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Migrants Finally on Dry Land After 19 Days; George Pell's Appeal Denied by the Court; British Consulate Member Missing for 10 Days now; Gangs And Gold, Maduro Uses Mines And Corruption To Keep Power. Aired 3-3:30a ET

Aired August 21, 2019 - 03:00   ET

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

[03:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRISTINA MACFARLANE, CNN ANCHOR: Finally on safe ground. Celebrations erupt as almost 100 stranded migrants are allowed to leave their boat.

Plus, an appeal from Cardinal Pell rejected as Australia's top court rules out overturning his conviction for child sexual assault.

And a CNN exclusive. We take a look at the dangerous gold mining that's keeping Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro in power.

Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from around the world. I'm Christina Macfarlane. And this is CNN Newsroom.

We begin with new turmoil in Europe as Italy copes with political upheaval and an escalating migrant crisis. Italy's 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.

At the center of their bitter feud is a migrant ship that was forced to languish for weeks off the island of Lampedusa until Tuesday night when this happened.

(CROWD CHEERING)

MACFARLANE: Jubilation and relief from nearly 100 migrants who were finally allowed to disembark. Thanks to a ruling from an Italian court.

Barbie Nadeau has the details now from Rome.

BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: A group of migrants who have been stranded on board a Spanish NGO rescue vessel for 19 days are finally on solid ground after an Italian court ruled that they must be disembarked immediately due to deteriorating hygienic conditions on board that vessel.

The Spanish NGO Open Arms rescued the migrants from sinking rubber dingy off the coast of Libya over the course of 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 which has made it very difficult for NGO ships who have rescued migrants to bring them to Italy as a path into Europe.

So desperate where the conditions on board that open arm ship that many of the migrants jumped overboard and try 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 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.

MACFARLANE: And Laura Lanuza is the communications director for the rescue charity Open Arms and she joins me now on the line from Barcelona. Laura, thank you for giving us your time.

Just explain to us after nearly 19 days on board your ship what that moment was like for you to hear that the migrants were allowed to disembark and what will happen to them now that they have.

LAURA LANUZA, COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, OPEN ARMS: OK. Thank you so much. In fact, the first feeling is relief, relief and happiness for them because finally they were finally were going to be able to be assisted because they needed urgent assistance today and we are asking for it. And in the end they were going to arrive to Italy and be able to get this assistance.

Well, regarding what's going to happen with them, they were -- they requested asylum, all of them on board, so I guess that all the other (Inaudible) for children will follow on land and it will take some time.

MACFARLANE: Has this experience and the open hostility the migrants have received from Italy, most notably a far-right Minister Matteo Salvini in particular, does that mean you are now going to need to change the way you operate in these waters?

LANUZA: Well, we don't have to. I mean, we are following the international migrant law, we are following the international agreement for the protection of refugees, the Geneva Convention. So we know that we arrive that our job is necessary. And in the end what we are doing is to defend and to do the things to protect the lives that our administrations in Europe are not doing this moment.

[03:04:58] MACFARLANE: But it is becoming increasingly difficult for you to do your jobs.

(CROSSTALK)

LANUZA: Yes, of course.

MACFARLANE: What will happen -- what will happen to the migrant crisis if you were unable to operate? LANUZA: Well, it has been a process of two to three years now, the

criminalization of the NGOs and all the people working, trying to save these lives, we are being all criminalize not only then after migrants but also us.

But you know we have to defend the rights of these people, so we know we are right. We know that for the moment all the legislative, the laws that are being passed in different countries in Europe are again most of them on the measure that are against the international migrant law.

So, you know, time and time we will still do as much as we can with the resources that we have and we will keep trying to protect their lives.

MACFARLANE: Laura, what awaits the fates of the migrants if organizations like yourself are restricted from stepping in?

LANUZA: Well, we not only save the lives but we also protect their rights, so in this last case, in this last episode we first saved the lives and then started some legal procedures in order to change these laws on these migrants. In Italy, for example, in this case, prevented us from arriving in Italy.

So, the Italian vessels in the first place let us entering the territorial water. So that was the first step. And in the end, the fact that we are now in an Italian port even Mr. Salvini has been saying for months that Italian ports were closed and that it was an Italian prosecutor who said that this was -- that we had to disembark in Italy.

That makes the change in the way. So we hope that it's going to be a, you know, a first step towards normalization and to go back to comply the laws.

