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Mayor Acts Like Robin Hood; Mexico Sacks Airport Security Staff
Aired August 22, 2012 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to NEWSROOM INTERNATIONAL, I'm Suzanne Malveaux. We're taking you around the world in 60 minutes. Here is what is going on right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
Extreme car racing in the deserts of Saudi Arabia. A popular trend now with deadly consequences.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is a dishonor killing, whatever they do. It is not an honor killing.
MALVEAUX (voice-over): A husband accused of killing his wife just for talking to another man. Well, now one activist in Pakistan is fighting for justice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: But first the civil war is now boiling over, the civil war in Syria not confined to Syria, not at all. Now it is spilling over into almost every country that touches Syria, so we are talking about Iraq and Turkey and Lebanon. People are dying in street battles and families are caught in the crossfire.
Arwa Damon, she is in northern Lebanon with that story.
ARWA DAMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is just one of the ways that the Syria uprising is manifesting itself in Lebanon. Along a Sunni- Alawite sectarian front line in the northern city of Tripoli. With the Lebanese army trying to pound both sides into submission.
Some residents choose to move to safer ground. Others hang around nervously in doorways, now living on the lower floors.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Speaking foreign language).
DAMON (voice-over): "We spent the night under gunfire. We had to eat in the stairway," this woman says, referring to the holiday at the end of the holy month of Ramadan.
Many admit they often don't know how the fighting starts or how it ends. But what they do know is that events in Syria are aggravating longstanding tensions between the communities.
DAMON: There have been numerous holes smashed into the walls between buildings here, just like this one. But this is not a recent development. These neighborhoods have been preparing themselves for battle for years now.
DAMON (voice-over): Some shops are open, not for business, but for safe passage. We're in Sunni Bab al-Tabbaneh neighborhood, separated from the Alawite area in the hills, Jebel Mohsen. Dividing the two is the appropriately named Syria Street.
DAMON: This is as close to the front line as we can get. People are having to dart across this one road, because right around the corner is Syria Street, and that is where these clashes are being concentrated.
DAMON (voice-over): It is not the first time these two sides have clashed. Each time sparked by different events, in this case, both agree that it was children playing with BB guns, a scenario that somehow escalated into this.
Both blame each other. And this time, residents fear, it is going to last.
This woman says a shell just slammed into their bedroom right on the front line. They are going to hunker down with relatives nearby. No one was hurt, but it was clearly time to go.
DAMON: These makeshift very crude routes are also how families are evacuating.
DAMON (voice-over): The Bab al-Tabbaneh gunmen say that they are hardly firing back. The other side claims they are showing restraint as well.
With gunfire echoing through the narrow streets, it is hard to determine where it is coming from.
DAMON: They're telling us to be careful of the opening right there as we move up towards one of the fighting positions.
DAMON (voice-over): The Sunni gunman says the Alawites are well armed, funded by the Syrian regime. On this side of the battleground, it is clear where loyalties lie. The Syrian opposition flag is painted on a storefront, a poster on the wall of four people from the area killed in clashes since the Syrian uprising began.
Amidst fears that yet another generation will grow up to the sounds of war and brutal lessons of war -- Arwa Damon, CNN, Tripoli, Lebanon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: And we saw that image of a child actually carrying a machine gun. I want to go to Michael Holmes with CNN International.
And certainly, the tension inside of Lebanon, it didn't start with this civil war that broke out in Syria. Explain to us why it is that you've got these different groups in Lebanon and they have taken a position when it comes to Syria, now this is the tension that was bubbling under the surface is now just exploding.
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I used to use it as sort of comparison when you talked about Iraq and say that Lebanon's similar in that -- what is it? It was lines drawn on a map after World War I by Westerners and threw everyone together and said, you are a country; now everyone get along.
When you talk about Lebanon, you are talking about 18 distinct religious groups, various Christian groups from orthodox to Catholic. There's a very tiny Jewish population there, you have got the Sunni, the Shia, the Alawite, the Druze, the Maronite, all bunched in together with their age-old -- going back centuries -- enmities and differences and tribal squabbles and all the rest of it. That has bubbled along forever.
