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George Pell Loses Appeal Against Conviction for Child Sex Abuse; Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte Resigns; Trump Touts Economy but Payroll Tax Discussion Reveals Recession Fears; Trump Cools on Background Check Push; E.U. Unconvinced by Johnson's Bid to Remove Irish Backstop; Stranded Migrants Finally Reach Italian Port; Italy in Political Crisis as Prime Minister Conte Resigns; Cardinal Pell Loses Appeal Against Conviction. Aired 2-3a ET
Aired August 21, 2019 - 02:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ROSEMARY CHURCH, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world I'm Rosemary Church and this is CNN NEWSROOM, coming up, stranded at sea for weeks, these migrants are on European soil after a court intervenes, details on how the standoff ended and their challenges ahead.
Cardinal Pell's appeal shot down, the most senior Catholic cleric ever convicted of child sexual abuse will stay in prison.
Despite what the U.S. president has said about ISIS being defeated, his top diplomat acknowledges the terror group is now more powerful in some places.
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CHURCH: Good to have you with us. And we begin with some long overdue relief on the high seas. A migrant rescue ship had been languishing for weeks off the Italian island of Lampedusa until Tuesday night, when this happened.
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CHURCH (voice-over): Jubilation from nearly 100 migrants, who were finally allowed to disembark, thanks to a ruling in an Italian court. Barbie Nadeau is in Rome with the details.
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BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A group of migrants stranded on board a Spanish NGO rescue vessel for 19 days are now on solid ground after an Italian court ruled that they must be disembarked immediately due to deteriorating hygienic conditions on that vessel.
The Spanish NGO Open Arms rescued the migrants from sinking rubber dinghies off of the course of Libya over the last several weeks and were hoping to disembark in Italy but last year Italy's far-right interior minister, Matteo Salvini, had instituted a closed port policy, that is made it very difficult for NGO ships that have rescued migrants to bring them to Italy as a pathway to Europe.
So desperate were the conditions on board the Open Arms ship that many of the migrants jumped overboard and tried to swim to shore when they had land in sight. They were rescued and taken back to the ship.
Now the migrants will be processed and will have to ask for asylum before it can be determined whether or not they can actually stay in Europe -- this is Barbie Latza Nadeau for CNN, Rome.
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CHURCH: There is another rescue ship carrying even more migrants looking for safe harbor, the Ocean Viking has over 350 people on board waiting in the Mediterranean, it's operated by Doctors without Borders, which is asking Italy and Malta for a safe port, so far there has been no response.
Well as Italy struggles with an escalating migrant crisis, it is facing another challenge, political turmoil. Its prime minister Giuseppe Conte has resigned after launching a blistering attack on his own interior minister, Matteo Salvini.
The outgoing prime minister accused the far-right Salvini of endangering Italy's economy for personal and political gain.
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GIUSEPPE CONTE, OUTGOING ITALIAN PRIME MINISTER (through translator): The decision to post the communication of a decision evidently taken some time ago and I regret to say it with such clarity as a gesture of grave institutional and disrespectful imprudence towards the parliament and, in any case, is liable to tip the country into a spiral of political uncertainty and financial instability.
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CHURCH: For more insight, CNN European affairs commentator Dominic Thomas is with us now from Berlin.
Good to have you with us.
DOMINIC THOMAS, CNN EUROPEAN AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Thank you, Rosemary.
CHURCH: Europe in the grip of a political crisis with Spain's prime minister quitting and warning of financial stability and political uncertainty.
Is he right about that?
And where is this all going do you think? THOMAS: I think whenever it comes to talking about political crisis in the Italian context, we have to be careful how we use the term. There's just been so many coalition breakdowns and governments in the past 50 or 60 years or so. It's not an uncommon concurrence.
It's what's particular about this instance is that were in a complete split in Italy around this question. Matteo Salvini's Northern League has been pushing toward power across the last few years and seeking all along to weaken this coalition and to improve his situation.
