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CNN International: State of Emergency Declared as Australia Bushfires Spread; Protesters Leave U.S. Embassy in Baghdad; Satellite Images Show New Signs of Uyghur Persecution in China; Turkish Media Says 7 Arrested on Suspicion of Helping Ghosn Flee; Tensions Hight After U.S. Embassy Siege in Baghdad Ends; Netanyahu Asks Knesset for Immunity in Corruption Cases; Tens of Thousands Forced to Flee Indonesia's Capital; Oldest Person Alive Celebrates Her 117th Birthday. Aired 10-11a ET

Aired January 02, 2020 - 10:00   ET

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

[10:00:00]

HALA GORANI, CNN HOST: Forced to flee. Apocalyptic scenes in Australia as tens of thousands attempt to evade deadly bushfires.

Also, anger in Baghdad. The U.S. embassy suspends its consular operations after protests at its doors.

And a CEO's great escape from Japan to Lebanon. Now Interpol has issued a warrant for Carlos Ghosh's arrest.

Hello, and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world. I'm Hala Gorani. This is CNN.

We begin in Australia where officials in New South Wales have declared a state of emergency as raging wildfires spread across the southeast of the country. Take a look at these images. The sky, thick with smoke, glowing orange as it reflects the fires on the ground. Some truly incredible, if not hellish pictures even. It's becoming very difficult to breathe there as well. This video was shot in Victoria. A state of disaster has been declared forward several regions there. And take a look at the aerial images also from Victoria. As you can see, the fires are large, out of control in many cases. So far, the death toll from these bushfires is 17.

Now the Australian Prime Minister who has been under heavy criticism over his response to the disaster, you'll remember early on, actually took a holiday to Hawaii. Well, he toured over the last 24 hours one of the hardest hit areas. His visit did not go down well with some of the residents. Anna Coren filed this report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A state of emergency has been declared in New South Wales with authorities bracing themselves for the return of catastrophic conditions following those devastating fires on New Year's Eve. Residents and holidaymakers here on the south coast are being told to get out. With fears it could be a further loss of life. (voice-over): This is what a mass evacuation looks like. Thousands

and thousands fleeing the area's worst hit by the deadly bushfires that have swept across the southeastern coast of Australia. A mandatory evacuation for tourists before catastrophic conditions return on Saturday. But some want to head the opposite way.

TREVOR GARLAND, DAUGHTER STRANDED BY FIRE: My daughter stuck in Sussex Inlet with friends down there.

COREN: Trevor garland's 16-year-old daughter, Haley, is stranded in one of the hardest hit regions with some friends. She told him she's safe but he's not taking any chances.

GARLAND: Been here for quite a while trying to see if I can get down there to get her out. I don't know the way because it's one road in, one road out.

COREN: It's dangerous but Trevor is not alone.

ZANTHIA WALSH, RESIDENT: At the moment we're just focused on trying to get family back together.

COREN: Zanthia Walsh and her family were away when fire struck the family home in Conjola three hours south of Sydney. They all escaped unharmed but their house was completely destroyed.

WALSH: It was a family that actually built the house. So it's hit a lot of people quite hard. It used to be a holiday house prior to us living in it. So all of our family has stayed in there at some point or another.

COREN: Walsh and Garland are two of the many that stuck around and inside some of the areas hardest hit by bush fires across the states of Victoria and New South Wales. Dozens of roads have been cut off and some communities remain isolated. Stranded residents, dependent on the Australian military for the most basic of supplies. It's part of the Australian government's efforts to deal with the crisis, but for some it's too little, too late.

The Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, who has been heavily criticized for his lack of leadership during this crisis and his government's inaction on climate change was heckled by residents during a visit to Cobargo.

A large part of the town was destroyed during the New Year's Eve bushfires and residents say the government has not done enough.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is not fair. We're totally forgotten about down here.

COREN: The Prime Minister left without responding. Conditions have improved slightly in the past few days. Allowing the countless men and women who continue to battle the flames a temporary, but very limited reprieve. And just enough time to say good-bye to one of their own. Firefighter Jeffrey Keaton was honored for his bravery at his funeral.

