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U.S. House Approves $1.2 Trillion Infrastructure Bill; Ethiopian Prime Minister under Pressure as Rebel Fighters Advance; Diplomat Found Dead Believed to Be Russian Secret Agent; Europe COVID- 19 Cases and Hospitalizations Rise; Young Activists Demand More Action on Climate Crisis; ABBA's New Album. Aired 2-2:45a ET

Aired November 06, 2021 - 02:00   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 (voice-over): Hello, welcome to CNN NEWSROOM, everyone, appreciate your company, I'm Michael Holmes.

Coming up on the program, long negotiations, setbacks and delays but the U.S. President finally gets his $1.2 trillion bill on infrastructure.

A call for an immediate cease-fire, the U.N. and others raise concern about the humanitarian catastrophe, unfolding, in Ethiopia.

And, young people, take to the streets in Glasgow, demanding an end to empty words and calling for real action on climate change.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from CNN Center, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Michael Holmes.

HOLMES: Welcome, everyone.

U.S. President, Joe Biden, has scored a major win in Congress, with final passage of his $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On this vote, the yeas are 228 and the nays are 206. The motion is adopted.

HOLMES (voice-over): After the vote, Mr. Biden released a statement, calling it a, quote, "monumental step forward as a nation."

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HOLMES: Getting the bill through the House was an uphill struggle and passage was uncertain, even shortly before the vote was held. But late-night arm-twisting by the president got enough Democrats on board to make it happen. CNN's Jessica Dean with the details.

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JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Big news out of the U.S. House of Representatives tonight, as the bipartisan infrastructure bill makes it out of the House and is now heading to President Biden's desk for his signature.

So, a major part of his legislative agenda getting done. House Democrats getting it done with 13 House Republicans joining them in that vote. You did see six progressives who voted against this. But the bottom line is the bipartisan infrastructure bill will, now, become law.

It is a big victory for President Biden, who was really hoping and had to end up calling and trying to push this over the finish line multiple times. But really, today, when it really came down to it, we started the day with expected morning votes and something that would be rather quick.

And it did not turn out that way, just hours and hours on negotiations dragged on, as various factions of the party wanted different things. A handful of House moderates, holding out for a CBO score on the Build Back Better Act.

And then the Congressional Black Caucus, offering a compromise idea, to vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill and a procedural vote on the Build Back Better Act.

While progressives balked at that at the beginning but, in the end, everyone came around, with moderates offering up a statement, committing to voting for the Build Back Better Act by November 15th.

And then progressives, the chairwoman of the progressives saying, the bulk of them would vote for this, which is what ended up happening and that is how they were able to get to those magic numbers and get this bill to President Biden.

That heads to his desk to become law. And as for the Build Back Better Act, it now has to pass the House. It will then go to the Senate, where expected a ton of changes will be made.

We know a number of senators, including Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema and also senator Bernie Sanders and others want changes made to this. So, expect that also to be a long, drawn-out process, before it makes its way back to the House side -- Jessica Dean, CNN, Capitol Hill.

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HOLMES: President Biden was thrilled to get the hard-won victory, after the infrastructure measure passed, he released a statement, touting the achievement.

It read, in part, the bill, quote, "will create millions of jobs, turn the climate crisis into an opportunity and put us on a path to win the economic competition for the 21st century."

Let's take a closer look at what is in the bipartisan infrastructure package. It comes with a $1.2 trillion price tag and $110 billion of that is earmarked, for fixing up roads and bridges. It also includes $66 billion to overhaul passenger and freight rail; $55 billion will go toward upgrading water infrastructure and $65 billion will be spent on improving broadband internet access.

Earlier, our Phil Mattingly asked CNN political analyst Toluse Olorunnipa what this passage of the long-awaited bill, truly, means for the Biden administration.

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TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: It means $1.2 trillion that they can go out and campaign on. They're realizing that they need to have a message going into the midterms. What they saw earlier this week show that they did not have something strong to campaign on. Now, they do. They can point to some of the things that this bill will fund. You know, money for new buses, money for high-speed internet, money for high-speed rail, things that people will actually feel in their communities.

