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British Government Puts Army On Standby Amid Panic Buying; Britain Facing Shortage Of Petrol Delivery Drivers; Parties Jockey For Power As Coalition Talks Begin; South Korea: North Korea Fires Presumed Short-Range Missile; Evacuated Afghan American Recounts Harrowing Escape; China Rations Energy To Cope With Power Shortages. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired September 28, 2021 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[23:59:53]
JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: Hello everyone, I'm John Vause. Ahead here on CNN NEWSROOM. Panic at the pumps with Brexit to blame. The military is now on standby to ensure petrol supplies across the U.K., just the latest shortage for independent global Britain, free of the shackles of the E.U.
[00:00:09]
VAUSE: (INAUDIBLE), no party emerges with a clear mandate after the weekend election in Germany and the post-Merkel era begins with an uncertain future.
After blowing off U.N. calls to end coal demands (PH) after failing to set a goal for reducing carbon emissions. Now, Australia's Prime Minister might snub a crucial gathering of world leaders focusing on climate change. Why is Australia so determined to be the global villain?
Winter is coming and it's looking to be a bleak Christmas for the U.K. Already this year, supply chains issues have caused shortages of everything from fast food, chicken to beer, milkshakes at McDonald's, candy and sweets. And what began with a small number of petrol stations out of fuel has ballooned into an outright crisis because of panic buying.
The U.K. does not have a shortage of petrol. The problem is someone has to drive the tanker to a petrol station, and Britain just doesn't have enough truck drivers.
One estimate says 100,000 extra drivers are needed, mostly because of Brexit and an end to the freedom of movement of labor, and the pandemic has made a bad situation worse. A dire warnings in recent weeks of a shortage of toys and Christmas trimmings.
CNN's Nina Dos Santos reports now from London.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here in the streets in a busy part of London, the local fuel station has just had its first delivery since Saturday, a relatively modest amount 40,000 liters. Normally, they only need three per week but they're now desperate to get one every single day.
And as you can see, within the last hour since the truck driver with that fuel has driven away, the cars in queues have been building up. They go back about three or four blocks. Many people who've been here say that they desperately need a tank of fuel to drive including delivery drivers, and also taxi drivers too.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obviously, we are very concerned extremely, it's my livelihood. And here, it's obviously a concern. The vast majority of our stations are out of fuel when I try. It's just lucky there's a tanker I see and I just pulled in here. But now, it's a massive problem.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think everyone else has probably gone in panic and then the rest of us who need it are a bit in a sticky situation.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been to maybe about five metro stations, none of them are open.
DOS SANTOS: So, what's the government doing? Well, it's agreed to use some visa restrictions to make 5,000 temporary visas available in the hope that they can tempt more heavy goods vehicle drivers over from Europe amid a shortage of about 100 to 120,000 drivers according to industry associations.
But they're also lessening competition rules so that fuel distributors are able to speak to each other and divert supplies to where they need it most like this.
But a lot of people say that now, perhaps it's time to make sure that some of the badly needed stocks of fuel are rationed for key workers at least in the temporary.
The government and also fuel distributors say that there is no national shortage of supply rather than what is causing seems like this is a dearth of drivers exacerbated by panic buyer.
Nina Dos Santos. CNN in London.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Catherine Rampell is a CNN Economics and Political Commentator. She's an opinion writer as well for The Washington Post and joins us this hour from our Bureau in Washington. Welcome back.
CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN ECONOMICS AND POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Great to be here.
OK, so the U.K. government is pleading right now to all motorists out there, please stop panic buying. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE EUSTICE, U.K. ENVIRONMENT MINISTER: We can only continue to reassure people that we have plenty of petrol both in storage coming out of those refineries as well.
And the only reason that we have an issue at the moment with some petrol stations not having petrol on the forecourts is that people are buying petrol when they don't need.
The most important thing everyone can do is just get back to normal, fill their cars up as they normally would, and not buy petrol less they needed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: That's not the only reason for this. Panic buying has probably has made a bad situation a lot worse. But there are a lot of other factors at play right now.
