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London Bridge Terror Attack; Several Wounded in Stabbing in Netherlands; Taliban Appeared To Be Caught Off Guard By Trump's Announcement. Aired 3-3:30a ET

Aired November 30, 2019 - 03:00   ET

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

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ROBYN CURNOW, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome live from Studio 7 here at CNN Center at Atlanta. I'm Robyn Curnow, great to have you along with us. So, here on NEWSROOM, we're learning more about the man being accused of a deadly terror attack in London and the civilian heroes who helped to stop him. Plus Donald Trump says the Taliban wants peace talks by that statement appears to surprise the Taliban and Iraq's prime minister says he's stepping down as protests rage.

So we are learning new details about Friday's fatal knife attack near London Bridge here in London which is being declared an act of terrorism. Police say a man and a woman were killed, three other people wounded and being taken to the hospital. Now this is what we know the attacker who was killed by the police. He has been identified as 28-year-old Usman Khan of the Staffordshire area of England. Police say he was convicted of a 2012 foiled terror plot and was released from prison last year. More on that in just a moment but I do need toward near the next video we're going to show you is of the incident and it is disturbing. So police believe the attack began in Fishmongers Hall where Khan was attending an event sponsored by Cambridge University. It is not yet clear why he was there. Khan ranted nearby London Bridge where passersby wrestled him to the ground. Police quickly moved in.

One witness said Khan appeared to have two knives, one of them taped to his hand. No one knew at that time that a bomb appeared that Khan appeared to be wearing was fake. Now in the aftermath, London's mayor praised the people who took action. While the prime minister lamented that a convicted terrorist was released from prison.

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BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: I have long argued that if it is a mistake to allow serious and violent criminals to come out of prison early and it is very important that we get out of that habit and that we enforce the appropriate sentences for dangerous criminals especially terrorists that I think the public will want to see.

SADIQ KHAN, LONDON MAYOR: Members of the public didn't realize at the time there was a hoax device and there really are the best of us, another example of the bravery and heroism of ordinary Londoners running towards danger, risking their own personal safety to try and save others. I want to say thank you to them on behalf of all of us but also because it shows the best of us.

CURNOW: It certainly does. Nina dos Santos recounts the terrifying moments as Londoners were again confronted by violent terrorism. Here's Nina's piece.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clear the area.

NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN EUROPE EDITOR (voice-over): Terror once again in the heart of London passengers on this bus became witness to a shocking scene.

LLOYD GRIFFITHS, WITNESS (via telephone): It looked like members of the public were fighting with a man. It looked like he was trying to be pinned down on the pavement. It looked like a shine of light come across from the man on the floor and we realized quickly it was a knife and then the police ran over with some guns and it ended with the man being shot.

DOS SANTOS: Police say they were called to the area just before 2:00 p.m. following reports of a stabbing. After being apprehended by ordinary Londoners, a suspect wearing a hoax explosive device was shot dead by officers.

CRESSIDA DICK, METROPOLITAN POLICE COMMISSIONER: I also want to thank the members of the public who have helped by showing extraordinary courage and stepping in to tackle this attacker.

DOS SANTOS (on camera): It wasn't far from London Bridge, one of the busiest commuter stations in the capitol city that things began to unfold. About a block in that direction behind the security cordon, witnesses say they heard what they later realized was a quick blast of gunfire. They were told to evacuate the area urgently, some panicked and they began to flee down streets like these.

DOS SANTOS (voice-over): And then chaos as people tried to make sense of the scene.

One woman found the situation all too familiar.

DOS SANTOS (on camera): This is the second time you've had a lucky escape from an incident like this?

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OLIVIA BIZOT, WITNESS: Yes. I was also in the Boston marathon attacks in 2013. And also, based on my experience while I was at the marathon, sort of 20 minutes or something, I can't remember how long. But just before it actually happened and some very similar thing of having a flood of people just running and not knowing what was happening and just fear, like huge amount of fear on their faces. And you could feel it as well in the energy of just everyone stressing out. DOS SANTOS (voice-over): London Bridge was the target of another attack two years ago. Eight people were killed and 48 were injured. This attack comes just weeks after the terror threat for this part of the U.K. was reduced to substantial and ahead of a crucial general election for the entire country. As for the motivation of the suspect, police say they are keeping an open mind.