The medal given to his young son. Just one of the many victims of a nightmare with no end in sight that is expected to worsen in the coming days.

(on camera): Searing temperatures and ferocious winds are expected on Saturday, whipping up fires. Many of them have been burning for months. And there is no reprieve in sight.

[10:05:00]

With Australia only halfway through its summer. Back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: All right. Thanks, Anna.

Australian tennis stars are trying to do their bit. A handful of athletes are supporting a victims of bushfires by donating money.

Nick Kyrgios was the first to make the pledge. He tweeted -- I'll be donating $200 per ace that I hits across all the events I play this summer.

So related to his game there. He was joined by several other tennis pros who promised to do the same. There are a series of tournaments ahead of the Australian Open later this month.

Let's bring in Chad Myers at the international weather center for an update on conditions. And, Chad, I've been reading that the weather conditions are due to worsen and make the job of firefighters even harder this weekend.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Probably not as bad as we had two weeks ago, but certainly worse than what we're seeing now. In that shot there from our reporter really didn't indicate any wind down to about 6 kilometers per hour where she is. But the maps behind me will show you that we're going up to 60 kilometers per hour by the weekend because there's a front coming. And sometimes you think that's a good thing. It's going to cool things down. But the front will generate significant wind as it pushes on through.

Look at the highs today in the middle 40s. Now we're going to have this front. We talked about this. It is going to cool down Melbourne. It's going to still keep very, very warm if you are to the north of that cold front into Canberra. Temperatures are going to be well up into the middle 40s. Now the cool air is on the way. A little bit of rain is possibly on the way. But when I say a little bit, I'm not joking. Like one to two millimeters. Certainly not enough to put any dent in anything.

There's the wind for today. We move you ahead into tomorrow afternoon and you start to see the red. As soon as you see the red, you're seeing here 75 kph -- 75. If you get a wind gust at 75 on a fire, those embers are going to be going down wind another two or three kilometers. That is the problem. Ahead of possibly the firefighters that are trying to fight the fire.

So finally we cool things down and dry things out a little bit there by Monday into Tuesday. But the air quality won't be getting any better in some spots there around Canberra. We had 100 and -- I think it was somewhere in the ballpark of 850 parts per million for the ash in the air. That was 2.5 millimeters or smaller. Just numbers that we don't see anywhere. We don't see those numbers in the worst possible conditions, in China when there's a high pressure and the fact we have to stop working because there's no wind. The numbers that we saw yesterday and the day before were truly unhealthy. In fact, I don't have to say it. Even the masks they're wearing won't help that much.

So here comes the rainfall. How much? A couple of millimeters. But Sydney will see the tomorrow down to 23. That's some relief. Here is the problem, Hala. We haven't had a lot of rain. We have this thing called the Indian Ocean Dipole. And the IOD has been blowing the wrong way for Australia to get any rainfall. It's been blowing in the direction of Africa. And we have covered the African floods. That's the rain that should be spread out. It's not spread out because it's blowing from Australia over to Africa and that's where the rain is going.

Overall, over the entire country, 188 millimeters short for this year. And the hottest year on record there at 1.52 degrees C above where we think is normal. What are we trying to hold the whole world to? 1.5 degrees C. So we're almost there.

GORANI: There you have it. A lot of work ahead for these firefighters and just ordinary Australians. Some of them trapped. We'll have full coverage in the coming hours. Thanks, Chad Myers at the world weather center.

Now a calm has settled over the U.S. embassy in Baghdad following two days of violent protests by supporters of an Iran-linked militia. And it caused some extensive damage to the compound. Angry demonstrators began storming the building on Tuesday over U.S. air strikes on the militia that they support. Now these are not the demonstrators that we saw over many weeks who are demanding more transparency and accountability from their government.

These are protesters angry with these air strikes on these militia positions. These air strikes killed at least 25 people. Iraqi security forces have now regained control of the area, but the embassy says that all public consular services are suspended until further notice. Let's bring in CNN's Arwa Damon. She is live in Baghdad with the very latest -- Arwa.