MACFARLANE: All rights. Laura Lanuza, very good to have you on. Thank you for your time.

LANUZA: Thank you so much.

MACFARLANE: Now Australian Cardinal George Pell, the most senior Catholic official is to be convicted of child sexual assault he's lost his appeal. A three judge panel decided two to one to reject Pell's 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. He was sentence in March and will not be eligible for parole until late 2022.

Pell's case has rocked the Catholic Church where he once served as the Vatican's treasurer.

Our Ivan Watson joins us now from Hong Kong. And Ivan, we understand in the past hour the Vatican have spoken out on the decision to uphold this conviction, what are they had to say? IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Right, the

Vatican put out a statement reiterating its respect for the Australian judicial system, saying that it acknowledges the fact that Cardinal Pell's appeal effort has been effectively quashed.

And mentioned as well, that Cardinal Pell has repeatedly maintained his innocence throughout this process and that the Vatican, quote, "confirms its closeness to the victims of sexual abuse."

So a rather neutral line here despite the fact that Cardinal George Pell not only was he convicted earlier this year and sentenced to six years in prison for five counts of child abuse and sexual assault against two 13-year-olds on two separate occasions but now his appeal effort has been overturned.

Now, there was a panel of three judges, they threw out unanimously two of the grounds for appeal and then there was a two to one majority over the third ground, here is what the chief justice had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANNE FERGUSON, CHIEF JUSTICE, VICTORIA SUPREME COURT: Part of Cardinal Pell's case on the appeal was that there were 13 solid obstacles in the path of a conviction. Justice Maxwell and I have rejected all 13.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATSON: The ruling was welcomed by victims groups and the father of one of the two victims of George Pell who was assaulted in 1996 in St. Patrick's Cathedral in Melbourne.

[03:10:00] That victim has since passed away of a drug overdose but his father very moved. And we cannot reveal his identity according to Australian law.

(BEGIN VOICE CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is nothing to be frightened off, you are going to be heard, justice will prevail and people are not going to laugh at you and tell you that you are stupid. They're going to listen to you.

So, if this has happened and I know there's a hell of a lot of victims out there that have not said anything, just do it, come out and say something.

(END VOICE CLIP)

WATSON: That's the father of the victim there appealing to other victims to come out and make their voices heard. As for Pell himself, well, he put out in a statement released by the archdiocese, the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney that he maintains his innocence and that he is clearly disappointed.

He appeared in court wearing his priest's collar, he has not been defrocked despite his conviction on five counts. The prime minister of Australia says he is likely to be stripped of state honors that have been awarded to him as the highest Catholic clergymen in Australia. Christina?

MACFARLANE: All right. Ivan Watson there live from Hong Kong. Thanks, Ivan.

Now the U.S. president is brushing off recession talk. But even so, Donald Trump is looking at ways to boost the economy, what he is considering, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACFARLANE: Protesters are expected to rally in the coming hours outside the British consulate in Hong Kong after a staffer went missing as he headed back into the city from mainland China.

U.K. foreign office tell CNN it's extremely concerned by reports of Simon Cheng's disappearance. It's believed he has been held on the border city of Shenzhen since August 9th.

Our Ben Wedeman is live this hour from Hong Kong. And Ben, it's been just over 10 days since Simon Cheng had disappeared. Do we know anything more about the details of his whereabouts or why he has been detained?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we understand that his lawyer has told his girlfriend that he has currently being detained in Shenzhen. Why and where is not altogether clear.

But the details of his case are very odd. He was on his way back on a high-speed train link between Shenzhen and Hong Kong on the 8th of August. He sent the last anybody has heard from him was a text message from to his girlfriend, he said, "passing through, pray for me."

So it's not altogether clear where he is, why he is being detained. The spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry said they have no information about him.

The British consulate we're standing in front of it at the moment has said that it has put out inquiries that it's in contact with the families but there is really no details at all about why he has been detained, gone to this trade meeting on the 8th of August, he was supposed to come back the same day but he's essentially disappeared. And it's a mystery.

And of course, it comes at a time about increasing concern about China's growing influence or control within Hong Kong itself despite the fact that in 1997 Hong Kong and China entered into this system of one country, two systems.