Nina dos Santos, CNN London.

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CURNOW: Now one of the witnesses was working on London Bridge and had a clear view of what happened. And here is what he had to say.

LUKE POULTON, WITNESS (via telephone): One of my employees had gone to lunch and then had been told that the building was on lockdown. And then moments after, he said that we heard four gunshots and saw people running across the bridge and after everyone left the bridge the police were then going around the bridge and there was a lorry that had been left in the middle. And they started picking up by a bit suspicious and checking to see if anyone was around it around the back trying to open the doors and then the reception area, we have a telescope where we people can come in and look around the London Bridge. We are able to look at the whole bridge and see the man's body after he had been shot by the police.

CURNOW: So I want to give you a little bit more about the suspect, Usman Khan, in his previous terror offenses. This is what we know. Khan is Pakistani in origin. He was 19 when he was arrested with eight others for a plot to bomb London Stock Exchange in 2010. His original 20 year sentence was reduced because he pleaded guilty. Police then launched a major covert operation to foil that plan involving nearly 1000 officers and staff. Khan was released from prison in 2018 unlicensed which is a form of parole to serve out the second half of his sentence from home.

Glenn Schoen joins me now from The Hague. He's a security management consultant and an expert on terrorism. Glenn, great to have you with us. We are actually getting a lot of details from the police on the suspect. And also, there's an extraordinary eyewitness account. So let's unpack it first. The eyewitness accounts, a number of people were extremely brave, it could've been much worse if it hadn't been for brave Londoners.

GLENN SCHOEN, SECURITY MANAGEMENT CONSULTANT: Certainly, I mean, this is the kind of situation where we are hearing you know if the public themselves showing the resiliency, they had so much assist law enforcement in disrupting these kinds of attacks. Fortunately, brave women men and women come forward and moments like this. Essentially throw the attacker off of whatever the original plan is. They were able to corner that person and chase him away which brings dynamism to the situation which in fact, in this, case allows law enforcement to be more of effective in its intervention. A positive thing to see, together with the whole reaction here of law enforcement how quickly they were on scene all together. CURNOW: Yes, they certainly were. I mean there was some video and there was some description. You heard one of the eyewitnesses there describing how some of them, one man had actually turned on this attacker with a fire extinguisher. So extremely brave men and women, the police response, they got there as quick as they could. Shot him, we heard those shots, why do you think they took him out so quickly? Was there a concern that that vest was live?

SCHOEN: I think so. It is standard operating procedure it's not just in the U.K. It's in a lot of other countries as well. If you are confronted with someone who is suspected to be a suicide bomber vest, the tactical extraction is usually to actually try and disable right away, which in this case means firing at the head instead of the torso, because of course firing at the torso means firing into the vest. We know from earlier incidents, earlier experiments in other countries that also head shots, however crude that sounds, are more effective in these situations in terms of collapsing the activities of the central nervous system. So what the police did in this instance. Of course if someone's carrying a vest, it could've detonated at a close range and if it as big explosive power, it's going to affect at least those police officers if not the public nearby. So I think that's a completely understandable reaction. It was executed very well yesterday.

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CURNOW: Let's talk about a pattern we're seeing here. It's a similar location. We saw another terror attack a few years ago in that facility by the market, London Bridge as well - knives. What do you make of that and the fact of course that this man still had his ankle bracelet on?

SCHOEN: Yes, like you said a lot to unpack there on the one hand we are still looking at is there a bigger frame to this or was this indeed a singular action, this person coming from the jail background taking maybe a form of revenge at a class setting and then going on a spree. But looking at the bridge itself, the tactical situation, we know that it is harder for people to escape particularly not just pedestrians but also people sitting in vehicles. We know that it greatly disrupts because generally not only that bridge is going to be blocked off but quite often in these situations you have other bridges checked just for safeties sake as well so you get a massive disruptive effect even with the localized incident. It's very simple means we have seen that again. We saw that in October in the shopping center in Manchester. We saw the vehicle again used in Germany months ago. So again it's very simple means that are still very effective in terms of having an impact.

