, what's really going on, is it what they are telling us. He didn't even know whether Bab al-Azizia had fallen or not. So they really -- you know, he's in as much of a shock as we are.

So it was just process of keeping it calm, keeping quiet, and remember we're all human and trying to talk to each other like that.

MALVEAUX: What did you say to him? What did you say to the gunmen to allow the group of you to leave?

KARADSHEH: Well, I actually, you know, we spent time with him over the past few days just sitting and talking to him about his kids, his family. And so I started in the context with just sitting him and telling him that I really miss my family and really want to go out and see my family who are really worried about me now and same thing for the 30-plus journalists in the hotel. And he got tears in his eyes in that moment and felt emotional about that too.

And slowly, myself and another colleague here, an Arab cameraman, we both sat there with him and told him that, you know, things are changing out there. So slowly he started listening to us. Listening to us saying, you have to think of your kids, you have to -- you know, you're left here alone, just let us go.

And it just happened. It was a slow process, it was a messy one at times, but it worked out in the end.

GORANI: Well, sometimes it's all about finding that common humanity. Doesn't always work, but when it does work, hopefully you get someone who's receptive to basic human emotions, and it seems as though at least in that gunman, Jomana and the team found it.

Jomana, stand by. We're delighted you're out, you and Matthew and the others. I understand Sara Sidner is in Martyr's Square right now, the renamed Green Square, with the latest -- Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: For awhile there it was quiet.

I just want to say, all of us were thinking about Matthew, Jomana and all of the other journalists that were inside the hotel. To us, it's a very big relief to hear that they are OK, because in the back of your mind, that could have been any of us.

People who have come here to cover this story have put ourselves in a precarious position, and no one could have known how this situation was going to unfold. We're happy to hear that they're out.

Here in Martyr's Square that was renamed, it used to be Green Square when Gadhafi was in power, the rebels calling it now Martyr's Square, for awhile had been pretty calm. But now as the sun is starting going down in the sky, people coming back out and blasting off these massive weapons. So I had to go ahead and put back the helmet in place just in case some of those bullets come down and towards us.

But I have to say, there's still a bit of fighting going on in the city. You're hearing loud blasts, that is rebel fire going off there, but not in a firefight. What we're hearing is there are parts of the city that are not safe.

Some of our reporters, Dan Rivers is now here, he was coming into the city, he was told there is a ring road you should not go on, that there are snipers. That there are still areas that are certainly -- they may be in control in the sense that there are checkpoints, but there still are elements of Gadhafi's forces in the streets that perhaps people can't see that are taking shots at people.

So still, a situation that is not completely under the control of the rebels.

MALVEAUX: And, Sara, we know the rebels are claiming that like 90 percent of the territory is in their control. You're on the ground, you can see what's taking place. What is your sense of who's in control? Is it still a very chaotic and fluid situation?

SIDNER: It is still a chaotic situation, but it's made chaotic by all of the celebratory gunfire because you can't tell -- when it's far away, you can't tell if there's an actual battle going on if you can't see it and you're not close enough to see what's going on or if that's friendly fire going on. We can tell what's going on here is the rebels just blowing off in celebratory gunfire, but in some of the neighborhoods, that is not the case.

The rebels do have control of many of the streets here. We do know that because we've been stopped at their check points around the city. We've been told where we can go, where we cannot go. So in that sense, they're in control knowing the areas that are still dangerous and keeping residents from those areas. We are not --

(GUNFIRE)

SIDNER: We are not seeing Gadhafi forces eye-to-eye. We know that they are in certain neighborhoods. Just the one, for example, right behind the Bab al-Azizia compound, the Gadhafi compound, we know that neighborhood does still have some Gadhafi forces in it. There's definitely some situation near the Rixos Hotel where all of those journalists were let out. People saying snipers in the area there.

So clearly the rebels may have control of many of the streets, but don't have full control of this city just yet, guys.

GORANI: All right. Sara Sidner there live in Martyr's Square. Thanks so much with the latest as we continue to follow these fast- moving developments out of Libya. Thank you very much.

That is some of the largest caliber celebratory gunfire I've ever heard, by the way.

MALVEAUX: Scary stuff that's happening.

GORANI: I mean, you 're used to hearing the AKs, but the big caliber stuff, I don't know.

MALVEAUX: And the bullets come down. The bullets reign down. It's just not a safe situation.

GORANI: They always come down. Wear your helmet, of course.

So we are going to -- are we taking a break right now? We're going to take a break. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: I want to bring you some live pictures we're looking at now. This is in Martha's Vineyard, this is where the president is vacationing for a little bit. It's clearly been a working vacation for President Obama.

We are waiting on a briefing that's going to take place. When of the deputy press secretaries, Josh Earnest, is going to be talking to reporters, answering questions about what is taking place in Libya.

The president earlier put out a written statement and talked about some of the things they are looking for and watching and clearly warning that this is a very tense time, it is a transitional time, giving as much support as possible to the rebels on the ground as well as talking about unfreezing assets to those rebels, looking for more ways the United States can help in that NATO effort to make sure that the rebels and the transitional government are successful.

GORANI: All right. And we have been covering, of course, over the last one hour-plus, the release of the journalists from the Rixos Hotel. Before we go to that sound, I'd like to say thanks for having me, Suzanne, here on "CNN USA," as we broadcast to our CNN INTERNATIONAL audience. I'll be back at 1:00 p.m. Eastern for the International Desk.

But for now, listen to Matthew Chance right after he was released, first speak to Kyra Phillips.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHANCE: We have now left the compound of the hotel. All of the 36 journalists that were kept inside essentially against their will in what we all considered all along to be a hostage crisis, have now been -- a hostage situation, rather -- have now been allowed to go out.

It's been a very complicated, a very frightening, a very, you know, emotional roller coaster over the last five days. I can tell you we're sitting in the vehicles of the ICRC, the International Committee of the Red Cross. We managed to negotiate the Red Cross to get in through the checkpoints of the Gadhafi loyalists, perhaps the only Gadhafi loyalist-checkpoint in the city if the reports that we have heard inside the hotel is to be believed.

And we've got all the journalists into these four cars plus a civilian car, and we're now driving out of the Rixos, we're driving through the deserted street of Tripoli to, you know, to our freedom essentially.

It's been an absolutely -- it's been an absolute nightmare for all of us, you know. There are journalists who have been, as a result of this emotional release, the fact that we've got out of the hotel, are crying, emotions are running very high.

We went through a rebel checkpoint. The rebel checkpoint all along was just about, what, 150 meters down the road from the Rixos Hotel. They hadn't approached the hotel, presumably because they didn't want a big gunfight to take place where all those international journalists had been hold up over the course of the past five days.

PHILLIPS: And it's been a while since -- that's OK, Matthew. And you let me know if it's not safe to talk. I mean, you've finally been able to get out of this hotel.

I want to ask you though --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: I want to go straight to Martha's Vineyard. This is one of the deputy press secretaries, Josh Earnest, who is answering questions, talking about the situation in Libya.

Let's take a listen.

(INTERRUPTED BY CNN'S COVERAGE OF A LIVE EVENT)