And then to -- and I think that you had that devastating civil war from 1975 to 1990. You know, Lebanese don't want to go back to that, but those sort of tensions are always there below the surface. I was there earlier this year and I remember sitting in a coffee shop and I looked across and there was a church and a mosque and I thought, this is wonderful.
And then there was -- the church bells rang, the call to prayer rang out, and you think, this is a really good model for the rest of the Arab world.
MALVEAUX: But it's not.
HOLMES: But underneath, it's a veneer (inaudible).
(CROSSTALK)
MALVEAUX: Tell us a little bit about the role of Hezbollah here, because we know that the United States considers it a terrorist organization. We have seen recently this big PR campaign on their part where they even have these kind of theme parks, Hezbollah parks, if you will, and now you have got European countries who seem to be a lot more accepting of them as a mainstream type of political party.
What are they doing inside of Lebanon?
HOLMES: Well, they've been there. They were formed as a reaction, if you like, to the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, and they came -- they were born out of that. It is called the Party of God, that is what Hezbollah means. And there are different areas of Hezbollah, there's the military wing which is the famed one, the one that does the destruction as --
MALVEAUX: (Inaudible).
HOLMES: -- the terrorist organization. Well, it's interesting. But first of all, going to say also, there is a political wing and there is a social wing.
Now the social wing does things central government doesn't do in Lebanon, because it is so weak. Provides hospitals, health clinics, agriculture clinics, social services, and so there's -- that gives it a grassroots support. People are getting things.
MALVEAUX: (Inaudible) that are resting pretty low. though. I mean, you've got all these (inaudible) --
HOLMES: (Inaudible).
MALVEAUX: -- fighting now, they are not taking a lead in this, but you do have police who are getting involved here and you have these clans that are set up in these neighborhoods.
Who is actually in charge? Who is running the show in Lebanon?
HOLMES: Well, you have got to say that Hezbollah is always going to be the party that seems to have the infrastructure, to have the most power when it comes to Lebanon.
The central government, unfortunately is weak, partly because of their fractured society and the political fracturing that goes along with that, but, you know, you have a situation where people are running around kidnapping people, and the government is sort of basically saying, please don't do that.
That just shows you the weakness of the government. Meanwhile, Hezbollah was kidnapping people and interrogating people on the road to the airport the other day, the army was 50 yards away and did not do anything.
The power is still there. Hezbollah laying low -- why? The two major losers if Assad falls, Iran and Hezbollah, because they have been heavily patronized by the Assad regime, but they are a powerful organization on many levels, social, political and the military wing.
But why they are worried is their legitimacy in the street comes from being the leader of the resistance against Israel and its allies. If you have another civil war in Lebanon, Sunni-Shia, that sort of legitimacy goes away and it becomes an internal thing. So they don't want that to happen.
MALVEAUX: All right. It is a fascinating story to watch --
HOLMES: (Inaudible) all those different groups fighting each other --
MALVEAUX: It's amazing, yes. I mean, it --
HOLMES: -- a confusing place.
MALVEAUX: And the fact that it is spilling out over to Lebanon and other countries we really have to keep a close eye on Syria and Lebanon.
HOLMES: Yes.
MALVEAUX: Thank you, Michael. HOLMES: (Inaudible).
MALVEAUX: The tug-of-war between China and Japan, the dispute is over a group of islands in the East China Sea. Just last week, Japanese authority arrested 14 Chinese activists, who landed on one of the islands. Those activists received a hero's welcome when they returned to Hong Kong today. CNN's Stan Grant shows us how the tensions at sea have spilled into the streets.
STAN GRANT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The message is clear, this is a no-go area. The Japanese embassy in Beijing is sealed off. Police and army on guard.
GRANT: So we're on this side, and the embassy is just over there, there has been a flurry of activity behind us, a lot of talking on phones, on walkie-talkies and there's a soldier here coming to speak to us now.
Ni hao.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ni hao.
(Speaking Japanese).
GRANT: (Inaudible) from here at all.