[03:15:09] The worry is that with the extradition bill that was floated and is currently not completely withdrawn but officially dead according to the chief executive of Hong Kong, that in a sense the legal fire wall between China and Hong Kong is beginning to erode. Christine. MACFARLANE: All right, Ben, thank you for the update there live from

Hong Kong. Our Ben Wedeman.

Now Donald Trump's planned trip to Denmark is off after the Danish prime minister labeled the U.S. president's idea to buy Greenland as absurd. Mr. Trump confirmed he wasn't kidding Sunday telling reports the Danish territory was strategically interesting.

But Danish officials couldn't believe it was not a joke. The prime minister said she strongly hope it wasn't meant seriously.

While meanwhile, President Trump is still calling the U.S. economy the best in the world but at the same time he's looking at ways to head off a major slowdown.

Pamela brown has the latest from the White House.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: President Trump pushing back against recession fears.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I think the word recession is a word that is inappropriate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And defending the U.S. economy to reporters in the Oval Office today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We are very far from the recession. In fact, if the Fed will do its job I think we'd have a tremendous birth of growth. A tremendous birth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: The president starting his day on Twitter, sharing more than a dozen tweets from allies and supporters raising his administration's efforts on the economy, from Vice President Pence "our economy is thriving and Americans are winning," to the RNC chairwoman, "economic confidence is at records highs."

But even as the Trump administration touts the economy CNN has learned behind closed doors the White House officials are mulling a payroll tax cuts to offset anxiety over an economic slowdown.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Payroll taxes, I've been thinking about payroll taxes for a long time, whether or not we do it now or not is, it's not being done because of recession.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BROWN: The economy is not the only issue Trump is considering, on gun

control Trump once again seeming to back down from his push just a few days ago for extended background checks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We are very, very strong background checks right now, but we have sort of missing areas, in areas that don't complete the whole circle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: After talking to lawmakers and NRA head Wayne LaPierre in the last week, Trump today using the lobbying group's language on gun control measures.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: A lot of the people that put me where I am are strong believers in the Second Amendment, and I am also, and we have to be very careful about that. You know, they call it a slippery slope. And all of a sudden everything gets taken away, we're not going to let that happen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Now in addition to pressure from the NRA the president's apparent shift on background checks comes after discussion with lawmakers over the past week in a briefing from White House officials who have been looking at various options.

Now White House officials maintain that gun control legislation isn't off the table. The true test will be once lawmakers return from summer recess.

Pamela Brown, CNN, the White House.

MACFARLANE: All right on the edge of Venezuela's rainforest lies, a wealth of gold but those riches they're only for a very few. How a network of fear and profit is keeping Nicolas Maduro in power in a CNN exclusive, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACFARLANE: Welcome back. Despite some of the world's largest oil reserves Venezuela is a country on the verge of economic collapse. But in jungles of Bolivar estate, President Nicolas Maduro has found a precious resource to keep his grip on power, it's gold dug from elicit mines and shipped around the world and controlled at the point of murderous guns.

[03:20:01] CNN's Isa Soares journeyed into the heart of darkness to shine light into the mines that maintain Maduro's regime. And we caution you some of the images here are graphic.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) ISA SOARES, CNN ANCHOR & CORRESPONDENT: On the fringes of the Amazon rainforest, a state-sponsored network of violent gangs and corrupt Venezuelan military hide amongst the vast land, rich minerals, and seeping gold.

All this has made this area Maduro's El Dorado and it's this that's giving him a financial lifeline.

We've come deep into Venezuela's mining arc to find out how Nicolas Maduro is holding on to power and able to resist American pressure.

He's given himself direct control over this land and he is bleeding it dry, enriching himself and buying the allegiance of the military, and it all starts with the local miners. Who with mouths to feed at home risk it all operating in this lawless region.

We venture in 50 meters deep, it is a precarious operation. Inside, the miners guide us through the various levels in galleries, past evidence of a colonial thirst for gold. Along the way I meet Darwon Roxas who has been mining here for three years now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): The gold comes out of here, from the earth.

SOARES: Backbreaking work in intense humidity.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): When you're working a large section of the mine, we could dig as many as 50 or 60 bags.

SOARES: Everywhere you looked speckles shimmer from above.

This mine has been so productive for them because they have got 250 kilos of gold out of this mine, just to give you a sense really why it's called "the millionaire's mine."