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Hala. Those Iraqi security forces are, yes, now once again manning those checkpoints that lead to the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. But where were they when all of this was unfolding? That is one of the big questions here.

[10:10:02]

Now we were able to arrive at the U.S. embassy just as these protesters were departing. Here is a look at what we saw.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAMON: We're standing just outside of this massive, sprawling U.S. embassy complex. You can see one of the entrances there. If I'm not mistaken, that is where you'd go through if you wanted to go to consular services.

(voice-over): The Iraqi security forces are finally on the scene, but that the protesters managed to get this far. For more than 24 hours, attempt to breach the walls of the U.S. embassy goes to the crux of the many multifaceted challenges that Iraq faces.

(on camera): Supporters and members of what is known as the popular mobilization force, the PMF, they are the ones that were part of this protest. These are not ordinary protesters. The PMF came together as a response during the fight against ISIS. And they have continued to be extremely powerful. The message here, obviously, is very clear.

(voice-over): Many fighters that make up the PMF gained the bulk of their experience actually fighting the Americans during the U.S. occupation of Iraq. They have historic longstanding ties to Iran with training, funding and weapons coming from there. In today's Iraq, they're ostensibly under the umbrella of the Iraqi security forces and the Iraqi government views the U.S. air strike against one of these groups, Kataib Hezbollah, as a violation of its sovereign sovereignty and an attack on its own forces.

Amid rising questions of, was the Iraqi government really helpless to stop this or simply unwilling? Iraq's Minister of Interior on the scene claimed that it took them awhile to spin up their forces.

(on camera): The situation has only just barely begun to get under control with the withdrawal of these protesters right now. But as the spokesperson for Kataib Hezbollah, the group that was the target of the U.S. strikes said, they left because they gave America their message.

(voice-over): At dusk, U.S. security personnel began removing the flags of the various groups, each which also has a powerful political party within Parliament. A tenuous calm for now but power struggles within Iraq and the proxy battle between Washington and Tehran are all far from over.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DAMON: And, Hala, that whole protest movement has now moved to the other side of the Tigris river from the U.S. embassy. They are giving Parliament a week deadline to begin negotiating a bill that is addressing the U.S. troop presence in Iraq. And one of Iran's top commanders in response to statements coming out from the White House and from President Trump has said that the U.S. should watch its rhetoric. Pretty much schooling America on being polite when it comes to addressing Iran and also saying while they're not looking for a war, they are not afraid of one.

GORANI: All right. Well, the war of words at least continues between the two countries. Thanks very much, Arwa Damon is live in Baghdad.

A couple other stories I want to bring to your attention. At least eight people are dead after a missile strike on a school in Syria. Yet another civilian target in Syria. That's from the volunteer group White Helmets and the Turkish government. The strike happened in the rebel held Idlib province on Thursday and left 16 people wounded. Syria's government says it was an anti-terrorism operation.

Investigators are trying to find out why a battery factory exploded in New Delhi Thursday. Several people and firefighters had to be rescued from the rubble. There's the aftermath. One of the firefighters died. Last month two fires at businesses in New Delhi killed dozens of people.

And a top military general in Taiwan is among eight people killed in a helicopter crash on the northern part of the island. The Blackhawk chopper was carrying 13 people when it disappeared from radar near New Taipei City. Five people survived this, if you can believe it, and this comes just a week before the island holds its general election.

Still ahead -- we know thousands of Uyghurs have been sent to camps in China's Xinjian province. Now there is new photographic evidence that entire Muslim graveyards are being wiped right off the map.

Plus -- he slipped under the radar, out of Japan to avoid a trial he says would be rigged. Now ex-Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn is officially a wanted man worldwide. We have new details next.

[10:15:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: We're seeing new evidence of persecution in China against ethnic minority Uyghurs. CNN has combed through satellite images to find what were Muslim cemeteries where they once stood. The land has been flattened, according to the satellite images and either redeveloped or simply smoothed over. Entire graveyards are being erased from existence again and again.

CNN's Matt Rivers brought us this story and he joins me now live. Talk to us more about what these satellite images reveal the Chinese government is doing to these burial sites.