GRANT (voice-over): Large protests have raised the alert. Thousands of people across China taking to Japanese consulates, attacking businesses, at times turning ugly, and it is all over this, uninhabited rocky outcrops in the East China Sea. Japan says it owns the islands, China says no.
TSANG KIN-SHING, HONG KONG ACTIVIST: (Speaking Chinese).
"The Diaoyu Islands are ours," this activist says. "They are part of China. It is as if they are our home. If a thief breaks into your home, don't we have to drive the thief out?"
Tsang Kin-Shing took it upon himself to claim the island for China. The Hong Kong-based activist known as Bull (ph) joined others in the symbolic protest. They were detained by Japanese police. Diaoyu, or as Japan calls it, Senkaku, is indeed many things to many people. There's resource riches here, oil and gas and it's strategically (inaudible).
Japanese activists, too, have swum ashore, raising their flag.
YOSHIHIRO KOJIMA, JAPANESE ACTIVIST: (Speaking Japanese).
GRANT (voice-over): "I believe that our landing was a success if we could show that Senkaku Islands are Japan's territory and we, the Japanese, must protest by ourselves," this man says.
It has touched off a diplomatic row. Chinese analysts say it is rooted in history and age-old hatreds.
GUO XIANGANG, CHINA INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: (Speaking Chinese).
GRANT (voice-over): "There shouldn't be any discussion of Diaoyu Islands. It has always been part of China.
China says it has claimed Diaoyu for hundreds of years. Japan says China ceded sovereignty when it lost the Sino-Japanese war in 1895. Japan's surrender in World War II clouded the issue again, before the United States returned Senkaku to Japanese control in 1972.
"The U.S. handed over the island to Japan for its own purpose during the Cold War," this analyst says, "so personally I think the U.S. should take the blame for the dispute of Diaoyu Island."
The U.S. says it is not taking a position in this current dispute, but it is treaty bound to defend its ally, Japan. It has now begun joint war games with Japan, a yearly routine, the aim this year to seize back an island.
Chinese activists returning to Hong Kong Harbor, just as determined to seize an island for themselves -- Stan Grant, CNN, Beijing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: A royal controversy brewing over Prince Harry caught in the buff in Vegas.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: It happened in Vegas, Britain's Prince Harry, photographed here in the nude after a reported game of strip pool in Las Vegas this past weekend. Well, the website TMZ posted the pictures online last night.
The Palace does confirm to CNN that the photos are of the prince. Piers Morgan, on the phone from Los Angeles, Richard Quest live in London, two people who know very much all about the British press and the Royals.
Piers, let's start with you here. I understand the British tabloids giving the prince a break here and not really covering the story at all. Tell us why.
PIERS MORGAN, CNN HOST: Well, obviously, it's in the backdrop of this Leveson inquiry back in Britain, an investigation into press ethics and standards and it's clearly already had a rather dramatic effect, because certainly, if I was still in the British newspaper business as I used to be, I don't think I would have hesitated before running these pictures, because they are irresistibly entertaining.
I mean, Prince Harry a single man of 27. He is in the army, he is on leave and he's behaving exactly how I would expect 27-year-old army boys to behave in Las Vegas. The only shame for him is that the time-honored convention of what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas has been ignored.
MALVEAUX: Piers, you have been tweeting about this. Give us one of your tweets.
MORGAN: Well, I just made the point that, you know, I'm obviously shocked and disgusted by the pictures, because it reminded me that I had not been invited. This looked like one of those parties you really wanted to be at.
I mean, he has been having swimming competitions with Ryan Lochte in the pool. He has now been having what are apparently a new sport, I mean, maybe Richard Quest may know more about this than I do, but the strip billiards is a new sport, certainly for me, and I'd love a piece of the action.
MALVEAUX: Well, let's bring in Richard.
Richard, we want to give you a little piece of the action here, this story, one of the things that people look at -- and we have been reading tweets about this, and they seem to be giving him a break here, saying, yes, he is young.
But others are saying, look, you know, we saw him representing the country at the Olympics and the Royals at the Olympics, that he was doing so well, that this is a disappointment, that this isn't a good judgment call, if you will. What do you make of how people are responding to this?