His far right anti-immigration party has galvanized --
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THOMAS: -- discussion in Italy and has raised serious concern about what a Salvini prime ministership would look like.
So the question of the crisis has to do with the future outcome. He is doing very well in the polls but the opposition parties are discussing a kind of anti-Salvini front and none of these options are really very good when it comes to dealing with serious issues that Italy is confronting today.
CHURCH: Right, and Italy's president now has to decide whether a new majority government can be formed or if parliament has to be dissolved.
What do you think will be the most likely outcome when you look at the political landscape right now?
THOMAS: Salvini is polling really well and since May in the European elections. This is a got that's only been in power for about 14 months since March of 2018 and the European election, Salvini's party went from being third in the general election to number one.
And not only that but increasing its positions in the polls to almost 40 percent. I think it's going to be very difficult for president Mattarella to not allow a general election to take place because the longer they wait, the more Salvini can spin the narrative, that the country wants to go to the polls, wants to support his policies.
As the sitting deputy prime minister and minister of the interior, he has been able to focus on all of these issues. And one could argue that he spent the entire summer period essentially in a pre-general election campaign mode, traveling around Italy and visiting whatever is on the beach is and holiday makers and so on too.
It's going to be hard for him to hold off any kind of interim government and to prevent the Italians going back to the polls yet again.
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CHURCH: Now Australian cardinal George Pell, the most senior Catholic official to be convicted of child sexual assault, has lost his appeal, a three judge panel decided 2-1 to reject his argument to have his conviction overturned.
The 78 year old is serving a six-year prison sentence for sexually assaulting two teenage choirboys in the late 1990s. Now Ivan Watson joins us from Hong Kong with more on this.
So what happened in that courtroom and when been the reaction to Pell losing his appeal?
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Pell was ordered back to prison to complete his six-year term for having been found guilty earlier this year on five counts of sexual assault and child abuse against two 13-year-old choirboys.
He can apply for parole after three years and eight months and he has to complete his sentence of being a lifelong registered sex offender.
Now two of the grounds that his defense proposed for overturning his conviction were thrown out by the three judges unanimously. And the third round for appeal, it was a 2-1 majority and take a listen to what the chief justice and to say.
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ANNE FERGUSON, CHIEF JUSTICE, VICTORIA SUPREME COURT: Part of Pell's case on the appeal was that there were 13 solid obstacles in the path of a conviction. Just as Maxwell and I have rejected all 13.
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WATSON: Now this decision has been welcomed by critics of Pell and the father of one of the two individuals who were assaulted in St. Patrick's Cathedral in Melbourne in the 1990s. That victim subsequently died of drug overdose as an adult. And we can't reveal the father's identity but take a listen to his reaction to the overturning of the appeal.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE, VICTIM'S FATHER: That verdict exceeded my expectations by so much. I was under the impression, I thought myself, she, I reckon there will be a retrial. At worse he's going to walk out those front doors.
So for that appeal to be quashed like that, wow. And the reasons they gave were so concise, so precise. I thought to myself this is better than what I thought was going to happen.
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WATSON: Now Pell's team still has one potential avenue left for an appeal, for another attempt to overturn the conviction and that is to take it to the high court. In the meantime he did issue a statement which was released by the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney, in which Pell maintained his innocence and expressed that he was, quote, "obviously disappointed" with the decision today.
He appeared in court wearing his priest's collar, Pell has --
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WATSON: -- not been defrocked from the Catholic Church, he's still a priest though he's no longer the treasurer of the Vatican.
Meanwhile the prime minister of Australia, Scott Morrison, said on this day his thoughts are with victims, as they are on every day, and he also said that it is likely that Pell will be stripped of state honors as a result of this conviction.
CHURCH: Right, Ivan Watson in bringing us up to date on that situation, many thanks.
President Trump is trying to reassure voters the economy is just fine but as the warnings of a downturn pile up, he's making plans for tax cuts.