President Biden can say, I got this done. Not only did I get this done, but I got republican votes. I've got Republicans to support infrastructure. We saw President Trump announce infrastructure week after infrastructure week and he said he would be the dealmaker and chief and that didn't happen.

Now, Biden has a $1.2 trillion bill which is bigger than the stimulus bill that happened under Obama, bigger than most of the Trump economic agenda pieces except for the tax cuts, and bigger than any kind of infrastructure bill that we have seen in a generation.

So, Biden will be able to say that he has delivered on his promise, that he worked across the aisle, that he got something that both Republicans and Democrats voted for. Now, he still is going to have to work on the other part of his agenda and getting some of the progressives, the defected, getting them on board and making sure that he passes the second half of his agenda.

Getting this on his desk after the summer and the fall that he had from Afghanistan to the drama over this bill will definitely be a sigh of relief and a sign that he will be able to go into the midterms at least saying that he passed something, and his agenda has been put into motion.

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HOLMES: Now the United Nations is calling for an immediate cease-fire in Ethiopia as joint rebel fighters advance on the capital. The U.N. Security Council says it is deeply concerned over the expanding and intensifying military clashes.

Amnesty International warns the country is on the brink of a human rights and humanitarian catastrophe. This coming as Tigrayan forces have aligned themselves with eight other opposition groups in an attempt to remove prime minister Abiy Ahmed from power.

But the government claims it has little popular support.

Meanwhile, the U.S. State Department, warning Americans to leave Ethiopia as soon as possible. CNN's David McKenzie, with more, on a deepening crisis.

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DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's now a nationwide state of emergency in effect, across Ethiopia. That means adults can be conscripted to fight. The prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, has also called citizens to take up arms against the threat from two now aligned rebel groups that this week threatened the capital, Addis Ababa, to the surprise of many diplomats.

Now the OLA and the TBF say they have no plans to move onto the capital and they're trying to pressure Abiy to step down a year and a couple of days after the start of this conflict.

I put the question to the attorney general of the Ethiopian government, just what it would take to sit down with the TPLF.

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GEDION TIMOTHEWOS, ETHIOPIAN ATTORNEY GENERAL: At the very least, the TPLF has to withdraw from Amhara and Afar regions, where it's brutalizing innocent civilians. It has no business, none whatsoever, being in this part of the country.

And at the very least, it has to withdraw from this part of the country, and it has to renounce the violence and offensives that it has been engaging in.

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MCKENZIE: This week, the United Nations and an Ethiopian human rights group said, all sides of the conflict have committed atrocities that could amount to war crimes.

Still, hundreds of thousands of people in Tigray, are in desperate need of humanitarian help. In Washington, D.C., representatives of Ethiopian armed and political groups, banding together to say, they want to push out Prime Minister Abiy, but the government called this a publicity stunt.

The international community is asking for an immediate stop to the conflict, a U.S. special representative, the envoy of the Horn of Africa is in Addis Ababa. And he has the task of trying to de-escalate the situation -- David McKenzie, CNN, Johannesburg.

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HOLMES: Bronwyn Bruton is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's Africa Center, joining me now, from Washington.

And thanks for doing so.

And do you get any sense that the tide has shifted against Abby Ahmed?

Where do you see this headed?

BRONWYN BRUTON, SENIOR FELLOW, ATLANTIC COUNCIL'S AFRICA CENTER: I have to say, what I've heard over the last couple of days, more than anything, is a sense of Deja vu.

For the last year, it has been very clear that the TPLF, the Tigray People's Liberation Front, and the government forces have been, more or less evenly matched, in terms of military capability. And if anything, the government has often been on the back foot.

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BRUTON: They were surprised when the TPLF launched the war in the middle of the night, when the conventional assault, turned into an insurgency. They reacted to the invasions of Afar and Amhara and they are now reacting to TPLF threats to take the road that connect Addis Ababa to Djibouti and/or the TPLF's threats to take over the capital city.

Time and again, we have seen TPLF seize an advantage from the jaws of defeat. It appears that may be happening now.

But time and again, we've also seen the government recover. And, at the moment, what I am hearing is that the TPLF is, more or less encircled about 300 kilometers above Addis Ababa. They do not at this moment look capable of breaking free.