RAMPELL: Right, the reason why this entire crisis began is that there was a shortage of drivers, a shortage of tanker drivers. And that's both because the -- you know, for the same reason why we've had shortages of all sorts of other occupations in the U.K., in the U.S., around the world, the pandemic. As well as some factors unique to the U.K., particularly Brexit. There are all of these drivers, as well as people in other occupations who are E.U. nationals who have since left.
So, initially, there was a shortage of drivers. And as a result, there were some fuel stations that ran out of fuel and a few had to close down temporarily. It wasn't a crisis to begin with, of course, but people heard about it.
[00:05:03]
RAMPELL: And then, all of a sudden, you have lots and lots of consumers and businesses and others deciding, I've heard that there's a shortage, I don't want to be the only person or business or what have you to be without fuel. I better run out and refill my tank whether or not I actually need a refill right now.
And so, that panic buying basically fueled other panic buying. It -- there were new stories about it that self-reinforced the effort, the sort of consumer psychology that people had to run out and get more fuel. It's sort of like a bank run, or how last year there were -- there were runs on toilet paper, right, during the pandemic, because everybody decided at once that they absolutely needed to get petrol, otherwise, they would be the only ones left without.
VAUSE: I guess part of the reason why there was such a run on fuel is because there'd been shortages already in the -- in the U.K., be it from beer or whether it was food, you know, natural gas, that kind of stuff.
So, to address that problem, the U.K. government says it will offer 5,000 short term visas for foreign truck drivers. It's one way to alleviate the supply chain problems you like. But it seems most drivers are reluctant to take those three-month long visas.
And then, you have the fuel distribution problems. This is a statement from the -- from the government. British Army tanker drivers will be brought to a state of readiness in order to be deployed if required to deliver fuel to where it is needed most and providing further reassurance that fuel supplies remain strong.
According to some reports, the number of Army drivers on standby is 150, which is clearly not going to end this crisis. You know, the whole thing just reeks of smoke and mirrors. So, at this point, what will bring the fuel shortages to an end?
RAMPELL: Well, some of it has to be that consumers do lay off, right? And that will happen naturally in due course as prices rise as they have done. And people say maybe I'm going to sit this one out, I don't absolutely need to fill up my tank. So, I won't.
And you -- as that happens, as demand diminishes and supply eventually comes back online in part because of these temporary visas but also just because there are other drivers around, supply and demand will even out and will go back to something like normal if not exactly normal.
But it's just going to -- the panic is going to have to work its way out of the system, partly driven by prices and partly driven by this kind of half measures that the U.K. government has been taking.
VAUSE: Yes, the funny thing is that, you know, while this is sort of fuel shortage (INAUDIBLE) across Europe, it's not as if the British government did not know that this in fact was coming. Their own pre- Brexit planning was called Operation Yellowhammer, predicted a significant rise in the cost of electricity, for example, predicted shortages of certain types of food. It predicted it would be all made worse during the run up to Christmas.
So, it does beg the question why have they been caught so unprepared to deal with this right now?
RAMPELL: That's an excellent question. I mean, there were a number of supply chain disruptions that were anticipated again as a result of Brexit that have been exacerbated by the pandemic because the pandemic has wrought havoc on basically every industry and supply chain.
If they weren't anticipating it before, they should have been anticipating it in the -- in the wake of these, you know, worldwide obstructions of supply chains.
But it seems that the U.K. government was caught flat footed, somewhat, didn't get these visas out in time, could have done so but chose not to.
I mean, Brexit after all, was motivated by a somewhat, by -- you know, an aversion toward temporary workers, towards granting visas to E.U. nationals.
So, I can understand why there might have been some political resistance to do what was necessary to head off these problems but without heading them off, they were going to happen and here we are.
VAUSE: And here we are, winter is coming perhaps. Catherine Rampell, thank you.
RAMPELL: Thank you.
VAUSE: And now in Germany, the political horse trading begins like never before, after the results from a national election like never before.