MATT RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Hala, I mean as you know, broadly speaking we've been reporting on this story for a long time now. And the central accusation from critics is that China and its government are trying to systematically wipe out Islam and Islamic culture from within its borders. And what we found here seems to be the latest example of that with more than 100 cemeteries across Xinjiang being destroyed and, in the process, it's affected families across the globe.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS (voice-over): When Aziz Isa Elkun's father died it was too dangerous for him to go to the funeral in China. Aziz is an ethnic Uyghur who lives in exile in north London but he grew up in a western Chinese region called Xinjian. An area activist say is the center of an unparallel human rights crisis in the world today.

AZIZ ISA ELKUN, UYGHUR POET: This is not a normal state, normal country can't do like this. This is pure evilness.

RIVERS: Xinjiang is where the United Nations says the Chinese government has detained hundreds of thousands of Muslim ethnic minorities, including Uyghurs over the past several years. Critics say China is doing that to try to eliminate Islam within its borders. Some detainees are seen here in leaked video blind-folded and shackled as they are transferred between places.

Former detainees have told CNN they're kept in a massive network of detention camps where inside allegations of torture abound. China's government denies that and says they're just offering vocational training designed to fight extremism. But last year, we tried to see those camps for ourselves and were met with police.

RIVERS (on camera): Can you tell me what that is? Is this something you don't want us to see?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why you are here? Tell me, why you are here?

RIVERS: We're here to film what we believe is a camp.

(voice-over): In London, Aziz tells us his father was buried in this tomb near his family home in central Xinjiang. In the past he visited him in the only way he could, by using Google Earth to see the tomb from above. But in June, the satellite image changed. Before rows of tombs now a largely empty flattened field.

(on camera): What happened to your father's remains?

ELKUN: I don't know. I don't know. I have no idea.

RIVERS (voice-over): In a months-long investigation working with sources in the Uyghur community and analyzing hundreds of satellite images, CNN has found more than 100 cemeteries that have been destroyed.

[10:20:05]

Most in just the last two years. Like this one in the town of Aksu. A cemetery first demolished and redeveloped with a manmade pond. Or this one in Xayar, distinctive white tombs leveled and simply built over. The AFP first reported on this destruction and visited some sites. At three different places, they said they found human bones.

CNN has also found multiple government notices online. In one case giving families just 15 days to move remains. We showed these images to Ryan Thum, an anthropologist who studies Islam in China and uses satellite imagery to study this region.

(on camera): There's no doubt in your mind what that is? RYAN THUM, UYGHUR HISTORIAN, UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM: No, this is

absolutely clear what this is. You can see the destruction encroaching and now if you look at Google Earth today, you'll see that this sort of flat surface now covers everything. And that is a phenomenon stretching right across the region of Xinjiang.

RIVERS (voice-over): In response, the Chinese government did not deny the cemetery destruction. They said in part, quote, governments in Xinjiang fully respect and guarantee the freedom of all ethnic groups to choose cemeteries and funeral and burial methods.

In public documents, official reasons for the destruction include wanting to build, quote, civilized cemeteries to promote progress. Uyghur cemeteries are central to village life. A place to meet and connect, one generation to the last.

THUM: It's akin to, for an American, seeing Arlington Cemetery razed and the tomb of the unknown soldier dug up and paved over. It's a great act of desecration and a kind of open insult to Uyghur culture.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are stronger together.

RIVERS: Aziz believes it's a desecration that will have a backlash.

ELKUN: We cannot live anymore with them together. Because they are committing genocide against the Uyghur people.

RIVERS: In Xinjiang it seems even the dead can't rest.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: And, Hala, one of the things you hear from activists often is they want more pressure from the international community against the Chinese government to stop this. Well, here in the United States, the U.S. Senate will likely take up and pass relatively soon the Uyghur Rights Act which would allow the U.S. government to place targeted sanctions on the Chinese government over these alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

GORANI: All right, thanks very much, Matt Rivers.