RICHARD QUEST, CNN HOST: It is a case of can you have your cake and eat it? Can you stand at the closing ceremony of the Olympics with the IOC president, representing the Queen and the country and then 10 days later be in the situation of these pictures on -- being shown around the world? That is really what this comes down to.
And there's nothing new about this. Princess Margaret, who, of course, had a lover that she saw and went off to Mustique in the Caribbean, Prince Andrew has had his own scandals in which he has been involved. It has happened time again for the royal family and the core question is whether anybody could live up to the sort of standard that is expected 24/7.
And as for Piers wanting to know the rules of that particular game, I will send him a book on the subject.
(LAUGHTER)
MALVEAUX: Looks like there's going to be a game here. That is coming up here, but I am not going to participate in any of this.
Let me ask you this, Richard, do you think -- how's the Palace reacting to all of this? I mean, clearly the folks are -- how are the Royals dealing with this? And are there going to be any repercussions? I mean, is he going to be able to participate in the Paralympic Games? Those ceremonies taking place next week in London.
QUEST: It could go -- it could go one of two ways here. It could be an enormous welt of sympathy for the prince, in which case people say, you know, fine, he did what a 27-year-old does when in Vegas. Or it could be the censorious tut-tutting brigade could come out of the woodwork and look down their teacups and wonder what in the world is going on. We just don't know.
From the Palace's point of view, I can hear the collective deep intake of breath as they think, oh, you know, so much good work, Diamond Jubilee, Olympics and then, whoosh, it all gets sidetracked to some extent by this.
This is not up there with the great scandals of our time. Let's be clear about that.
MALVEAUX: Piers, let me ask --
MORGAN: It isn't even down there with the smallest scandal. I mean, look, the guy is a young, single party boy who also happens to be a fine British Army officer.
He is extremely brave. He's done war duty, and if he wants to go to Las Vegas and do, by the way, what 95 percent of everybody who goes to Las Vegas does, let him do it. I'd like to know who took the pictures and who leaked them, because that (inaudible).
(CROSSTALK)
MALVEAUX: Well, let's talk about that, Piers, because I mean, these -- if these pictures were, in fact, released to TMZ by the security or the people close to the prince, does that raise some security concerns for him?
MORGAN: Well, I don't think there's a genuine security scandal, because these are obviously just party girls he has got up in his suite, but somebody in that suite, it seems to me, looking at the pictures, has taken these on a mobile phone.
And this is one of the problems in this cell phone era that we're inn, means that people like Prince Harry have to be a lot more careful than everybody else, because they are one cell phone click away from this kind of thing happening to them.
But you know, is it going to cause huge repercussions? I think most people in America are having a good laugh about it. Most people in Britain that I've spoken to think it is hilarious. The Palace will pretend to be outraged and I suspect that he will be asked to performed his new expert sport of strip billiards at the Christmas party for the Royal Family.
MALVEAUX: I'm not touching that.
Richard, the final question for you here, do you think --
(CROSSTALK)
QUEST: (Inaudible) -- I have a question for Piers. I've got a question for Piers.
Piers, would you have bought the pictures if they'd been offered?
MORGAN: I think it is a very interesting question, and I have not been a newspaper editor for nine years and the rules have definitely changed. What I think is, (inaudible), my gut feeling is I probably would, given the way that these kinds of stories were covered back in the early part of this century.
However, there's no doubt that the rules of engagement for the British tabloids have dramatically changed since the hacking scandal and since the Leveson inquiry back in Britain, and you can see the effects of that on the press today.
Now, whether it is a good or bad thing, the British press are the only papers in the world currently not running these pictures. I mean, even CNN is running the pictures.
So, you have now got a situation where the British tabloids, supposedly the bad boys of the world's media -- and girls -- are not running the pictures everybody else is running. So, I don't think that is necessarily a great victory for the free press.
Having said that, I would like to know who took the pictures, because that is clearly a personal breach of trust to Prince harry.
Having said that, he has obviously made some new friends of some import in Las Vegas and they are probably not going to be the most trustworthy of people. So he brought it on himself, I suspect Her Majesty, the Queen will be having a quiet word in his ear before he goes back to his army duties, where I imagine his commanding officer will have an even louder word in his ear.