The most likely contender for Chancellor is Finance Minister Olaf Scholz leading his left leaning Social Democratic Party to merge on top. If he is to be the next Chancellor, first, he has to make a deal to form a coalition government. That means wrangling together three very diverse parties. Complicating the outcome even further, the conservative run up and Chancellor Angela Merkel's pick to succeed her is trying to do the exact same thing.
Merkel will remain in power until the new government is formed. But after nearly 16 years with her in the top job, there are big questions about what her departure will be for Germany's future at home and abroad.
On Monday, Scholz addressed those concerns while speaking to CNN's Frederik Pleitgen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: If you do manage to form a coalition and become the chancellor, how do you intend to fill those big shoes?
OLAF SCHOLZ, SPD CANDIDATE FOR GERMAN CHANCELLOR: I think the first topic for German politics will be to form a stronger and more sovereign European Union and making this happen will have an influence on the international strategy and the foreign policy of Germany.
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PLEITGEN: What sort of a partner will Germany be for the United States in NATO and on the international stage, especially as the Biden administration continues to challenge China?
SCHOLZ: Subtrends (PH) of lending partnerships is of essence for us in Germany and for a government that will be led by me. And so, you can rely on the continuity in this costume.
It is important that we understand ourselves as democracies and that we see that in the world that becomes more dangerous, it is important that we work together, even if we do have conflicts in one or the other costumes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: CNN's European Affairs Commentator, Dominic Thomas joins us now from Berlin. Dominic, thank you for being with us. DOMINIC THOMAS, CNN EUROPEAN AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Thanks for having
me, John.
VAUSE: OK, so Olaf Scholz and his Social Democrats emerge from the election with this narrow list of leads, but also a very calm optimism about forming a new government, here he is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHOLZ: My idea is that we will be very fast in getting a result for this government and it should be before Christmas, if possible.
On the other hand, you should note Germany always has coalition governments, and it was always stable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Yes, they have coalition governments. But the reality is this election ended without the typical building blocks for a coalition. Normally one very strong party with a junior partner that's been upended by a vote which returned for sort of medium sized parties if you like.
So, what does that now say about German politics and what does it say about where Germany is right now as a country?
THOMAS: Yes, well, it tells us where Angela Merkel is, and she can't wait for Christmas and that may be optimistic.
But clearly, the era of the sort of major two parties coming together to form coalitions are over. In 2005 when Merkel first became chancellor, she had a 70 percent coalition with the SPD. And this time around, it is most likely going to take three parties just to be able to scrape by with a thin majority.
I think what's interesting in the past and over the -- over the past 16-year period is that many people voted with the CDU knowing that Merkel would be the chancellor.
And what we saw in this election, and it started in 2017 when the erosion of these major parties is people are voting for parties before actual leaders.
And so, Germany has changed a lot in this 16-year period. We saw this time around the linker, the outgrowth far left party from the former GDR on the verge of extinction, the AfD hovering with about 10 percent with lingering issues there.
But what we really saw was that the conservative CDU brand has failed to renew itself, and that we essentially now have a center-left leaning Germany, in which the three parties that will be working for the coalition increase their votes by 12 percent, which is going to translate into a fairly substantial change in the Bundestag, with about a hundred more votes for that party.
So, those are the most significant changes at the moment. VAUSE: And two smaller parties are likely to pay the role of kingmaker, deciding who will be the next Chancellor, one of those parties is The Greens. This is their party leader, listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNALENA BAERBOCK, GREEN PARTY CO-LEADER (through translator): We have made it clear that we want a real awakening, we want a real renewal, and each party must now decide for themselves what it wants to bring to the next government. And this will be the result of the coming days.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: You know, it seems putting together a coalition will be complicated enough but keeping that coalition together and working as a government will be a bit like playing multi-dimensional chess.
THOMAS: You're absolutely right, John, it's going to be challenging. I mean, clearly, there are, you know, important priorities for them. And the important priorities really are, even though Olaf Scholz is talking about the European Union, that really is to move towards a more Germany and German infrastructure concerns with clearly and with points of coalition around climate, infrastructure development, schools, digitization, and so on.