We have new developments to bring you in the case of former executive turned fugitive Carlos Ghosn. According to Lebanese state media, Lebanon has received a red notice warned from Interpol for Ghosn's arrest. That is where Ghosn surfaced after he secretly fled Japan earlier this week.

He'd been awaiting trial for alleged financial misconduct but he claimed the Japanese justice system was rigged. Just hours ago, prosecutors in Japan raided Ghosn's home in Tokyo. Authorities are still trying to figure out just how he managed to slip out of the country unnoticed. There are new reports that Ghosn slipped through Turkey to get to Lebanon. Gul Tuysuz is following this for us. So, Gul, we're hearing several arrests have been made in Istanbul itself. What more can you tell us about that? GUL TUYSUZ, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL PRODUCER: Well, flight data

showed there was a private jet that took off from Osaka, Japan, and landed in Istanbul. And just a little while later, another flight took off, another private jet from Istanbul and landed in Beirut. That's one of the scenarios for how he managed to escape.

And the Turkish authorities, the Istanbul prosecutor's office is looking into what happened in the airport in Istanbul. And right now they have already detained seven people, four of them pilots. One is a manager at a private chartered jet company, as well as two ground staff members.

The airport that all of this apparently took place in is not Istanbul's main international airport. It's in fact, the one that's been decommissioned and now is used primarily for cargo flights and for these kinds of private jets. And so the Istanbul prosecutor's office, along with the police, are looking into what they can glean about how Ghosh got away. And some of the testimony that may come out from those seven people that have been detained might shed a small bit -- might uncover a small part of the puzzle as to how Ghosn engineered his audacious escape.

Meanwhile, as you mentioned earlier, there's also a red notice out for Ghosn at this point. We don't know which country made that issue to Interpol. But red notices are more along the lines of requests as opposed to orders. So whether or not Japan could ever possibly get Ghosn back, of course, is something we don't know yet.

[10:25:00]

GORANI: And regarding how he fled, that's, of course, probably the question now foremost on people's minds because it was such a daring escape. I mean, it sounds like something out of a movie. There were these reports that maybe he'd been smuggled out in a music case. But Reuters is quoting Mr. Ghosn's wife Carole as saying that is fiction.

TUYSUZ: Well, so far, we have Reuters and the "Financial Times" reporting that he was in fact smuggled out of Japan by a private security company. There are allegations, as you mentioned, about a musical instrument. But really, just the sheer logistics of getting out of Japan, landing possibly in Turkey and then switching planes and going to Beirut, that just goes to show you the amount of coordination and logistical engineering that had to take place for Ghosh to be able to not just leave Japan but go and land here in Turkey and possibly go on to Beirut.

So there's a lot of questions that are up in the air and, of course, the Japanese authorities, along with now Turkish authorities, are going to be looking into how it was that this escape was possible -- Hala.

GORANI: All right, thanks very much, Gul.

Still ahead on CNN -- bad blood gets worse between the U.S. and Iran following the violence at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. Plus, Israel's Prime Minister wants to make sure the corruption

charges against him will not affect his election chances. Will his plans work?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: Returning now to the growing tensions between the U.S. and Iran on the heels of two days of violent protests outside the U.S. embassy in Baghdad by supporters of a militia.

President Donald Trump accused Iran of pulling the strings behind the violence and said there would be a price to pay. But Iran's Supreme Leader is not backing down. Telling the U.S. in response, you brought this onto yourself.

Where is it heading? I'm joined from Washington by Professor Vali Nasr. He teaches at the school of advanced international studies at Johns Hopkins University. Vali, thanks for being with us. Is this increased tension bringing us closer to open conflict between the U.S. and Iran?

VALI NASR, JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY: Well, the risk of a conflict is definitely much more. And it may be an accidental stepping into conflict by both sides. But I think Iran is putting pressure on the U.S., arguing essentially that the maximum pressure strategy that President Trump has followed is only going to lead into conflict. And try to push him to change course.

[10:30:02]

For Iran, this is a calculated way in which to drive the point home to Washington that his strategy with Iran is not working, is not going to give a new nuclear deal or is not going to change Iran's posture in the region. It's only going to lead to conflict, hoping that President Trump would reassess how he's approaching Iraq.

