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Iran's Supreme Leader to Lead Friday Prayers; Senate Impeachment Trial Kicks Off; Australia Getting Too Much Rain; Ukraine to Investigate Surveillance on Marie Yovanovitch. Aired 3-3:30a ET

Aired January 17, 2020 - 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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MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, and welcome live from studio seven at the CNN center in Atlanta, I'm Michael Holmes.

And coming up here on CNN Newsroom. A very public appearance. Iran's supreme leader leads Friday's prayers as his country faces a series of challenges.

Impeachment and new revelations as the U.S. Senate prepares for a trial. Ukraine now investigating actions that may have been taken on behalf of Donald Trump.

And from bush fires to flooding, you couldn't make it up, heavy rain bringing new problems to Australia.

Well, it is a monumental day in Tehran, for the first time in eight years Iran's supreme leader expected to lead Friday prayers.

Now the weekly sermon is typically handed off to a cleric but today Ali Khamenei will speak to the Iranian people. This coming as the historic nuclear deal between world powers appears to be on life support.

Iran's president just announcing when it comes to uranium enrichment there are no limits, saying the country is producing uranium at a higher level than before it signed the nuclear agreement.

Now all of this as protests erupted after Iran's admission that it mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian passenger plane. All 176 people on board were killed.

To break all of this down, CNN journalist Ramin Mostaghim joins me now from Tehran. Ramin, first of all, when it comes to Friday prayers and the ayatollah delivering them, give us a sense of the moment on what this means.

RAMIN MOSTAGHIM, CNN JOURNALIST: It is very important in Iran and since eight years ago, he has not shown in a Friday prayer gathering, so when he comes it means important news will be unfolded and he is the most articulate, I mean, orator, I can say the most important orator and articulate with high eloquence in his speech among the top leaders.

Even the critic of Ayatollah Khamenei admit that he is the most articulate clergymen in Iran in post-revolutionary time. So, when he speaks, he sets the agenda for the coming weeks, the coming months, even the coming years.

And then once he made a speech, actually when he makes sermons in the form of prayers it means that he will be quoted (Ph) over and over by top and middle officials later on, even commoner in the streets, grassroots will quote him to elaborate their own ideas.

So, he is the agenda setter in Iran. And when he talks it means that everybody should listen and what he says as a sermon is a music through the ears of his devotee who are flooding to the grand mosque Musalla in Tehran.

Now as we are talking to and we are in the lamenting pre-sermon phase of the total orchestrated Friday prayer. Michael?

HOLMES: We will check in with you as this unfolds. Ramin, thank you. Ramin Mostaghim there in Tehran.

Let's get some more on all of this and turn to Soraya Lennie. She's an Australian-Iranian journalist who spent years covering the Middle East. Joining me now from Melbourne. Soraya, good to see you.

So, Khamenei leading players that does speak to the seriousness of the moment. What is your take on the significance? This is not the norm.

SORAYA LENNIE, AUSTRALIAN-IRANIAN JOURNALIST: Absolutely. The last time the supreme leader spoke was in 2012 and they were four things that were happening at that time. The Arab Spring, first of all had really transformed the Middle East the year prior.

It was -- there was also the upcoming anniversary of the Iranian Revolution and there were also planned protests from the Green reformist movement to protest against the House arrest of its leaders the year prior. And then, of course, tightening international sanctions and the threat of war over Iran's disputed nuclear programs.

So, I would say back then, there was significant domestic crisis and also international crisis and we are really seeing a repeat of that now where arguably Iran is really facing that same kind of situation, domestic pressure as well as external pressure.

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And certainly, a very dramatic escalation after the assassination of Soleimani, the accidental shooting down of the Ukrainian airliner as well. And the supreme leader really just comes out in the sorts of times of crisis, I think to show both leadership but also in this situation when people have been -- some people have been calling for his resignation over the handling of that shooting down of the Ukrainian plane. And the fact that Iranian authorities did not come clean on what really happened for three days. So, I think there is also an opportunity for the supreme leader to push his view forward.