But there's going to be a level of fragility. I do think, though, that after 16 years of essentially a CDU led government, these individual parties realized that they have an opportunity here, and they're eager to get into power, and they're eager to be able to push their agendas.
And it's clear that from this election that the CDU defections were all in the direction of the SPD Greens and FDP. And so, it now stands for them. They have this responsibility to take this forward and to try and find ways of working together.
VAUSE: Britain's The Times newspaper put the election results like this, Germany's future will come down to a love triangle involving three ill-fitting groups in the Bundestag.
What then goes on to lay out the various alternatives depending on what the coalition looks like from a wealth tax and massive increase in government debt to tax cuts, as well as slashing regulations.
[00:15:02]
VAUSE: How much harder will it be to keep the promise that both front runners made to be chancellor and to lead like Merkel with this dependability and consistency and with that sort of environment?
THOMAS: Yes, I mean, look, I think that you have to put this in context. It's interesting that you bring up the U.K. Example, I would add the French example in there. Two systems in which the process of identifying a prime minister and the president do not work along proportionality as they do in Germany. So, you could say that the U.K. Parliament, I mean, you're either in
power, and you're in opposition. And we see this opposition with all of these parties that feel under represented.
And what's extraordinary about the French system is that when Emmanuel Macron became president, in the first round, he only scored 24 percent, which is what the CDU ended up with this time around, yet, he ultimately went on to become president.
I think that what these parties have to realize is they need to be very careful about what they wish for. We know that in the second Merkel administration, the FDP were in the coalition.
By the end of those four years, these junior partners ended up not even getting up to the five percent threshold to get positions in Parliament.
So, the big challenge ahead here is that these individual groups and parties are essentially answerable to their electorate. They're answerable to the folks that got them the adequate percentages to be there in this coalition.
And yet, as leaders now, they need to rewire and find ways of working in government together, which is very different, while nevertheless knowing that the electoral landscape in Germany is highly volatile and that in four years' time, they're going to be answerable to those people again.
And so, it introduces a level of precariousness and volatility, which we haven't seen in German politics. unlike in the politics of proportionality that we see in Italy or in the Netherlands as other examples.
VAUSE: Yes, Israel with a very similar system where they seem to be changing government, what, four times in five years or going two years, rather.
Dominic, thank you. Dominic Thomas in Berlin, appreciate it.
THOMAS: Thank you.
VAUSE: The South Korean defense ministry says North Korea has launched what's believed to be a short-range missile, which landed off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula.
CNN's Will Ripley tracking developments live this hour from Taipei. What to make of the timing here, the launch came just before the North U.N. envoy addressed the General Assembly.
WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: About 20 minutes before Ambassador Kim Song spoke at the UNGA you have this early morning launch 6:40 a.m. local time. The speech began just after 7:00 a.m. local time.
Did he know going into the speech that this was going to happen? It's probably unlikely to be honest, because they're two separate departments. But certainly, in Pyongyang on the North Korean side, they knew that
their representative would be speaking around this time, and what better way to make an impact than to launch a missile, listen to what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KIM SONG, NORTH KOREAN AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N. (through translator): Given the U.S. South Korean military alliances increased military threats against the DPRK, nobody can deny the righteous right to self- defense for North Korea to develop tests, manufacture and purchase the weapon systems, equivalent to the ones which are possessed or being developed by them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RIPLEY: This particular launch was from Chagang province. It's a mountainous region that straddles the border with China. And noteworthy because back in 2017, it's where they launched an ICBM.
This is not an ICBM, the Japanese government did call it a ballistic missile which would be a violation of, you know, multiple U.N. restrictions against North Korea launching ballistic missiles and conducting nuclear tests.
But this is their third test just this month. They had back on, you know, mid-month they had a simultaneous day where they launched a ballistic missile from a train and in South Korea, launched ballistic missile from a submarine.
South Korea happens to be putting one of those submarines in the water today. So, there's a lot of factors that could be behind this.