If 250 kilos or just over 550 pounds is accurate, that's well over $10 million at global market prices, all from one single dark hole. There are dozens around as thousands within Venezuela's mining ark.

But not all that shimmers is gold and these miners know it. These rocks need to be crushed, processed, scraped and melted before you actually see the gold.

This nugget here $315 but it comes at a cost to the health for the miners as well as the environment, with mercury and other chemicals used to separate gold from grit poisoning everything you see around us.

But this is business and these mills don't do it for free. And then there is an additional cost, even if the miners are scared to admit it.

SOARES (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): Do you have to pay anyone else?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): No one else. No, no one else.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): Right? It's like that.

SOARES (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): It is like that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): It's like that.

SOARES (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): Is it more or less like that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): More or less like that.

SOARES: It's clear from what he's saying there are other forces involved, there are other people they have to pay in order to be continuing to work in these mine -- in these mines, but clearly they're not prepared to tell us who they are.

They have every reason to be afraid. These mines are run by a network of hooded militias called pranes (Ph) who according to a senior military source and to mine's (Inaudible) still in silence. They do so together with complicit members of the military who they bribe to operate freely.

SOARES (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): What kind of pressure, they kill people?

A local miner to scare too scared to speak out about the gang's close to the mines opens up once his identity is hidden.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They mutilate people, they cut them, torture them and the ones that speak are also tortured and mutilated. They killed them and throw them down those holes.

SOARES: One active senior military sources confirmed what we've heard in El Callao, telling me the same group used death squads command obedience, battling each other and the military for control over this mining area.

It's a pressure tactic of blood and bullets. I asked the miner if he blames Maduro.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the government has the capacity to put an end to the planners, if they want to do it but they are not going to do it because they benefit from it.

SOARES: This is echoed from the top, General Manuel Figuera was the former spy chief for the Venezuelan president until April the 30th when he defected.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Maduro has knowledgeable of this. This has done very less, if anything.

SOARES: For years he was part of Maduro's inner circle with the U.S. Treasury sanctioning him of accusations, he ever sought mass torture, mass human rights violations and mass persecution.

[03:25:09] Now, with sanctions dropped, he's speaking out about corruption at the very top, backing the U.S. assessment that Maduro's family also profiting. UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): There are companies linked to

Maduro's family circle, to buy the gold and negotiate the extraction of the gold in the south of the country. They sold one part of it to the Central Bank and the other part they take out of the country without any kind of control.

SOARES: In Caracas we find this network expands beyond Venezuela. In 2018 Maduro traded Venezuelan gold to Turkey, some in exchange for food which the government then used in their subsidized food boxes, but it didn't stop there.

According to a source at the Venezuelan Central Bank, 26 tons of gold were taken out of the bank to the end of April, they were put into private airplanes at a destination, Middle East, and Africa. That is $1.6 billion, much of it skirting U.S. sanctions, according to the source, several other shipments left Caracas this year to United Arab Emirates, directly and also via Uganda on a Russian plane in exchange for Euros.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Maduro is at the helm of a criminal enterprise, he is hijacked all the state institutions to work in his service, this has allowed him to corrupt public servants and military official and all the power structures in order to perpetuate his rule.

SOARES: This matches what we here on the streets of El Callao, here where gold is a standard currency, many like this gold seller are just a cob in the system that controlled all the way from the top.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (ON SCREEN CAPTIONS): What we hear, is that everything is completely controlled by the government. Directly or indirectly, we're all working for them.

SOARES: But with the river of gold running deep and the economy is shrinking by half in the span of five years there is little sign Maduro and his men will turn their back on this blood gold. Here human misery goes hand in hand with environmental devastation, it is a free- for-all, a gold rush where the main winner is Maduro.

Isa Soares, CNN, El Callao, Bolivar State, Venezuela.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MACFARLANE: I want to tell you, CNN contacted both the Venezuelan government and Central Bank, but obtained no response, the Venezuelan government has dismissed U.S. sanctions in the past saying there an unjustified attack on the country and an attempt to get hold of it results on this. We also reach out to the Turkish government, but received no response, an Emirati official did tells CNN that they take these matters very seriously and that the UAE government is in compliance with international law. But no comments on legal proceedings in another country.

All right. That is it for this edition, thank you for joining us. I'm Christina MacFarlane, coming up next Talk Asia, but first I'll be back with the check of the headlines in just a moment. END