HOLMES: Do you feel that the global community has been even-handed on this?

The TPLF has itself been accused of diverting aid from the people to the war effort.

What should the outside world be doing?

BRUTON: I think it's been a great error on the part of the diplomatic community, to not be more evenhanded in apportioning blame. As I said, in much of this conflict, Abiy Ahmed has been reacting to TPLF aggression.

The TPLF, although we tend to frame it in terms of the victim of a conflict -- and, certainly, this small Tigrayan minority has been framed as a victim of this conflict -- they are a very powerful military force.

And very little has been done to put sanctions on them or to dissuade them from fighting. Even though they have massive amounts of money overseas, they would probably be more receptive to pressure than Abiy Ahmed is able to be, because of the strong support for the war within the Ethiopian population. HOLMES: Right. When it comes to the U.S., it has its representative in

the region, its envoy.

But what real leverage does the U.S. even have?

And how is the U.S. viewed generally in Ethiopia, given its past involvement and actions?

BRUTON: The U.S. supported the TPLF-led dictatorship for many years, at the expense of the Ethiopian public. So I think, suspicions, going into this conflict, were very high that the U.S. would maintain that posture and attempt to provide some support for the TPLF and even be receptive to its return to power.

I don't think that is an accurate read of U.S. intentions. But certainly, the U.S. has been one-sided in its criticism of the government and that has led to rising levels of hostility -- I would say that anti-U.S. sentiment is higher now than I've ever seen it in Ethiopia.

And of course, that makes it very difficult for U.S. intervention to be constructive.

HOLMES: And I'm curious what your thoughts are about the geopolitical implications of instability in Ethiopia.

What is the potential for destabilization in the wider Horn of Africa region?

BRUTON: I would never have expected Ethiopia's transition from dictatorship to democracy to be peaceful. And it's been messier that most of us thought that it would be.

And that has not been helped by the fact that, as Ethiopia's emerging from this conflict environment, that it is also building the Grand Renaissance Dam, which has, dramatically, increased tensions with Egypt.

The U.S. is a very important partner. So really, this is causing a lot of reverberations across the Horn of Africa in Sudan and Ethiopia. And I think one of the great challenges that the U.S. has is balancing, the conflict between these two 2 U.S. allies.

It's another area in which U.S. intervention has not been, particularly, helpful. So, I would say that the potential for continued instability, in Ethiopia, is significant, given that ethnic tensions are not restricted to Tigray.

But also, that Egypt is on the sidelines, poised to meddle, in any way it can and worsen the situation, if it sees some way to do so. But I think the situation is very worrying, indeed.

HOLMES: Absolutely. I appreciate your analysis. Bronwyn Bruton, thank you so much.

BRUTON: Thank you. (END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: German authorities, reportedly, believe that a diplomat found dead outside of an embassy in Berlin was a secret agent for Russia's FSB intelligence service. According to "Der Spiegel" magazine, the 35- year-old fell from an upper story of the Russian embassy building. But it is still not clear how he fell.

The Russian embassy didn't agree to an autopsy and the man's diplomatic immunity meant that Germany could not carry out an investigation.

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CHRISTOFER BURGER, SPOKESPERSON, GERMAN FOREIGN MINISTRY (through translator): I can say that the German foreign ministry is aware of the incident; however, for privacy reasons, I can't give any further details about the case.

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HOLMES: The Russian embassy released a statement on Friday, saying the diplomat's death was a tragic accident and speculation by Western media about the incident is, quote, "absolutely incorrect."

All right. Activists make their voices heard in Glasgow. Why many say the commitments made at COP26 just are not enough. That is when we come back.

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HOLMES (voice-over): Young activists marching through the streets of Glasgow, Friday, demanding stronger action on the climate crisis. A week into the COP26 summit, the focus is shifting to how the changing climate will impact future generations. And many young people say they have heard little so far, other than empty promises.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I believe there's some that are legal sentences that maybe would have (INAUDIBLE) but I believe that many of our leaders here are here for the show of being here. I don't think they actually care. I don't think it affects them enough (INAUDIBLE) here.