Interesting though, John, that North Korea continues to talk about diplomacy with the South. You had Kim Yo-Jong, the sister of Kim Jong- un talking about the possibility of reopening the Inter-Korean Liaison Office that she ordered blown up, and also maybe talking about another inter-Korean summit.
Normally, North Korea likes to ratchet up the tensions before they start talking about diplomacy. So, let's see what happens.
VAUSE: We wait, we watch. Will Ripley in Taipei, thank you.
When we come back, a terrifying tale of American stuck in Afghanistan when the Taliban took over. The story of how she made her way to safety in just a moment.
Also, a lockdown is ordered in parts of the Canary Islands as lava from an erupting volcano approaches the ocean, details next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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VAUSE: Good morning to the Canary Islands where it's just gone 5:31 a.m. and this is the scene right now on Spain's La Palma island as the volcano there continues to spew ash and lava but has now ended what could be a dangerous new stage.
Residents on the east shore of the island were ordered into lockdown Monday, as lava nears the ocean. Experts warned that when the melted rock hits the Atlantic, it could be explosive with enough force to shatter windows.
On top of that, there could also be plumes of toxic smoke. Thousands have been evacuated so far, but many flights have been canceled because of the volcanic ash.
Well, you can expect (INAUDIBLE) tough questions in just a few hours when top U.S. military leaders go before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
It's the first time Congress has gotten to publicly question the Defense Secretary and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs about the withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The leader of U.S. Central Command who oversaw the evacuation from Kabul will also be testifying. In addition to the chaotic withdrawal, they're likely to be asked about the mistake of drone strike, which killed 10 civilians, including seven children.
The Afghan evacuation may have looked chaotic while it was happening but we're now hearing some -- from some of the evacuees rather about how challenging it was just to get out.
CNN's Alex Marquardt spoke to one woman about the operation that brought her to safety.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHAQAIQ BIRASHK, EVACUATED AFGHAN AMERICAN: You guys look, no more flag
ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: As the Taliban took over Afghanistan's capital, Shaqaiq Birashk was filming their fighters from her balcony.
BIRASHK: OK, so, they are here, trying to get into that person's house to --
MARQUARDT: She was in a high rise overlooking downtown Kabul as American and NATO forces were desperately trying to evacuate people just like her. An Afghan American who worked for the Afghan government and on a U.S. funded project. Birashk was born in Afghanistan and moved to the U.S. at 13 years old. She returned as an adult spending most of the past four years working with local organizations.
Now, she's back in Denver after taking part in one of the most secretive operations in the entire evacuation, which a U.S. official tells CNN was in part run by the CIA.
BIRASHK: The airport was absolute chaos. It was -- it was as if we would have had to gone through a Death Valley in order to make it and survive.
MARQUARDT: Birashk was in her apartment when she got a call from an American.
BIRASHK: And I said, who is this? He said, I'm a government -- U.S. government official.
MARQUARDT: No details about who he worked for?
BIRASHK: No details. No, nothing at all.
MARQUARDT: The American wanted Birashk to leave. But she said she wanted to bring Afghans with her.
BIRASHK: He said, well, my priority is you. I understand that you're -- you feel this responsibility towards the people that you have worked with but unfortunately, my priority is you.
MARQUARDT: Hours later, she changed her mind after a friend who was evacuated convinced her.
BIRASHK: I got my passport and then, I just head downstairs.
MARQUARDT: A driver in a Toyota Corolla picked her up but they didn't know exactly where to go.
Just tell me where you are and I will help, the American texted. Birashk shared her location as they drove through the dark and Taliban checkpoints.
BIRASHK: The Taliban members came and just smacked the front of the car and you know, kind of waved at us and said, don't move stop here and then, our driver was like I'm not going to listen to him.
MARQUARDT: The American official was tracking them. I see you, he texted. Just follow the road until you see a gas station, then you will see my guys.
[00:25:02]
BIRASHK: I wasn't scared because I wasn't -- I didn't have the time to be scared. I had no -- being scared was not an option.
MARQUARDT: They went the wrong way. The American texted, you missed the left turn.
Around midnight, they finally arrived at Eagle Base, a CIA base just east of Kabul located by the New York Times where helicopters were ferrying people inside to the airport.