HOLMES: Yes. If he does present the image of a unified Iran, one nation together, would that be an accurate representation?

LENNIE: I would say absolutely not. Iran is a nation of 80 million people. It's a fractured country, people have very different views just like any country anywhere else. But certainly, the recent events the November protest were arguably hundreds of people were killed that shocked even some government supporters.

So, there was a lot of disillusionment as well, and particularly after the shooting down of that Ukrainian plane. I think we are seeing a very divided Iran and a country that was only very united briefly for about five days after the assassination of Soleimani.

HOLMES: Right.

LENNIE: What we are seeing now I think is back to the status quo.

HOLMES: And it is interesting too, you know, you have those protests over fuel prices and dozens and dozens of people were killed. We've had protests in recent days after the shooting down of that plane. And it speaks to this.

You've got parliamentary elections coming up in Iran in February. When it comes to the voice of the people, what's been happening in terms of reformers and moderates for those elections?

LENNIE: Well, that's a very good question. Because we saw in 2016 the reformists and moderates probably won about half of those seats, independent candidates made up probably another quarter, for example.

However, the guardian council which has the power to vet candidates has really vetoed and rejected a number of moderate and reformist candidates for these upcoming parliamentary elections including some very high-profile people like Ali Motahari.

The president himself has responded by saying this is not how you run an election. It's not diversity. And this is basically just going to create a large population of the opposition. So, you can see that divisions within Iran and also a lot of pressure on the president from hard-liners.

So, what we are looking at basically is probably a very low outcome turnout for the parliamentary elections. And one reformist has predicted that hard-liners were probably win around two-thirds of the seats in parliament.

HOLMES: Yes. The people on the streets, they want some democracy I'm sure. That is going to be interesting to see how that plays out.

Always good to get your voice, Soraya Lennie. Thanks so much in Melbourne. All right, to China now, with just reported its weakest annual growth

in 29 years. The world's second biggest economy grew 6.1 percent in 2019 as it fought a trade war of course with the U.S. and was not over by the way.

It's down from 2018 but in line with expectations in many ways. Beijing has also been dealing with rising debt and cooling domestic demand but the announcement follows the signing this week of the first phase of a new deal with the U.S.

We'll take a quick break. When we come back, allegations of a U.S. ambassador under surveillance in Ukraine. They don't raise a peep out of the U.S. State department or the nation's chief diplomat. Ukraine though not silent about it. We'll have the details ahead.

Also, rain in Australia's fire ravaged states bringing some relief but also that flooding. We'll have the latest in the bush fire crisis down under. We'll be right back.

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HOLMES: Welcome back.

The U.S. Senate has formally launched an impeachment trial of the president for only the third time in American history.

President Trump continuing to denounce his impeachment as a hoax and predicts his trial will finish quickly. He is counting on rock-solid support from Senate Republicans to prevent his removal from office despite disturbing new information that seems to undermine his entire defense.

Among that evidence, the U.S. government watchdog now determining the Trump White House broke the law in withholding U.S. military aid to Ukraine which of course is at the heart of his impeachment.

We got the latest now from CNN's Phil Mattingly.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is now the Senate's job, the idea of whether or not to vote to remove the president of United States. It started on Thursday with a procession of the seven House Democratic impeachment managers walking over those two articles of impeachment.

And what followed was something that at least as it pertains to United States president has only been seen two times prior to today on the United States Senate floor.

Take a watch.

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MICHAEL STENGER, SERGEANT AT ARMS, UNITED STATES SENATE: Hear ye, hear ye, hear, ye. All persons are commanded to keep silent on pain of imprisonment, while the House of Representatives is exhibiting to the Senate of the United States articles of impeachment against Donald John Trump, President of the United States.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The managers on the part of the House will now proceed.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): Donald J. Trump, President of the United States is impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors. With the permission of the Senate, I will now read the articles of impeachment.