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HOLMES: On a farm in Italy, one man is doing his part to save the planet by saving his chickens from the slaughterhouse. Ben Wedeman with that story.

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BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Breakfast is served. It's the crack of dawn on Julio Apollonio's (ph) chicken farm in southern Italy, a project based on a simple concept: happy hens lay better eggs and happy hens are better for the environment.

"It's possible to produce," says Julia, "while not treating the animal as an object. It's possible to produce according to natural rhythms, respecting the environment."

Julio is a newcomer to the business. Until a few years ago, he ran a catering company. One weekend he visited an egg supplier and was shocked by the conditions.

"This project," he says, "is meant to demonstrate it's possible to produce an egg that is both ethical and ecosustainable."

Julio's chickens have been given a second lease on life. He buys them from egg factories, where hens are kept in cramped conditions, under artificial light and in steady temperatures to maximize egg production.

And when production drops, it's off to slaughter. And then the hens often end up as pet feed.

But not here.

[02:20:00]

WEDEMAN (voice-over): Around 6,000 hens and roosters are free to roam over three hectares, about 7.5 acres, scratching around, strutting and socializing to their heart's content.

And unlike most egg factories, male chicks aren't slaughtered after hatching. The presence of roosters, Julio says, is necessary for the flock's mental health.

The chickens live naturally and, when their time comes, they die naturally, as nature intended.

"For centuries, perhaps millennia, Easter was a holiday of the egg because it was Easter when you started to see the first eggs," says Julio.

"They were raised according to the rhythms of nature. Today, man is trying to force them to forget nature. But you can't force nature. For decades, we have tried to do that, creating natural disasters. But we are obliged to go back and respect it."

On this little patch of land, one man is trying to do exactly that. And that is something to crow about -- Ben Wedeman, CNN, Southern Italy.

(END VIDEOTAPE) HOLMES: Well, as Europe wrestles with a major surge in COVID cases, Italy says its situation is better, thanks to one controversial move by the government. We will have that, after the break.

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HOLMES: On the pandemic front, some encouraging news about an anti COVID pill developed by Pfizer. The company says the interim results of a trial showed that the drug was 89 percent effective in preventing in hospitalizations and deaths.

Unlike the vaccine, the pill would be given to people who are already infected, and they would take it at home. The pill, called Paxlovid, would be taken in combination with another antiviral, ritonavir.

Now Pfizer says, it will apply for emergency use authorization in the U.S., possibly as early as this month.

Now in Europe, Italy says its green pass is starting to make a difference in the fight against COVID-19. It's required to enter cinemas, stadia, workplaces and other sites. It proves that someone has been vaccinated, had a recent negative test or has recovered from the virus.

The number of new cases still growing in Italy but elsewhere on the continent, the situation is far worse. Fred Pleitgen reports.

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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Europe fully in the grip of another surge of COVID-19 as new cases and new hospitalizations spiral, leading to a dire warning from the World Health Organization.

DR. HANS KLUGE, WHO EUROPE: We could see another half a million COVID- 19 death in Europe, in central Asia by the 1st of February next year.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): 500,000 lives on the, line as the continent, again, is declared the epicenter of the pandemic. Europe has registered more than a 55 percent rise in new COVID-19 cases, in the last 4 weeks, alone.

The region is now home to more reported infections than Southeast Asia, the Eastern Mediterranean, Western Pacific and Africa combined, the WHO says.

The continent's largest economy, Germany, the latest country to break records for daily infections.

[02:25:00]

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Reporting over 37,000 new cases, in 24 hours. New records for daily infections were also seen in Greece, Slovakia, Croatia and Slovenia this week, serving as a dire warning for the rest of the world.

DR. MICHAEL RYAN, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: We only have to look at the roller coaster epidemiologic curve to know that, when you're coming down the mountain, you're usually about to go back up another one.

And the fact that Europe is climbing that mountain again should really stand everybody up, around the world, saying, what are we going to do?

PLEITGEN (voice-over): The biggest threat facing the region, uneven vaccine uptake, the WHO says. Despite administering over 1 billion doses, immunization rates differ, dramatically, between some Western European states and their former Communist bloc neighbors to the east, where the WHO says, a lack of trust is fueling vaccine hesitancy.