Plus Boris Johnson won't back down on the Irish backstop, the latest on a bumpy road to Brexit, that's next.
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CHURCH: Donald Trump's planned trip to Denmark is off after the Danish prime minister labeled the president's idea to buy Greenland "absurd." Trump confirmed that he was not kidding Sunday, telling reporters the Danish territory was strategically interesting.
But Danish officials could not believe it was not a joke. The prime minister says she strongly hoped it was not meant seriously.
Well, back in the United States, President Trump is rejecting talk of a possible recession, considering ways to stimulate the economy. He is also taking sharp aim at a Democratic congressman he has targeted before and is backing gun control legislation. Jim Acosta has more on the presidents wide-ranging comments.
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JIM ACOSTA, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Trump is ripping into forecasts from economists that the U.S. could be headed toward a recession.
TRUMP: I think the word recession is a word that is inappropriate because it is just a word that the -- the -- certain people, I'm going to be kind, certain people in the media are trying to build up because they would love to see a recession.
ACOSTA (voice-over): Still the president revealed he's considering some proposals to boost the U.S. economy, including a payroll tax cut.
TRUMP: Payroll tax is something we think about and a lot of people would like to see that. And that very much affects the working -- the workers of our country and we have a lot of workers. I've been thinking about payroll taxes for a long time. Whether or not we do it now or not is -- it is not being done because of recession.
ACOSTA (voice-over): But the president contradicted his own aides --
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ACOSTA (voice-over): -- who had just batted down the idea a few hours earlier in the day.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- being considered?
HOGAN GIDLEY, WHITE HOUSE SPOKESPERSON: It is not being considered at this time.
ACOSTA (voice-over): Mr. Trump is still touting the U.S. economy as the best in the world but there are signs of possible trouble. U.S. Steel announced up to 200 temporary layoffs in the critical battleground state of Michigan. That news came less than a week after the president said the steel industry was humming along.
TRUMP: We're doing steel. Steel industry is high. The steel -- they were dumping steel all over. They were destroying our companies. U.S. Steel now -- all of them, they're all expanding. The steel industry is back. It is doing great.
ACOSTA (voice-over): On gun control, the president also seemed to downplay the need for tighter background checks. Sources tell CNN the president has soured on the idea of new gun laws after talking with lawmakers and the NRA.
TRUMP: We are in very meaningful discussions with the Democrats and I think the Republicans are very unified. We are very strong on our Second Amendment, the Democrats are not strong at all in the Second Amendment.
And we have to be very careful about that. You know they call it the slippery slope. And all of a sudden, everything gets taken away. We're not going to let that happen.
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ACOSTA (voice-over): But listen to what the president said earlier this month, when he claimed he didn't agree with the notion of a slippery slope and NRA talking points.
TRUMP: NRA has, over the years, taken a very, very tough stance on everything. And I understand it. You know, it is a slippery slope. They think you approve one thing and that leads to a lot of bad things. I don't agree with that.
ACOSTA (voice-over): The president also attacked Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, who gave a tearful rebuke of Israel's decision to ban the Michigan Democrat along with Minnesota representative Ilhan Omar, tweeting, "I don't buy Tlaib's tears. I've watched her violence, craziness and most importantly words for far too long. Now tears? She hates Israel and all Jewish people. She is an anti-Semite."
TRUMP: All of a sudden she starts with tears. Tears. And I don't buy it. I don't buy it. I don't buy it for a second. I think any Jewish people that vote for a Democrat, I think it shows either a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty.
ACOSTA (voice-over): And just days away from the next G7 summit, the president resurrected his own talk of allowing Russia back in after the group of world powers gave Moscow the boot over its annexation of Crimea.
TRUMP: We're talking about Russia because I've gone there, numerous G7 meetings and I guess President Obama, because Putin outsmarted him, President Obama thought it wasn't a good thing to have Russia in. So he wanted Russia out. But I think it is much more appropriate to have Russia in.