Birashk was met by Afghan Special Forces. And then, Americans, including the American guiding her.
BIRASHK: I've mentioned his name and I said, is that you? He said, yes, that's me. And then there was a sigh of relief at that point that I knew that we have made it. You know, there's no more checkpoints. MARQUARDT: On the base, their phones were taken away. They were asked not to reveal the base's location. The next day, they were flown to Kabul airport, and out of the country to safety.
What do your friends and colleagues who are still in Kabul, still in Afghanistan, telling you about what they think the future is going to look like?
BIRASHK: They continuously say, life -- Afghanistan is now a body without a soul. Seeing the way that everything that they had worked for the past 20 years has been just shattered in front of their own eyes, the promises of the international community never leaving them behind. And now, they're left with nothing.
MARQUARDT: Birashk says she and others like her are now suffering from significant survivor's guilt.
BIRASHK: To this day, I'm still processing the information and processing the reality on the ground. It just feels like it's a ongoing nightmare that you know, I haven't been woken up from.
MARQUARDT (on camera): Birashk tells me that she feels blessed and privileged to have been evacuated the way that she was, as she says without a scratch. She knows that that is not the case for so many who were evacuated from the airport, and many more who are still trying to get out of Afghanistan.
The State Department said on Monday that there are around 100 American citizens and legal permanent residents who are ready to leave.
The biggest obstacle a senior State Department official says is the unpredictability of who the Taliban will allow to leave.
Alex Marquardt, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Still to come, across China they're feeling the pinch from a power supply crunch. A crunch which could soon be felt worldwide.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VAUSE: Welcome back, everyone, I'm John Vause. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
China is facing a power supply crisis with widespread rationing of electricity, plunging industry into chaos, and residents in the north into the cold and dark with reports of rolling blackouts. The power cuts threaten to further slow an already slowing economy.
CNN's Steven Jiang live this hour for us in Beijing.
How much of this shortage is due to record high energy costs? And how much does this have to do with a push to move away from carbon-based fuel to reduce emissions? STEVEN JIANG, CNN BEIJING BUREAU CHIEF: Well, John, this is actually a perfect storm brewing because on the demand side you have surge in demand for electricity because of China's export and industry-driven economic recovery after the pandemic, especially involving some low- end manufacturing that happened to be power hungry.
[00:30:21]
On the supply end, you have many Chinese power plants that are running at very thin margins, or even at the last, because of the skyrocketing coal prices. That obviously not helped by China's boycott of Australian coal due to geopolitical tensions.
And many of these power plants in China also don't have the able to set or raise power prices because of lagging market reforms.
And then, of course, you have local authorities, as you mentioned, rushing to meet their annual carbon emissions reduction goal, because now President Xi Jinping has made this a top priority in terms of peaking Chinese carbon emissions before the year 2030. So now you start to see a lot of political campaign-style efforts to reduce energy consumption towards the year end.
So all of these factors combined, of course, leading to this almost unthinkable scenario of the world's emergent super powers, running out of power -- John.
VAUSE: Yes, Steven, a perfect storm, indeed. Thank you. Steven Jiang, live for us in Beijing.
Well, a surge in global demand for coal has sent prices to a record high this month. And while Australian coal imports have effectively been banned in China, Australian producers have had little trouble finding new markets.
No country in the world earns more from exporting coal than Australia, and Canberra has boasted exports will continue way beyond 2030, despite calls from the U.N. and environmentalists to end those exports, as part of a global effort to mitigate the effects of climate change.
In fact, it seems Australia's prime minister has little interest in discussing the climate emergency, indicating he might snub a crucial meeting of world leaders in November. Scott Morrison says he wants to focus on restarting Australia's economy after an extended pandemic lockdown.
His actions, though, would be significant, given more than 100 leaders, including the U.S. president, Joe Biden, have confirmed they will be at COP26 in Glasgow.
Will Steffen is an expert on climate science. He's an emeritus professor at the Australian National University. He sits on the Climate Council of Australia. He joins us this hour from Canberra.