In Bulgaria, Romania and in Ukraine, hospitalizations and deaths are surging. But the percentage of the population fully vaccinated, remains stubbornly low.

The World Health Organization is again calling on wealthier countries, to share vaccine supplies but some European countries are trying to vaccinate their way out of this latest surge, with Greece and Germany announcing that they will make booster shots available to their entire population.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Booster shots after 6 months should become the norm, not the exception.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Bracing for a long winter, 23 countries in Europe and Central Asia have now tightened restrictions in the past two weeks. But as colder weather descends and hospital beds fill up, Europe's leaders fear, tough months lie ahead -- Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Berlin.

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HOLMES: U.S. secretary of state Antony Blinken says that he will convene a virtual meeting of his foreign counterparts next Wednesday to discuss the pandemic. Blinken says it will assess the current state of the global response to the virus as well as the threat of future pandemics. Vaccine equity and financing will also be discussed.

The top U.S. diplomat says the meeting aims to establish a platform for foreign ministers to talk regularly about health security.

Major climate protests are again expected to kick off in Glasgow soon. We will speak with one of the activists behind the movement. That is coming up.

And also, ABBA fans had faith their beloved Swedish band would reunite one day and that day is now. Their new music, coming up.

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HOLMES: Welcome back to viewers, all around the world, I'm Michael Holmes, you're watching CNN NEWSROOM.

And, for the second day in a row, massive climate protests are expected in Glasgow, Scotland. Demonstrations also planned for cities all around the world. Many activists saying, the pledges made so far at COP26 are just not enough. Our Phil Black, with a closer look.

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PHIL BLACK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As the climate conference approaches the one-week mark, crowds of people are taking to the streets to maintain the pressure. This is the first big protest.

Thousands of mostly young, passionate, noisy people, who are not satisfied and do not have a great deal to gain from the process of the negotiations taking place at a conference center not far from here.

The first look at the conference has seen a flurry of deals and announcements, claiming to make significant progress and setting the world on the right track to a low carbon future from big deals to end deforestation, to cut down on methane to, even, embracing the possibility of low carbon steel by the end of the decade.

But they all, to some degree, contain caveats, weaknesses. They are qualified successes to the people watching here today and, indeed, for the science behind all this, that action simply not enough to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Climate criminals, coming through.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Understand, if it's not affecting you directly but it's affecting people all over the world. And it is so important that you stop it for our future because we're the next generation. We're the ones who will feel the brunt most.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The action just is not quick enough and not hard enough. You know, it is all good to see like we're going to save the forest by 2030. You stop cutting trees down now. I hope they try hard enough to try and -- I don't know if they will.

BLACK: This one is just a warm-up. Saturday will bring in even bigger protests, tens of thousands of people marching through Glasgow, demanding more than just qualified deals and incremental progress -- Phil Black, CNN, Glasgow, Scotland.

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HOLMES: Activist Greta Thunberg was on hand in Glasgow to give her view. She says the summit is a failure and a greenwash. She had this to say about the intentions of world leaders. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRETA THUNBERG, CLIMATE ACTIVIST: The leaders are not doing nothing. They are actively creating loopholes and shaping frameworks to benefit themselves and to continue profiting from this destructive system.

This is an active choice by the leaders, to continue to lead to the exploitation of people and nature and the destruction of present and future living conditions to take place.

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HOLMES: Asad Rehman joins me now, he is spokesman for the COP26 Coalition, a group organizing the global day of action for climate justice demonstrations.

Thank you for being with us.

When Greta Thunberg says that COP26 has been a failure and there has been more, quote, "blah, blah, blah," as she puts it, does she have a point?

More talk and sentiment and not enough tangible action?

ASAD REHMAN, SPOKESPERSON, COP26 COALITION: I think she's absolutely spot on. What we have seen here -- and of course, we entered this climate summit with a warning from climate scientists, that it was code red for humanity. We had even leaders just talking about that we're one minute to midnight and the need for urgent action, this decade, which countries need to step up, do their fair share.