President Trump used the powers of the presidency in a manner that compromise the national security of the United States, and undermined the integrity of the United States democratic process.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MAJORITY LEADER: The presiding officer will now administer the oath to John G. Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States.

JOHN ROBERTS, CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE UNITED STATES: I am now prepared to take the oath.

CHUCK GRASSLEY, PRESIDENT PRO TEMPORE, UNITED STATES SENATE: Will you place your left hand on the bible and raise your right hand?

Do you solemnly swear that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of Donald John Trump, President of the United States, now pending, you will do impartial justice, according to the Constitution and the laws, so help you God?

ROBERTS: I do.

GRASSLEY: God bless you.

ROBERTS: With all senators now stand or remain standing and raise their right hand?

Do you solemnly swear that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of Donald John Trump, President of the United States, now pending, you will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws, so help you God?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: And it quickly kind of lay out what's going to happen next. You're not going to see the senators on the Senate floor for the trial again until Tuesday at 1 p.m.

But in the meantime, stuff will be happening behind the scenes. The president has now officially been summoned for that trial. The response from the White House defense team will come this weekend. Also, both the House managers and the White House defense team will have to file briefs in responses to those briefs over the course of the next several days.

And when senators return on Tuesday, they will be debating and voting on the initial rules and structure of the trial. The expectation at this point in time is it will essentially be presentations from both sides, each lasting 24 hours over the course of a couple days, then questions from senators for the course of 16 hours.

Now that is a resolution that's been drafted or still being drafted by Senator majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Democrats have made clear they are unhappy with that, would like to vote against it and likely will offer amendments to it in the initial stage of the process. So there should be votes. It could get interesting early.

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But the big question that is still outstanding for everybody is, will there be enough votes at some point in the trial likely after the presentations consider the questions to subpoena witnesses and documents.

At this point in time, Democrats have made clear that is what they are focused on. They will need four Republicans to join the 47 Democrats to be able to make that a reality. Still waiting to see where those Republicans come down.

Senator Susan Collins putting out a statement last night making clear that she is open to the idea but has not decided on any specific witnesses, and is only open to it after those initial presentations, which rounds counter to what Democrats want, at least at the start of the trial.

So, basically, we are going to have and see like before a couple of weeks to get the answer at least to the question of witnesses and documents.

HOLMES: Phil Mattingly reporting there.

Now one of the key figures who has emerged in the Ukraine scandal is Lev Parnas, an associate of President Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani. Now among the many documents Parnas has given to Congress is the disturbing suggestion that Marie Yovanovitch was under surveillance while she was a U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.

The U.S. State Department has been silent, but Ukraine sounding the alarm and says it will investigate to find out what happened on its soil.

CNN's Nina Dos Santos covering this for us. Nina, good to see you. Tell us more about the investigation. It could be embarrassing for the U.S. president, depending on what it finds, and it could be awkward for the Ukrainians.

NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It could indeed, this is a really difficult time for both countries. Ukraine's interior minister deciding to open this investigation yesterday appealing to the FBI to cooperate with it here. Because it wants to see whether or not there were any infringement of domestic Ukrainian law and also any infractions vis-a-vis, international law as well.

Because, remember, Michael, since 1961 international diplomats have been protected when they go about their day to day activities, protected from things like surveillance and harassment. As per the Vienna convection, and one of the big signatories of that convention was of course the United States.

Why is all of this important? Well, because earlier this week that series of text messages you referred to there between Lev Parnas and a man named Robert F. Hyde who is a GOP donor who was planning on running for Congress later on this year on a Republican ticket emerged.

And during this series of exchanges between the two men, it appeared as though they were suggesting that they had somebody monitoring the serving U.S. ambassador to Kiev's whereabouts as she was going about her daily diplomacy in the Ukrainian capital.