Welcome back. Good to see you. WILL STEFFEN, COUNCILOR, CLIMATE COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIA: Thank you.
VAUSE: OK. So apart from not wanting to be on the receiving end of, you know, getting a hard time from other world leaders, if the Australian prime minister does snub COP26, what does that mean in a practical sense?
STEFFEN: Well, I think it means that Australia won't hear the strong message, or I should say Australia's leader won't hear the strong message that he should get from the rest of the world, that this is a global problem, that we're all expected to do our fair share.
Australia is a major player, as you pointed out, with our exports and imported. We would rank as the 5th or 6th biggest emitter on the planet. So we're a major player. He's the leader, the prime minister of this country. As you said, world leaders from around the planet are going to be here. I think it's his duty and his obligation to go there and represent us, as Australian (ph) (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
VAUSE: Well, Prime Minister Morrison told the West Australian newspaper, "I am bringing the government, and I hope the country, together on where we are seeking to go, and we are working through our commitments. We are working through our plans. A plan that gives people certainty about the big change that will occur over the next 20 to 30 years."
The Australians really want any reference to containing global warming to 1.5 degrees removed from a trade agreement with the U.K. The Australians boast about continuing coal exports beyond 2030. Australia's OK with not publicly stating a goal for cutting emissions. Is this where the Australian public's at?
STEFFEN: Nom it's not. And there's a big gap, I think, between the government -- an increasing gap between the government and the public.
When you look at other levels of jurisdiction in Australia -- I'm talking about state, territory and local -- there is much more action on climate change. We here in Canada have already reduced our emissions by more than 50 percent. We're 100 percent renewable. South Australia's moving.
And I think they are viewed as being very popular electorates by taking this form of action. I think there's a growing gulf between what the Australian public wants and how our prime minister is behaving.
VAUSE: So at that federal level, you know, they talk about their plans for reducing carbon emissions. What are their plans?
STEFFEN: They don't have any. They have a very weak emission reduction target by 2030. It's 26 to 28 percent on 2000 climate levels. But there are no plans. They're talking about new technologies and so on, but they're avoiding, completely avoiding the way we can get our emissions down rapidly at cost and with side benefits. And that's to go to renewable. We've got one of the best renewable resources on the planet, the best
in the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) world, and yet they shy away from making any commitment to any sort of target about the -- about the percentage of renewable we should have in our electricity system.
So they're totally avoiding the issue and just trying to put a lot of spin on it, and divert attention to other issues and so on.
VAUSE: What doesn't really add up here is that this is a country which is already seeing major impact from climate change. You just think back to the bush fires two years ago. Is it -- how can there be that disconnect between, you know, the federal government and reality?
[00:35:15]
STEFFEN: There's an enormous disconnect. And I think the disconnect is mainly due to two issues. One is political ideologies. It's unfortunately become a partisan political issue. It never should've been.
And the second thing, of course, is we have very large vested interests to make a lot of money in exporting coal and increasing gas. And also make a lot of money from our consumption of coal and gas domestically.
So there are very strong interests. You put back together with the Murdoch press, which you're familiar with in the U.S., and of course, that's a pretty toxic cocktail for national climate change.
VAUSE: Yes. Australia on the playbook. Will, thank you. Will Steffen.
STEFFEN: Yes, really (ph).
VAUSE: Appreciate your time, Will. Thank you.
STEFFEN: OK. No worries. Bey-bye.
VAUSE: Well, it's a dramatic fall for an R&B star. Coming up, after decades of accusation, a jury convicts R. Kelly of sex trafficking.
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VAUSE: More than 3,000 Haitians have been deported from the U.S. since September 19. The U.N. group says they've been returned to Port-au- Prince on repatriation flights.
The Biden administration is using a Trump-era public health order to remove migrants, mostly Haitians, who've arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The order gives officials power to turn them back and deny them any chance to seek asylum.