CURNOW: This was a man who admitted to terror activities he was convicted in a British court. This is certainly going to raise a lot of questions about not just the justice system but what to do with people who threatened terror in the U.K. What do you think the right cause of action would have been in terms of releasing someone like him because clearly he wasn't deterred from buying a gun, buying knives and doing this? SCHOEN: No. I mean these are extremely difficult cases. It's particularly hard looking at the future of not so much the U.K. but particularly mainland Europe in the next few years. What we know now is that this person indeed was probably involved in this plotting in 2010 to conduct several attacks including the Stock Exchange in London. It was a group of Britain's mostly people from Pakistani dissent. We're looking at -- doing a number of attacks with the jail and then indeed came out already I think about nearly year ago, now he's in a special program.

This, of course, is repeated literally hundreds of times over elsewhere in Europe now. The concern among security services is that we're dealing with between six and 800 people who will be coming free in the next roughly three years in Europe coming out of these programs and hopefully of course, with all the help of people in prison, social workers and so forth. That most of them will be de-radicalized. However, the danger factor here is we know from the past 15 years, generally roughly about 12 to 15 percent of these people remain radicalized when they come out of prison. It's a huge challenge there.

CURNOW: Certainly is. A twisted irony in terms of this case, it seems like he might incur in terms of early reports. He might have actually been attending a prisoner rehabilitation conversational meeting, involving Cambridge University where he first struck. So, certainly a lot of questions will be answered. And Boris Johnson the prime minister jumping on that saying he doesn't want violent criminals released early. So this is going to be both political and policing in terms of the response as Britain's wake up this Saturday. Thank you so much, Glenn Schoen, always good to speak to you and have your expertise as well. Thank you.

SCHOEN: Thank you.

CURNOW: So I want to turn to another incident in the Netherlands where a manhunt is on the way for a suspect there who stabbed and wounded three minors, children in a busy shopping district in The Hague. A video posted online shows how the shoppers running away after the incident as you can see here. Dutch authorities are asking for witnesses to come forward. Police say the situation is complex and of not named a suspect or possible motive but a Dutch national broadcaster, Nos, reports there's no indication terrorism was a factor.

And coming up, a major announcement from Iraq's prime minister as violent protests continue to claim lives across the country. The embattled leader says the change is coming and Black Friday sales are spreading across the world but some lawmakers are actually trying to stop the U.S. tradition - the U.S. shopping tradition. We will have those reasons ahead.

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CURNOW: I'm Robyn Curnow thanks for joining us. A quick update now on Friday's fatal terrorist attack in London. Police say a 28-year- old Usman Khan fatally stabbed two people injured three others before police shot and killed him. Some video you will see now is disturbing but take a look at this bystanders on the London Bridge tackled Khan to the ground before police arrived. Witnesses says the attacker was yielding two knives, one duct taped to his hand, the suspect was a convicted terrorist sentence in 2012 for a foiled plot to bomb the London Stock Exchange. He had been released from prison last year.

Meanwhile, pro-democracy protesters have returned to the streets in Hong Kong. These live pictures right now hundreds of students are holding a rally in the financial district. They are calling for reforms and denouncing police brutality, so far nearly 6,000 people have been arrested in connection with that protests.

And in Iraq, weeks of deadly protests there, appeared to have sparked significant political change after almost two months of unrest. The country's prime minister says he will submit his resignation to Parliament. He's agreeing to step down after Iraq's top Sheik cleric criticized the government, responds to the violence. Many protesters in Baghdad reacted to the news with celebrations. Another deadly week on the streets in the country south at least 42 people were killed when clashes broke out.

And the U.S. President Donald Trump may have spoken too soon when he said peace talks have resumed with the Taliban. The comments seemed to have actually called the militant group off-guard. And now senior Trump administration officials say the U.S. is in the process of restarting them.

White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins has more on all of these mixed messages.

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KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Trump is back in Florida today after a top secret trip to Afghanistan.