ACOSTA: Now getting back to the president's comments about Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, the Jewish Democratic Council of America has released a statement in the last few minutes saying, quote, "This is yet another example of Donald Trump continuing to weaponize and politicize anti-Semitism."
Meanwhile Tlaib's colleague Ilhan Omar also has released a tweet just in the last several minutes. She simply said, quote, "Oh, my," -- Jim Acosta, CNN, the White House.
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CHURCH: Larry Sabato joins me now and he's the director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia.
And it is always great to have you with us.
LARRY SABATO, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA: Thank you so much, Rosemary.
CHURCH: So even though President Trump keeps denying a recession is on the horizon despite signs of trouble, he is now making plans to put in place a payroll tax cut which will keep consumer spending and the economy propped up until November 2020 election.
Is that what's going on here and, if it is, will it work?
SABATO: It is what is going on if he actually follows through. There is no other reason for a payroll tax cut except to increase consumer spending to stave off a recession. I haven't heard of any other explanation.
Would it work?
It would depend on how bad the recession that may be coming turns out to be. It could be too little, too late, or it could be enough to accomplish what he wants or at least push the recession past November 2020.
CHURCH: Perhaps that's the strategy, perhaps not, we will see what happens, but days after the deadly mass shootings in Dayton and El Paso, President Trump said he would consider background checks to make sure weapons stayed out of the hands of those likely to kill.
But now he is backing away from that and apparently told the national rifle association chief that background checks are off the table. We have seen this play out before, why does he keep going over the same old ground and who's going to hold his feet to the fire on this, anyone?
SABATO: It's up to the Republicans in Congress. And they say we wont do anything unless the president gets his cover. If the president comes out for red flag laws or background checks or any number of reforms, he could have picked one.
I think Republicans are actually in the position in the Senate to go along with it and, of course, the Democrats in the House probably would have.
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SABATO: But as you said, this has happened before, no one is shocked by these particular play, we have seen it before, we will see it again probably.
If there's anybody in the White House who thinks the president ought to adopt some kind of gun control to help him in the election in 2020, all they have to do is get the White House operators to stop forwarding the NRA's calls.
CHURCH: All right and I want to take a look at a new CNN poll, it has former Vice President Joe Biden sitting on 29 percent support, that doubling his lead over Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
Kamala Harris has dropped 12 points since June and also beating Trump is the top priority for most Democrats rather than picking the nominee who shares their position on various issues.
What did you make of all those new poll numbers, can you read much into them at this juncture, do you think?
SABATO: That's really been fascinating, despite the fact that Biden goes up and down, essentially since the beginning of this race, which seems like years ago. Biden has been the front-runner and it is a question of what happens to the other candidates, who's up, who's down?
Who becomes a second place runner, pushing Biden?
That has changed and so Kamala Harris' decline is stunning. To be fair I have to mention that in other surveys she's not declined that much. So you can still bet on Biden as of today but he's not in such a strong front-runner's position that he could obliterate the field. So I think it is still very much open.
CHURCH: The thing is with the process and the way it all works in this country is that there is so much more time for the other candidates to tear Biden down and in doing so reduce any chance the Democrats have been taking down Trump, which is apparently what Democrats want, right?
SABATO: Yes, and you just put your finger on it, Rosemary, it's the fact that average Democrats want to beat Trump more than anything else and probably they are willing to settle for whether it's Biden or someone else, whoever it is they evaluate at the time the nominee is picked who has the best chance of beating Trump.
That is actually very good news for the Democrats because this is a fractious party, if you go back, you will see frequently they threw away their chance in November by focusing too much on their particular individual issues, they couldn't get back together.
CHURCH: Before you go, I would have you look at Mr. Trump's tweet on his early desire to buy Greenland, let me read it to you.
"Denmark is a very special country with incredible people. But based on prime minister Mette Frederiksen's comments, that she would have no interest in discussing the purchase of Greenland, I will be postponing our meeting scheduled in two weeks for another time.