At the same time, the threat of deportation still exist for about 13,000 migrants who arrived in Del Rio. They're still in the United States as they face proceedings to see if they can stay. For many, a return to Haiti would be horrific. CNN's Melissa Bell
reports from Port-au-Prince on extreme gang violence, which is gripping the country.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MELISSA BELL, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Here, even church is no sanctuary. The blood still marks the steps of this Baptist church, in the very heart of Port-au-Prince.
As Sunday service began, an armed gang attacked, wounding several of the congregation and killing one man, who tried, but failed, to stop his wife from being kidnapped.
"Who will pay the ransom now?" asks Mary Yolandshil (ph), a human rights advocate who explains that nothing in Haiti is now sacred, and no one's safe.
"We are in peace nowhere," she says. "Not even in the president's house. He was executed, the most protected man in the country," she says, referring to the assassination of the Haitian president, Juvenal Moise, in July.
Jil (ph) says this kidnapping is at least the tenth in the Haitian capital since Tuesday, the very week that has seen thousands of deportees returned to Port-au-Prince. A city many had left in the years following the 2010 earthquake, fleeing both its poverty and insecurity. Now that is only getting worse.
[00:40:06]
BRUNO LEMARQUIS, U.N. DEPUTY SPECIAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE SECRETARY- GENERAL: Each time there is an uptick in the number of kidnappings, the authorities react by having more patrol in -- in the streets.
BELL (on camera): You can see, on the streets of Port-au-Prince, that increased police presence. And yet, as visible as it is intended to be, it doesn't seem to be doing much to reassure Haitians that it's safe to go out into the streets once again.
(voice-over): "It's like a boat on the ocean with no captain," says Jil (ph). "The country is left to its own devices. Gangs rule and keep gaining ground. So we are abandoned to our fate."
Since much of it was leveled in 2010, Port-au-Prince is a city that has struggled to stand up.
Now, gang violence has forced entire neighborhoods to flee what little they had, like the 219 families living inside this dilapidated school building, one of seven camps for internally displaced people, or IDP's, in the capital. Camps that are not designed to accommodate the returnees.
LOUBY GEORGES, INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR MIGRATION: Clashes between different gangs have really blown out of control. And so, you find persons like the IDPs that are here. They had to leave their permanent village or campsite, in which they were residing since the earthquake in 2010. So imagine that.
BELL: In all, the United Nations says that 20,000 people in Port-au- Prince have been displaced by gang violence in the last year. A homeland even more dangerous to those being deported by the United States this week than the one they fled.
Melissa Bell, CNN, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: R. Kelly faces 10 years and life in prison for his conviction on sex trafficking and racketeering. His prosecutors accused the R&B singular of using his celebrity to lure women and underage girls for sex. It happened for decades.
Forty-five witnesses testified, some saying he promised to help victims' careers before demanding obedience to his rules. They needed permission to eat or go to the bathroom.
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JACQUELYN KASULIS, ACTING U.S. ATTORNEY, EASTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: Today's guilty verdict forever brands R. Kelly as a predator, who used his fame and fortune to prey on the young, the vulnerable, and the voiceless for his own sexual gratification.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: The singer's hearing is set for May 4. R. Kelly's attorney said there will be an appeal.
Kelly faces additional charges, including child pornography, and criminal sexual abuse in the states of Illinois and Minnesota.
Well, plans for a children's version of Instagram, for kids under 13, now on hold. The announcement came amid growing opposition to the project. Child safety groups, lawmakers, 44 attorneys general all pointed to mental health and privacy concerns.
"The Wall Street Journal" recently reported on data showing the harmful effects Instagram has on teens, especially girls.
When it announced the new parent-managed version in July, Instagram said kids were already online, and this would reduce the incentive for them to lie about their age.
Well, that's not going to happen. Well, at least for now.
Thank you for watching CNN NEWSROOM. I'm John Vause. Please stay with us. WORLD SPORT starts after the break. I'll see you again, hopefully, at the top of the hour.
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(WORLD SPORT)
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VAUSE: Hello, everyone. I'm John Vause. Ahead here on CNN NEWSROOM, panic at the pumps, Brexit to blame. The military now on standby to ensure petrol supplies across the U.K.