Now obviously Ukraine is such a sensitive country. At the moment it is still technically at war with Russia. It has a hot border in the east. Part of its territory has been annexed. And it's also an important energy transit country at a time when energy contracts are being renegotiated. And of course, the United States is becoming a bigger player in the liquefied natural gas export market as well.

As you mentioned, the State Department has not yet commented on this. We do know that Robert F. Hyde has gone on some media outlets to claim that well, this is basically just boy's banter, he's never been to Ukraine and he denied the suggestions.

In a statement in opening this investigation it's interesting to note that the Ukrainian interior ministry was very keen to walk this fine line of diplomacy to hedge its best politically in America by saying it didn't want to get involved in diplomatic tit-for-tat.

And it was also keeping an open mind, suggesting that maybe this could also be just bravado and a fake conversation between the two citizens. But this investigation as per this week will proceed in Ukraine with the cooperation of the FBI. Michael?

HOLMES: All right. Nina, thank you. Nina Dos Santos there on duty in London for us.

Let's turn now to Michael Bociurkiw. He is a global affairs analyst for CNN and a former spokesperson for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Good to see you, my friend. You are also the author of what is on the screen now. Your opinion piece at CNN.com, Trump can't dodge the GAO report bombshell about withholding aid from Ukraine

Plenty to talk about as you join us from London. Let us start with Ukraine's announcement that it is investigating the surveillance of Marie Yovanovitch and also the Burisma hacking. That investigation could hurt Trump. I mean, how has this all unfolded in Ukraine at the top level? What sort of investigation could they conduct?

MICHAEL BOCIURKIW, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Good to be with you, Michael. Well, look, I guess on the one hand, Donald Trump did get his Ukraine

investigation but I guess not exactly what he was expecting, it could turn up dirt if not on him on some of the allies in his circle. But I think once again, Michael, this is one of the things that Ukraine does not want to do.

I spoke yesterday here in London with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister Prystaiko and the clear, clear kind of sense I got with him is that here we go once again, Ukraine's name is being smeared. But they are -- they -- he did say that look, this fellow Parnas is a big shady. These are still allegations but if we find something, we will pursue it.

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So, it remains to be seen. But once again, they want nothing more than to stay out of this whole political drama that's unfolding in Washington.

HOLMES: There was something that you picked up on earlier, which is Lev Parnas making the allegations that the quid pro quo wasn't perhaps just for Volodymyr Zelensky but also maybe for the former president, Poroshenko that if he announced the Biden investigation, Trump would back him in the election. That -- what did you make of that?

BOCIURKIW: I couldn't believe it. I mean, this is a bombshell, Michael, if true. So last November, the Halifax International Security Forum, Poroshenko was there in Canada and he was asked point blank, were you shaken down? Was there a quid pro quo kind of threat put your way? And he said, absolutely not.

But Lev Parnas talking to your colleague, Anderson Cooper yesterday said, well, that was indeed the first quid pro quo kind of approach. It was to Petro Poroshenko who was in a very, very tight race at the time against Volodymyr Zelensky.

Apparently, Poroshenko didn't go for it and then they of course they switched the tension to Zelensky -- and we have the situation which we have today. So, what a drama, I don't think anyone could -- anyone in Hollywood could think (Ph) such a thing.

HOLMES: Extraordinary. Before I let you go, I do want to ask you about the shooting down of the Ukrainian passenger plane. I know that you are in touch as you always are with folks in Ukraine but also in your homeland Canada. You're also in Europe with some of the victims came from.

What concerns are there generally about the investigation, the progress of it and the transparency of it?

BOCIURKIW Right. Well, the five ministers of the so-called grieving nations were here yesterday and they had a press conference. I think, we came away from that, Michael, with the impression that they are frustrated with the lack of progress by the Iranian authorities. But they are going to press as much as they can. First of all, for a very thorough and transparent international

investigation. But the other thing there they want of course is the quick repatriation of those bodies to loved ones.