TRUMP: The Taliban wants to make a deal.

COLLINS: The president was off the grid for hours, unnoticed until he landed in the combat zone for the first time, where he announced that peace talks with the Taliban are back on.

TRUMP: The Taliban wants to make a deal. And we're meeting with them. And we're saying there has to be a cease-fire.

COLLINS: Those talks collapsed in stunning fashion less than three months ago when he scrapped a secret meeting with Taliban leaders at Camp David.

TRUMP: They're dead. They're dead. As far as I'm concerned, they're dead.

COLLINS: Details about the revived talks are still spare and one official tells us CNN the U.S. is still in the process of even restarting them, while questions about a cease-fire go unanswered.

TRUMP: If they do, they do, if they don't, they don't. That's fine.

COLLINS: The Taliban seemingly caught off-guard by the president's announcement. A spokesman telling CNN: Our policy regarding peace talks is the same as it was.

Trump also telling reporters he wants to reduce the number of troops in Afghanistan to 8,600.

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COLLINS (voice-over): Down from the approximately 12,000 currently stationed there.

TRUMP: That day is coming, coming very soon.

COLLINS: The Thanksgiving visit could give the president a boost in military support amid strained relations with the Pentagon.

TRUMP: They wanted to take his pin away and I said, no, you're not going to take it away.

COLLINS: Trump clashed with military leaders after he intervened in several high-profile war crimes cases, including Eddie Gallagher's, the Navy SEAL who was convicted of posing with a dead ISIS fighter's body, but acquitted of more serious charges, including threatening to kill SEALs who reported him.

That episode led to the firing of the Navy Secretary Richard Spencer.

RICHARD SPENCER, FORMER NAVY SECRETARY: What message does that send to the troops?

You can get away with things. We have to good order and discipline. It's the backbone of what we do.

COLLINS (on camera): Now coming to an agreement between the U.S. and the Taliban was pretty complicated last time.

Now that the president is saying that a cease-fire is on the table, there are more questions being raised because, of course, that would be seen at a pretty big concession by the Taliban that they weren't open to last time.

So the main question is really why is that something they would agree to now just less than three months after those talks were called off, if they weren't open to it before.

Kaitlan Collins, CNN, traveling with the president, in West Palm Beach, Florida.

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CURNOW: Thanks, Kaitlan, for that.

Now coming up as Black Friday deals spread across the, globe some climate activists take to the streets to end the shopping.

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CURNOW: Welcome back. U.S. retailers are seeing record sales this holiday weekend world and while more and more countries around the world are embracing the Black Friday tradition the day after Thanksgiving, climate activists in France are pushing back. Melissa Bell has more on why they're trying to stop the shopping frenzy.

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MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: In Lyon, the police had to clear them by force. Climate and anti-capitalist protesters held sit-ins this Friday outside Amazon offices in several French cities.

The object of their anger, Black Friday, an American tradition that's found its way across the Atlantic and onto the boulevards of France in the last few years, promising sales but without the Thanksgiving.

AURELIE TROUVE, ATTAC SPOKESWOMAN: (Speaking French).

This is also a social disaster.

BELL (voice-over): And the very things angering protesters are also worrying the French government.

France's Parliament is debating banning Black Friday on the grounds it is bad for the planet and promotes overconsumption. Meanwhile, the shoppers were out in force this Friday.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I look always for sales. It's really nice because you can buy a lot of things for a small amount. That's really good.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The discounts really amazing. And you can shop until you drop.

BELL (voice-over): But this might be the last opportunity for the French to shop until they drop. MPs could vote to ban Black Friday as part of a new anti-waste bill that will be debated next week.

Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.

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CURNOW: Thanks to Melissa for that. Derek Van Dam joins me now here in the studio. He's going to talk with us. As people are trying to go home after Thanksgiving, here in the States, they got their TVs in their suitcases. Their extra washing machine, but they're going to be facing delay. It's going to be pretty miserable.

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CURNOW: Thanks so much for watching NEWSROOM, I'm Robyn Curnow, I will be back with the headlines in just a moment.