MALVEAUX: I imagine that both are true.
Piers, Richard, thank you so much, and we have to leave it there. Appreciate it.
MORGAN: Pleasure.
MALVEAUX: Sure.
She was known as a human rights activist, a voice for victims, but Syria's first lady is silent while a massacre is unfolding in her own country.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: At least 110 people died today in fighting across Syria. That is according to an opposition group that tracks casualties every day there.
Well, one prominent person inside Syria has been noticeably quiet on the civil war that is tearing her country apart. We're talking about Syria's first lady. She has called herself in several interviews a fierce defender of human rights, but most recently she has said nothing.
Here is Ivan Watson.
IVAN WATSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Asma al-Assad stood smiling by her man as the Syrian president cast his ballot last February in a constitutional referendum held amid a backdrop of escalating violence.
She remained silent about the mounting death toll, even though it wasn't long ago that the first lady of Syria declared herself a vocal defender of human rights.
ASMA AL-ASSAD, FIRST LADY OF SYRIA: This is a conflict that has been going on for too long. And we have a choice. We can either sit by and we can sit and watch our TV screens and watch the atrocities and see some really horrific images, or we can get up and do something about it.
WATSON (voice-over): Asma al-Assad issued that call to action in a 2009 interview with CNN during the three-week Israeli bombardment of Gaza that left more than 1,300 Palestinians dead, a vigorous Israeli response to months of Palestinian rocket attacks.
AL-ASSAD: Nobody is immune from what is happening. We heard of women, children being killed, medics, journalists -- it seems like this, it affects everyone.
WATSON (voice-over): The trouble is, for most of the last year and a half, Syrian security forces have been documented committing horrific abuses against Syrian citizens.
This month, CNN recorded Syrian warplanes repeatedly bombing Aleppo, Syria's largest city.
CNN witnessed a hospital targeted twice by warplanes on the same day. And last week, the organization Human Rights Watch documented the aftermath of more Syrian government airstrikes against the rebel- held town of Azaz. At least 40 people were killed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (from captions): (Inaudible). My father, my mother, my sister. I can list the names of them all.
WATSON (voice-over): In the Syrian countryside, government artillery routinely pounds towns and villages like Njara (ph), which we visited last month.
"We feel defeated by the shelling," this resident told us. "These are young children. What have they done to deserve this?"
AL-ASSAD: Where is human dignity? Where are the rights, the human rights that we all talk about?
WATSON (voice-over): These are the questions Asma al-Assad asked in 2009 when she joined the wife of the prime minister of Turkey, campaigning on behalf of civilians in Gaza, but they are not questions Asma al-Assad asks today. After more than 17,000 Syrians have been killed throughout the uprising, much to the surprise of Emine Erdogan, who once considered herself one of Asma al-Assad's friends.
"I personally thought Asma would never accept these events," Erdogan told a Turkish newspaper this month. "I can't believe she has remained silent about all this happening."
Three years ago, Asma al-Assad talked about the responsibilities of being a first lady.
AL-ASSAD: What do you do in the position that you hold, regardless of senior you are or how influential you are. What is it that you are going to be doing? Now as a mother and as a human being, we -- as I said, we need to make sure that this, these atrocities stop.
WATSON (voice-over): Inspiring words that today ring deafeningly hollow -- Ivan Watson, CNN, Istanbul.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: It is not a scene from a movie. This is Saudi Arabian extreme driving. It is a growing trend with a cult following and extreme consequences.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: Oversteering a car at high speeds -- it's called drifting and it is a form of entertainment for some young folks in Saudi Arabia. Mohammed Jamjoom, he takes an inside look.
MOHAMMED JAMJOOM, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: In the Saudi desert, the thrill seekers gather. Cars skid and spin -- it's called drifting. And it originated in Japan before seeping into the mainstream in films like 2006's "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift". Drifting, reckless and often dangerous, was celebrated this year by hip-hop star M.I.A. in the video for her song, "Bad Girls," filmed in Morocco.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
JAMJOOM (voice-over): In Saudi Arabia where many forms of public entertainment are banned, it is a rare outlet for young men, their exploits are captured on countless amateur videos.