GORANI: So the U.S. is blaming Iran directly. Are they right to? How much control does Iran have over this particular Shiite militia?

NASR: No, they're correct to point the finger at Iran but the U.S. also made mistakes of its own. He didn't engage the Iraqi government ahead of its retaliation against the attack on the base in Kirkuk. It has consistently not factored in the nationalist sentiments in Iraq, and now gave the initiative to Iran.

Yes, the militia attacked the U.S. embassy, but it also has changed the political dynamic in Iraq. He has mobilized others. The entire back and forth between Iran and the United States has not made the United States much more of a problem in Iraq than Iranian meddling. And we have the senior ayatollah in Iraq, the Prime Minister of Iraq and many other officials also expressing support for the militia and some politicians even showed up during the demonstrations outside of the U.S. embassy.

GORANI: Yes, and it's important to distinguish between the demonstrations we saw for many weeks that were met with sometimes incredible amounts of violence from security forces. And those men who were attempting to storm the U.S. embassy compound.

NASR: Yes, indeed. In fact, the United States thought that those demonstrations we saw against Iran was a positive development in Iraq for the first time. It had problematized Iran's presence in Iraq. And the U.S. made a decision and carried out the retaliation against Iran in a way that has now diverted attention from Iran onto the United States and has provided room for Iran's allies and clients to essentially be able to be much more influential in politics in Iraq at a time the country is going to be choosing a new Prime Minister.

GORANI: So where does that leave ordinary Iraqis who understandably want a more transparent, less corrupt, more representative government? They are extremely frustrated, by and large. What does the future hold for them?

NASR: Well, it's not good for Iraq if it becomes the scene of an Iranian American rivalry if these two countries begin to fight their battles on Iraqi soil. It will impact negatively political developments in Iraq. We already are seeing that it's diverting attention from demands for corruption, for reform, for transparency. It might impact where Iraqi politics goes. Instead of focusing on a better government in Iraq, the Parliament is now going to be debating removal of U.S. troops from Iraq. None of this benefits Iraq. I mean and, in a way, Iraq may be pushed into a much more dangerous situation.

GORANI: Right. So no respite unfortunately for people who have already suffered quite a bit. Thanks so much, Vali Nasr, as always for joining us.

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants lawmakers to grant him immunity from those corruption charges he's facing. Israelis will try for the third time to elect a majority government. The Prime Minister's request will likely delay a trial until after the election. He denies wrongdoing and calls the charges an attempted coup.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (through translator): I intend to ask because I am sacrificing my life to you, people of Israel. But there are people who, unlike me, did commit grave crimes, and they have life-long immunity. They are just on the right side of the media and the left wing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GORANI: Oren Liebermann joins me now from Jerusalem with the details. Netanyahu is just trying to protect himself and just keep holding on to his political career here.

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And this was very much about politics, Hala. You got a sense of the speech he gave, the statement he made in requesting immunity. The official request where he said I'm going to request immunity was a very short part of that statement. It began with listing his achievements and saying all the achievements he wants to bring if he's reelected, if he can carry out what he calls, the will of the people. A quick request for immunity and then immediately shifting to a political attack which you heard some of there. Netanyahu earlier this week called immunity a cornerstone of democracy and followed it up with this in his statement.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[10:35:00]

NETANYAHU (through translator): The immunity law is intended to protect elected officials from fabricated legal proceedings, from political indictment intended to damage the will of the people. This law intends to ensure that those elected can serve the people according to the will of the people, not the will of the law clerks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIEBERMANN: Critics immediately blasted Netanyahu for putting in this request. Benny Gantz, the head of the Blue and White Party said voters now have a clear choice in the upcoming election in March. It's either Netanyahu's interests or the state of Israel's interests. It's either vote for the kingdom of Bibi or vote for the state of Israel.

Since the immunity law was changed to its current format in 2005, there haven't been that many immunity requests. There've only been a few in fact but they have all been rejected. Netanyahu seeking to become the first to get that immunity request.