There was very quickly one question from me actually yesterday to the foreign ministers and that was, what accounted for that one-hour delay of that UAE plane before it took off from Tehran? And it does appear more and more that there was a difficultly with matching some of the baggage with passengers that might have left the airplane.

I think they are going to be more questions asked, but a little bit -- a few more questions over what is a very, very big tragedy for people around the world.

HOLMES: All right. Michael Bociurkiw there in London for us. I appreciate it. Good to see you, my friend.

BOCIURKIW: Thank you.

HOLMES: All right, we'll take a short break. When we come back, Australians get a break as heavy rain falls fire-stricken areas but the downpour also causing flooding in places. More on that when we come back.

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HOLMES: More severe thunderstorms drenching parts of Australia. That's good news really in that it helps firefighters with those massive bush fires but then you get what you see on your screen there. Flash flooding in some areas.

This is the Reptile Park in Somersby, New South Wales. They had to close because of the flooding, water was above the fence line in some parts of the park and you don't want that when those guys are there.

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They say it hasn't been this flooding in more than 15 years. State authorities say there are 82 fires still burning. More than 30 yet to be contained.

Meteorologist Derek Van Dam is here with more on what is happening in Australia. And the funny I did see another photograph of that that park. The water was within that much of the top of the fence and the croc was in its enclose on the other side.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: I was thinking, if I had a dollar for every time, I had to shoo a crocodile away. With a broom.

HOLMES: You'd be poor.

VAN DAM: Exactly. That's amazing footage. I actually saw some of those zookeepers there who were taking koalas and rescuing them as well.

HOLMES: Yes. VAN DAM: Because the water came up so quickly. And they weren't alone with sights like that because the rain fell heavily across parts of New South Wales all along the coastline.

In fact, here's some other footage of a farm across the extreme northern sections of the state. And of course, this is what has been very dry parched arid bushfire ridden land. And of course, when you get too much of a good thing, the ying and yang the yang the balance of opposites. That rain is not easily absorbed into that hard-packed dry earth.

Since of course, it just kind of floats on top and creates a muddy mess, right, to say the least. And that's exactly what happened. So here is the radar currently right now across east coast of Australia, it continues to be wet from Brisbane southward into Sydney, Canberra as well as just outside of Melbourne there are some showers -- Victoria will see more rain set in over the next three to six days and I'll highlight that in just a moment.

But here's how much rain has fallen so far. We're talking about over 175 millimeters in some locations especially across the extreme northern sections of New South Wales. There is a rainfall totals going forward over the next week. Eventually that rain will start to shift into Victoria giving some relief into the hardest hit areas there as well.

You can see the northern territory also getting in on some of the rain. Interesting fact, 15 millimeters of rainfall can stop the spread of a bush fire but 50 millimeters of rain is actually needed to help extinguish the flames.

That's why the rural fire service still says about over 30 fires are still uncontained across New South Wales at the moment. Even though over the past 24 hours they have seen relief in the form of rain in across all of the burned areas that are ongoing. So that's good.

Much more needed rainfall and scenes like this across the Sydney International Airport. I told you that Melbourne will start to see rainfall, you can see it in the weekend starting off the work week then a dry slot on Tuesday but more rain starts to set in on Wednesday and Thursday as another cold front approaches.

Temperatures of course, a major factor for bush fires spread. And we have had cooler weather and humidity values start to increase across the coastline as we get that influence from the Tasman Sea. Over the next several days you can see the influence of the rainfall starting to pick up in that region. Anywhere from 50 to 150 millimeters of rain is not out of the realm of possibilities here. We need to see those numbers continue to pile up, but of course, too much of a good thing maybe in some places?

HOLMES: Yes. yes. Well, they need, what did you say, 50 millimeters to actually drench the fire?

VAN DAM: That's right.

HOLMES: Yes.

VAN DAM: That's what they need.

HOLMES: Derek Van Dam, they are telling us wrap it up so we better. Good to see you, my friend. Thanks for watching CNN Newsroom. I'm Michael Holmes. I'll have your headlines in a moment.

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