Most of the time the streets are empty, but sometimes the drivers weave maniacally through traffic, here narrowly missing a school bus.
Joyriders also careen out of control, crashing in horrific fashion. In this video, at least two passengers are ejected as the vehicle rolls over. It's not known if they survived.
In June, Saudi daily newspaper "Al Watan" reported that a man who hit and killed two onlookers while drifting had been sentenced to death by beheading, a sign that the authorities are beginning to clamp down on this high risk adrenaline rush.
JAMJOOM: Drifting has also been gaining in popularity here in the UAE, but in the past few years, some drivers have begun to promote it as a sport, saying it can be done in a much safer way.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here we go.
JAMJOOM (voice-over): Ahmed al-Ameri is the United Arab Emirates' 2011-2012 drift champion.
JAMJOOM: This doesn't get old for you? You love this?
AHMED AL-AMERI, TOYOTA EMIRATES DRIFTING TEAM: I like my life always. I like my life to be sideways.
JAMJOOM (voice-over): Ahmed al-Ameri learned the technique in Japan and now competes as part of the Toyota Emirates Drifting Team. He takes me around the track a few times.
AL-AMERI: What you are looking for to do it in the public street? Maybe some of our families' members on that street, maybe you can kill them. For what? For nothing? For a few seconds of enjoyment? Come and enjoy here for hours.
JAMJOOM (voice-over): Drifting can be done safely, he says, with the right precautions.
AL-AMERI: How to set up the car, how you set up, how you can make your car safety cars when you are drifting. The roll cage, seats, suits, helmet.
JAMJOOM (voice-over): But for some young men, restless and bored, drifting with rules may not be enough. Being beyond the law, showing off and cheating death is what gives them the high octane thrill -- Mohammed Jamjoom, CNN, Abu Dhabi.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: That is one dangerous sport. Not recommended to do that at home, that's for sure.
Well, in a world where men's pride trumps human rights, a wife in Pakistan is strangled, allegedly by her husband, for flirting. We want to bring you the one man who is trying to find justice for her parents.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: Murder cases that are never brought to trial. The victims are women. They are killed by their fathers, their brothers or uncles. They are so-called honor killings, and in Pakistan, they are happening at an alarming rate. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan says 943 women died in honor killings last year. That is almost a 10 percent jump from 2010.
Reza Sayah, he has the story of one man who is fighting to reverse the trend. A warning, these images that you are going to see are disturbing.
REZA SAYAH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Fareeda Bibi's husband accused her of flirting with other men, so he beat his wife, then killed her, her mother says. She knows this, she says, because she heard her daughter's frantic cries in a desperate phone call for help.
HAMIDA BIBI, VICTIM'S MOTHER (through translator): I could hear her on the phone. She was screaming, "Why are you beating me? Mother, please save me. They are killing me."
SAYAH (voice-over): Fareeda's (ph) husband used her scarf to strangle her, her mother says. The bloody scar that rings her neck too gruesome to show.
BIBI (through translator): I have cried so much, I have gone blind from crying.
SAYAH (voice-over): CNN has been unable to reach Fareeda's (ph) husband, but police say he denies killing his wife. He has not been charged or named as a suspect.
According to police, the husband says a relative killed Fareeda (ph) over a land dispute. Police say they are investigating, but more than a year has passed since the killing, and activists are convinced Fareeda (ph) is another victim of an honor murder in Pakistan.
Fareeda's (ph) parents say the only place that answered their plea for help in trying to build a case, this dark and dusty office in Karachi.
SAYAH: This where we found Hamida Bibi, at the Madadgar Help Center in Karachi. The reason the interview with her looks so dark is because the power often goes out here, and you can see this place is nothing fancy, but for the many families who come here, the man who started this place is nothing short of a hero.
ZIA AWAN, LAWYER: My name is Zia Awan. I'm a lawyer by profession.
SAYAH (voice-over): Few in Pakistan have done more to fight honor murders than Zia Awan.
AWAN: Honor killing is the worst form of violence against women, because they are being killed.