But because there is no Knesset house committee right now, Netanyahu's request can't be heard which means the legal proceedings against him are stalled. And, Hala, this now becomes a political fight about can the opposition force the formation of a Knesset house committee that would then hear and, at this point, likely reject Netanyahu's request for immunity.

GORANI: And what makes Netanyahu believe that the third time is lucky for him here? I mean, what tea leaves is he reading?

LIEBERMANN: First of all, in Israeli politics you never count out Netanyahu. Perhaps he has a different strategy that he wants to play this time. He does, as you know, have a lot of ground to make up. He's at 55 seats. Needs to get to 61 if he has any shot at having his immunity request approved. But more importantly, as long as Israel is in this political deadlock and there is no house committee, the legal proceedings against him are stalled. Israel's legal or rather political deadlock works to Netanyahu's advantage here.

GORANI: All right, Oren Lieberman, thanks very much.

Still ahead, the New Year gets off to a soggy start in Indonesia's capital. Making matters worse, more rain could be on the way. If you are watching us from that part of the world, I don't have to tell you, it has been miserable weather.

Plus -- we've come a long way since 1903. And this lady has seen it all. We'll tell you about her very special birthday coming up. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: Flash floods and landslides have forced thousands of people to flee the capital of Indonesia. The floods have claimed at least 26 lives. This after what some believe are the heaviest rain in decades. Drone video shows some of the roads washed out by the landslides and flooding and the bad news here is that more severe storms are expected. David Culver has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID CULVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The streets of Indonesia's capital city, Jakarta, turning to rivers. The heavy rain began as 2019 ended. It continued into the New Year. Claiming multiple lives and forcing tens of thousands to leave their homes.

FARID, SON KILLED BY ELECTRIC SHOCK (through translator): My son's body was covered with newspaper and my second child passed by. If my other child did not pass by, we would not know why my son had been killed.

CULVER: Escaping the flash floods and landslides is not easy. Especially in the eastern and southern portions of the city. Jakarta police posting on Twitter that many roads are impassable. Train lines blocked and widespread power outages across Southeast Asia's most pop populous city.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We hope this will never happen again. Because this keeps happening every five years. Floods happening every five years.

[10:40:03]

CULVER: Indonesia's minister of social affairs tells CNN despite temporary relief centers set up, some people are refusing to leave. In recent years, officials have tried to make Jakarta's low-lying areas less susceptible to flooding but the country's President blames land acquisition problems for delaying much-needed infrastructure projects.

JOKO WIDODO, INDONESIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): Regarding the flooding issue, the central government is still quite new. A lot of projects are still yet to be completed.

CULVER: He also called on emergency and rescue officials to work together.

WIDODO (through translator): The disaster mitigation agency, leaders of the provinces, search and rescue teams need to move as one to give people who are affected by the floods a sense of safety.

CULVER: Amid brief breaks from the rain, receding water leaves behind trash, cleaning defenses, residents are cleaning out their homes, pushing out the mud and debris. Children, innocently playing in the water as locals fear more heavy rains could be on the way. (on camera): Indonesia's cabinet secretary warning that extreme

weather may continue across the country through the weekend and even into next week. David Culver, CNN, Hong Kong.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: A woman in Japan has hit quite the milestone. Kane Tanaka is celebrating her 117th birthday on Thursday. Last January, she earned the Guinness World Record for the oldest person alive. To put her age in perspective, she was born January 2, 1903. The same year the Wright brothers took their first successful flight. And hopefully they had fewer candles than the number of years on the cake. That would take some time to put out even for a much younger person.

Now, if 2020 already has you down, take a look at this. Twenty things to look forward to in 2020. Well, actually, you don't have to look forward to it because we don't have it. But that's OK, we'll bring it to you as soon as it becomes available.

That's going to do it for me. I'm Hala Gorani. I will be back with another hour of news in just about 15 minutes. And you can find me on Twitter. I'm @HalaGorani. In the meantime, do stay with us. As I mentioned at the top of the hour, I'll be back with you. But you have "WORLD SPORT" coming your way in just a matter of seconds on CNN.

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