"The prime minister was able to save a great deal of expense and effort for both the United States and Denmark by being so direct. I thank her for that and look forward to rescheduling statement in the future."
So Larry, Trump's not going to Copenhagen because they won't sell Greenland to him, your reaction?
SABATO: Well, that will show her.
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SABATO: Look, it is just so absurd, you could never sell this kind of story to a publisher, no one would believe it. But there it is in the headlines and it will go on. There are many acts to this play left.
CHURCH: Well, he can't have Greenland. We will see what other island nation --
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CHURCH: -- there are still some options out there. Larry, many thanks as always.
SABATO: Thanks a lot.
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CHURCH: When it comes to the Irish backstop, British prime minister Boris Johnson isn't backing down. He wants it gone and made it clear yet again ahead of Brexit meetings with E.U. leaders, including Germany's Angela Merkel in the coming day. Mr. Johnson says another border solution is needed but Brussels replied there is no realistic alternative as of now, making chances of reaching a Brexit deal by October 31st ever more slim. CNN's Anna Stewart has more on the road to Brexit.
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ANNA STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): His stance on Europe means he is hated by some and adored by others. But Boris Johnson's rocky relationship with the E.U. began long before the term Brexit was even coined.
In the early '90s, Johnson's was posted to Brussels for British newspaper --
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STEWART (voice-over): -- "The Telegraph," where he developed a niche, filing mocking stories about E.U. bureaucracy. Charles Grant was a fellow Brussels-based journalist at the time and knew him well.
CHARLES GRANT, FORMER BRUSSELS CORRESPONDENT: He gradually worked out that if you wrote anti-stories, exaggerated hugely, sometimes simply invented stories, you'd go on the front page of the day. And you became famous.
STEWART (voice-over): Johnson's dispatches not only advanced his career but they contributed to a growing anti-E.U. sentiment back home in Britain.
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BORIS JOHNSON, INCOMING U.K. PRIME MINISTER: I was just checking these rocks over the garden when I listened to this amazing crash from the greenhouse next door over in England. It was really direct from Brussels where it had this amazing explosive event. It really gave me, I suppose, this rather weird sense of power.
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STEWART (voice-over): It wasn't until 2016 that Johnson decided to stake his whole career on the issue of Europe.
DAVID CAMERON, FORMER BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: The choice is in your hands.
STEWART (voice-over): But the Brexit referendum was cool, he first did it about which side to back.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Make up your mind, Mr. Johnson.
STEWART (voice-over): Perhaps calculating which will open the door to Number 10, his long held dream.
In the end, he surprised many by coming out for Vote Leave and took center stage in the campaign.
JOHNSON: Can we go forward to victory on June 23rd?
Yes, we can.
STEWART (voice-over): And it later emerged that Boris Johnson actually wrote two versions of the column which came out in support for Brexit. The first, what we know of the published version, in which he said there's only one way to get the change we want. Vote to leave the E.U.
Then there is the other, the unpublished version, in which he actually warns of an economic shock and the break-up of the union should the U.K. leave.
As it turned out, Johnson picked the winning team.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The U.K. has voted to leave the European Union.
STEWART (voice-over): Now as prime minister, Europe is the biggest problem he has to face. He has made a firm commitment, Brexit will happen on October 31st.
JOHNSON: Do or die, come what may.
STEWART (voice-over): He wants to revise deals for a move the Irish backstop, something Brussels has made clear it will not renegotiate, setting himself up for a showdown.
GRANT: Boris is about rhetoric. He is about facts. Boris is a cavalier they use about roundheads. And I think the trouble is that when cavaliers meet roundheads, they have to fight. And that's what's going to happen.
STEWART (voice-over): Leaders in Europe say they are willing to work with Johnson but he has already built himself a reputation as a troublemaker. He makes promises he can't keep and he's about to drive Britain off a cliff -- Anna Stewart, CNN, London.