SAYAH (voice-over): Killed, because they're accused of bringing dishonor upon their families or communities.
In 1999, Awan started the first helpline for victims of abuse and those who lost loved ones in honor murder.
AWAN: We listen to them and we help them. Whatever we can do.
SAYAH (voice-over): Thirteen years later, Awan has help centers in four cities, every year giving thousands of victims and their families shelter, legal advice, medical care, most of it at no cost.
AWAN: The anger which I have, the cry which I have in my heart, so we convert into our movement.
SAYAH: Every day this call center gets scores of calls or people just walking in. This is Shabira (ph) Bibi and her son, Saddam (ph). Shabira (ph) says she's here because her husband was a victim of an honor killing. Now she says the killers are after her. Sadly, it's impossible to tell all these stories.
Activists here say one out of every five homicides in Pakistan is an honor murder, the crime often justified by communities that say it's part of deeply rooted cultural norms.
AWAN: It's a dishonor killing, whatever they do. It is not an honor killing.
SAYAH (voice-over): Awan and human rights groups say killers often go unpunished by local governments that either sympathize with them or are too weak or corrupt to prosecute them.
AWAN: Some time it is very frustrating when you see that the systems are not working.
SAYAH (voice-over): But, he says, the fight is slowly paying off. Police are making more arrests. The courts are prosecuting more cases.
AWAN: This is a change which I see, a big change.
SAYAH: And most importantly, he says, more and more people, like the Bibi family, are no longer afraid to speak up.
BIBI (through translator): She was such a good girl. I need justice. The killers of my daughter should not go unpunished.
SAYAH (voice-over): Reza Sayah, CNN, Karachi.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: He's a real-life Robin Hood, a mayor in Spain leading raids on stores to feed the hungry.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: He staged robberies at supermarkets, but it's not your typical thief, actually. In fact, he is the mayor. One mayor in Spain. Al Goodman has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AL GOODMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He's known as Spain's Robin Hood, and now he has quite a following. Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo, a leftist village mayor and regional politician, is leading this march against the Spanish government's austerity cuts.
"In the 19th century, local bandits stole from the rich to give to the poor," he said. "A kind of collective Robin Hood. In this economic crisis, capitalism do just the opposite, rob from the poor to give to the rich."
Sanchez Gordillo gained notoriety earlier this month for leading raids on two supermarkets in nearby towns.
"We did it in an organized way," he says, "taking basic food stuffs to deliver to an NGO. But we hit the powers right where it hurts the most, and that's why the authorities are nervous."
GOODMAN (on camera): Most of the people taking part in this march are unemployed farm workers, union leaders say, and dozens of them took part in the recent supermarket incidents.
GOODMAN (voice-over): Like Andres Amaro, a jobless farm worker with a wife and daughter.
ANDRES AMARO, SUPERMARKET PROTESTER (through translator): I took part, like the others, in a symbolic protest against the crisis we are suffering, above all, the working class.
GOODMAN: He and six others were arrested at a supermarket. They are charged with robbery. Sanchez Gordillo has political immunity.
The conservative government blasted him for flaunting the law, but he says these are desperate times. The jobless rate in Spain is more than 24 percent. But here in southern Andalusia, it's 33 percent. For months, there have been large protests across Spain against the cutbacks and tax hikes that the government says are needed to reduce the deficit and revive the economy. But Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has vowed to stay the course.
"Right now we see no sign he's going to change. All we see," he says, "are police, arrests, repression."
This day civil guards protect a wealthy farming estate as marchers pass by. The marchers take a break and plot their next move. Suddenly they rush on to the estate through a hole in the fence before the civil guards can stop them.
GOODMAN (on camera): The protesters hope to keep the pressure on the authorities with what they say are a series of symbolic actions, like occupying this land.
GOODMAN (voice-over): A standoff ensues with some protesters deep inside the estate refusing to leave. For these followers of a man now seen as a modern day Robin Hood, this is just one of the first stops in a three-week-long march aimed at getting the world's attention.
Al Goodman, CNN, Anatwelos (ph), Spain.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: A deadly shooting has one airport in Mexico cleaning house. The entire security staff is now out.