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CHURCH: And we will take a short break here. President Trump says we have won against ISIS but destroying the caliphate hasn't stopped the threat and ISIS still has the money, weapons and men it needs to carry on. Why the danger is far from over, we will be back in just a moment.
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ROSEMARY CHURCH, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Welcome back, everyone, I'm Rosemary Church, want to update you now on the main stories we've been following this hour.
Nearly 100 migrants are finally on dry land in Italy, they have been forced to wait for weeks on a rescue ship of the Island of Lampedusa, until an Italian court ruled, they could disembark. Medical staff say the health and hygiene conditions on the Open Arms charity ship were becoming dire.
That ship sparked a bitter feud between Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and far-right party leader, Matteo Salvini. Now, Mr. Conte is calling it quits. His government collapsed after Salvini withdrew his support. The Italian president will try to see who can form a government.
Australian Cardinal George Pell, the most senior Catholic official to be convicted of child sexual assault has lost his appeal. A three- judge panel in Melbourne, rejected Pell's argument to have his conviction overturned. The 78-year-old is serving a 6-year prison sentence for sexually assaulting 2 teenage choir boys in the mid- 1990s.
Well, even as U.S. President Trump insists the U.S. economy is in great shape, he is considering tax cuts in case of a downturn. He said he's thinking of a cut in the payroll tax to boost consumer spending. The taxes used to fund Social Security net programs like Social Security and Medicare.
Well, in this squalid camps, housing tens of thousands of displeased Syrian civilians, the notorious terror group, ISIS, appears to be making a comeback. It's been less than six months since the White House declared ISIS 100 percent eliminated in Syria.
But a recent Pentagon report says the U.S. troop withdrawal there, has crippled Syrian partner forces, running the sprawling camps, enabling ISIS to thrive and even the Trump administration is now admitting ISIS may be down, but it's far from out.
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MIKE POMPEO, SECRETARY OF STATE, UNITED STATES: It's complicated. There are certainly places where ISIS is more powerful today, than they were three or four years ago, but the caliphate is gone, and their capacity to conduct external attacks has been made much more difficult. We've taken down significant risks, not all of it, but a significant amount.
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CHURCH: Kimberly Doss is a CNN Global Affairs analyst and contributor at the Daily Beast, and she joins us now from Washington. Good to have you with us.
KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Good to be here.
CHURCH: So, President Trump claims he has wiped out ISIS, but his Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, admitted Tuesday, that ISIS is more powerful now, than three or four years ago, in some areas, despite those claims of victory by the president. What are we supposed to make of those mixed messages?
DOZIER: Well, Secretary Pompeo is saying out loud, in an interview, that the president might hear, something that his national security officials have been saying carefully all along, they've been saying yes, the caliphate, the territorial caliphate is defeated, but ISIS is not, as an ideology or as a fighting force.
The president, however, keeps using that overarching phrase, ISIS is defeated, because it sounds good on the campaign trail.
This has been frustrating for his team that is trying to stress to him that they don't want to shrink the number of U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria or in Afghanistan because in both places, we've had deadly activity by ISIS which shows you that they've just changed form, they haven't lost the will to fight.
CHURCH: Yes, because we saw Secretary Pompeo did try to downplay the risks now posed by ISIS, didn't he? In the wake of a report warning of its resurgence saying the caliphate is gone in their capacity to conduct external attacks has been reduced. What is your reaction to those comments, because clearly, that's not what we are seeing on the ground, is it?
DOZIER: Well, it's complicated and I'm glad to see that Pompeo is, at least, backing up some of his officials in the state department, the ISIS envoy, Jim Jeffrey, and the counterterrorism ambassador, Nathan Sales, both gave a joint conference earlier this month, saying that ISIS had metastasized in other parts of Africa, the Middle East, that they are up to 15,000 fighters or more inside Iraq.
And when I was last in Iraq, even then, yes, they had retreated from many of the cities that they had held, but what intelligence officials told me is what they had simply done was decided not to fight.
[02:35:11] They just change out of their uniforms into ordinary clothes, and now, they are coming back and menacing people at night. That's happening in Iraq. In Syria, both of these officials talked about the fact that, yes, ISIS doesn't hold territory in northern Syria, but in places like Idlib and places where Assad forces are still fighting rebels, they're pretty strong there.
CHURCH: And, of course, we saw that deadly attack at the wedding in Kabul over the weekend, so we are seeing this happened in Afghanistan, what does the U.S. need to be doing to counter this resurgence, this ISIS threat?
DOZIER: Well, what many national security officials will tell you is they can only do part of the job, by the time it gets to it being a group of fighters that they have to defeat on the battlefield, it's too late. That there are many things going on in terms of the economy, lack of jobs.
That things like climate change are causing some people to move from some locations to others, seeking work, and then they're turned away, that feeds this ideology of the rest of the world, the west is rejecting you, come with us, fight with us, we'll give you jobs and we'll give you something to believe in.
CHURCH: Right, and you touched on this, President Trump indicating earlier that he didn't want to reduce U.S. troops in Afghanistan, although he's now signaling he may have to hold off on that plan. What would be the impact of troop reductions and the region where ISIS is now becoming more powerful?
DOZIER: Well, in Afghanistan, the special inspector general for the Pentagon has said, if you take away U.S. troops, the Afghan forces simply don't have the strength to stand without, at least, some logistical support, some financial support.
What proponents of keeping some presence there, are trying to get the president to agree to, is at least a small counterterrorism force that would help stiffen the spine of the Afghan forces and it wouldn't be a large U.S. footprint, but it would also be a reminder to the Taliban that the U.S. is still there and they can't completely take over the country again.
CHURCH: And just finally, what about the 50,000 young men, under the age of 18, sitting in camps across northeastern Syria, are vulnerable right now, to ISIS recruiting, are there any plans to counter that possible threat, what can even be done about that?
DOZIER: You know, it is a problem that I hear talked to death by officials from the U.N. to the U.S., to Iraq. They know that they have these groups of people, they don't know how to rehabilitate them, they don't have, at this point, the resources to do the kind of rehabilitation and reintegration that they've done in other parts of the world like Saudi Arabia.
And even those programs have a question mark as to how long-term effective they are, and it's even worse in Iraq where you have up to 150,000 people, many of them, women and children, in addition to the fighting males, who are in camps, can't go home, and the Iraqi government doesn't have the resources to rehabilitate them.
CHURCH: Yes, it is a concern all around, many thanks to you, Kimberly Dozier, for your analysis, we always appreciate it.
DOZIER: Thank you.
CHURCH: Well, climate change, seeing it in a new way, may explain glacier melt better than the real thing, that's next on NEWSROOM.
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CHURCH: It can be difficult to comprehend just how quickly most of earth's glaciers are receding, well, now an artist in South Africa is combining scientific data with art to help us visualize how climate change is reshaping our world.
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DILLON MARSH, ARTIST, SOUTH AFRICA: I've combined photography in and CGI to show the amount of ice that's being lost on various glaciers. They are volumetric representations of ice that's being lost every minute, hour, or half hour.
My name is Dillon Marsh and I'm an artist from Cape Town, South Africa. I photographed all the scenes within India and Nepal. On a previous trip, I had gone up to the -- one of the glaciers in the Himalayas, I could see that it had receded by quite a long stretch.
I think people are generally surprised at the rate at which these glaciers are receding. The World Glacier Monitoring Service compiled (INAUDIBLE) from research around the world. So, if you use that to record all my data. I've got a few favorites, the one that stands out for me is the one that is set within the center of Delhi.
I quite like that one because I think that's the one that I think is the clearest indication of the volumes that have been lost.
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CHURCH: Very powerful there. And thank you so much for watching CNN NEWSROOM, I'm Rosemary Church, stay tuned now for "WORLD SPORT." You're watching CNN.
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