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MALVEAUX: A major change at Mexico City's International Airport. The entire security staff has been fired or reassigned. This is after a deadly gun battle that broke out inside the airport in June. Rafael Romo has the story.
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RAFAEL ROMO, CNN SENIOR LATIN AMERICAN AFFAIRS EDITOR (voice-over): It was a day of shame for the Mexican Federal Police. One of their own, arrested for allegedly shooting and killing three fellow officers. A top official with the Mexican Federal Police says the suspect, Bogard Felipe Lugo had been working with drug traffickers who were using Mexico City's International Airport to deliver drugs smuggled from Peru. Federal Police Chief Luis Cardenas says Lugo shot and killed three Federal Police officers in the mid June morning rush hour gun battle at the airport as the officers were trying to arrest him and two accomplices.
LISBETTE VALAZQUEZ, SHOOTING WITNESS (through translator): We were really very confused. We didn't know whether the attackers were people dressed as police officers or if it was a fight among real police officers. We don't really know.
ROMO: Now, two months after the shooting, all 348 officers who were in charge of security at the airport have been reassigned and replaced.
LUIS CARDENAS PALOMINO, MEXICAN FEDERAL POLICE (through translator): The officers were notified in several phases that they would be reassigned to other locations so as not to disrupt their duties at the terminals. These officers are already working at new locations throughout the country.
ROMO: Two years ago, President Philippe Calderon fired 3,200 Federal Police officers, about 10 percent of the force, in a government initiative to weed out corruption and links to organized crime.
PRES. FELIPE CALDERON, MEXICO (through translator): The fragility, weakness, corruption and venerability of police agencies and prosecutors in a good portion of the country made Mexico incapable of defending itself and it also allowed corruption and the power of criminals to grow exponentially.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: Rafael Romo joins us.
Rafael, I actually don't really know where to begin on all the questions I have about this story.
ROMO: Incredible (INAUDIBLE).
MALVEAUX: First of all, you moved these guys, all these officers, out of the airport. You've assigned and reassigned them to other places. So is that not kind of moving the problem away to other places? I mean, you don't really even know if these guys are corrupt, right?
ROMO: That's right. An that's a very good question. They're working under the premise that there were deeply entrenched networks of corruption at the Mexico City Airport because you get flights from all over South America and what they are investigating is the fact that cocaine from Peru, from Colombia would come to the Mexico City Airport and these officers were actually in charge of transporting the drug out of the airport and to different people.
Now, if you relocate all of them, all of a sudden (ph) you disrupt all of those networks and you can begin fresh. And they're being replaced with officers who are fresh to the force or have worked for many, many years and have proven that they are very clean.
MALVEAUX: OK. How do they prove that they're very clean? How do you know that guys -- the new guys that are reassigned to the airport aren't going to be corrupt as well?
ROMO: That's right, you never know exactly who you're dealing with. But in this case, what the Mexican authorities say is that they have undergone background checks. They've been vetted twice. Or the other officers are officers who are veterans in the force, who have been proven to be clean, who have undergone a series of tests and who have participated in operations, top secret operations, where they respected the secrecy of the Mexican Federal Police.
MALVEAUX: All right, Rafael, it's just an extraordinary story. Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
ROMO: It is. Thank you.
MALVEAUX: Smoke, ash, red hot lava, it is all spewing out of a volcano. This is in central Ecuador. It is raining down on the communities below. Now Reuters reports that people living near the volcano are now evacuating that area. Officials are urging anyone who has not left to get out now. Falling ash has reportedly ruined farms. It is also endangering farm animals that have been left behind.
And, a massive storm is now brewing. It's in the Atlantic Ocean. It could threaten the Republican National Convention. That, up next.
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MALVEAUX: Several stories caught our attention today, photos as well.
Take a look at this. In Seoul, South Korea, people wearing gas masks run out of a building. It's part of an annual military drill put on by the U.S. and South Korea.
And a family of six sits on a sidewalk in Paris. They are illegal immigrants. French police have been raiding their camps and deporting them, mainly to Romania and Bulgaria.