We need to support poorer countries who are not responsible for this crisis but are dealing with the heaviest impact. What we have had is a lot of pronouncements. What is really interesting about these pronouncements, whilst they're all headline grabbing, many have been made before.

Many of them are outside of the U.N. climate negotiations themselves. And many of them are not quite what they seem because --

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HOLMES: I was just going to say that actually. When we talk about the sense of urgency, you make a good point. As one example, the decisions made on coal are being lauded by many. But in reality, those sorts of decisions should have been made years or decades ago.

REHMAN: You are right. Absolutely, they should have been made decades ago.

But also, they should be sticking to the reality of what the science is telling us. It is telling us, you cannot expand coal, gas or oil.

What we have seen is some leaders, very happily, standing up to say, we promise to end coal. Many of them, already, promising ted a decade ago whilst, at the same time, doing a massive expansion of gas and oil at home and failing to, actually, take action.

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REHMAN: We have half the world, which doesn't have electricity or access to clean cooking. So tackling energy poverty but also moving away from our addiction to fossil fuels requires a really profound change, so bravery.

It really requires countries to step up and say, we're going to solve this problem and we're going to solve it this decade.

Instead, we saw lots and lots of empty pronouncements. Quite rightly, all around the world, people are realizing that. They're see that what we've heard in the last week in Spain, the wool has been pulled over people's eyes.

They will see today a very, very strong call from people, millions of people around the world, actually calling on our governments to really act in our interests. The people whose voices seem to be heard the loudest in these negotiations so far have been Big Business.

HOLMES: Well, self interest can be a powerful motivator, even if a short sighted one. Overall, we touched on this youth representatives at the summit, seeming less than enthused about the efforts of the decision makers.

And, as Thunberg says, they feel their voices, the voices of the next generation, just aren't being heard.

So what role does the world's youth play, going forward?

How do they make their voices heard?

REHMAN: This has been an incredibly poorly organized summit by the U.K. government. A bunch of civil society and not just young people have found themselves either locked out of the negotiations or, when they have been able to even get into the venue, they find themselves locked out of the negotiating rooms.

We play a very vital role, not just being the ears and eyes of the people and citizens everywhere but also, providing, really, policy advice and expert analysis to many of the poorer countries, who, of course, have much smaller delegations than some of the richest countries.

So what's really needed was a summit that was committed, not just to listening to the voices of young people, who are really critical, but listening to the voices of many (INAUDIBLE) communities.

Many of them are here, many are already here (INAUDIBLE) what we're seeing. But also, many of them come here with solutions. There is no shortage of knowledge about what we need to do. What we really need is our political leaders to listen to us.

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HOLMES: And, to that point, just using coal as an example, you had 40 countries promise to phase out coal. But then you have the other big users, like China, and the U.S., not making such promises.

I read one study that said, the carbon footprint of the world's richest 1 percent will be 30 times the stated emission goals, going forward.

What does not having the big emitters on board, in a meaningful way, mean for a planet?

REHMAN: I mean, it's cooking the books, isn't it?

It's pretending to take action when we're not. It is that lack of taking action which is taking to warming, which is predicted to be 3 degrees or more.

So you can't fool the science. Actually, you can't even fool people, because people are seeing through this now. What we really needed was every country to step up and say we're going to do our fair share of effort, even the 40 countries that are listed in the coal statement for example, 20 of them have never used coal before.

So it's no good just hyping these half-baked statements and pretending that they made major breakthroughs. Major breakthroughs take real discussion, negotiation at the table, with countries committing to take action, put money on the table, share technologies, listen to the voices of those being impacted and say, we have a shared goal here.

We have got to say the planet, people and we need to tackle global inequality. If governments came with that commitment, we would be seeing a very different (INAUDIBLE). Instead, what we are still seeing, is lots of governments that are saying I'm interested in protecting my short-term economic interests.

I'm interested in protecting the interests and the profits of my biggest businesses. And it is their voices that are being heard the loudest.

HOLMES: It really is so shortsighted. Thanks for all of the work you do. Asad Rehman, thank you so much.

REHMAN: Take care. Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: And by the way, do join us for the first ever Call to Earth Day, next Wednesday, November the 10th. It is going to be a big, day here at CNN. CNN is partnering with schools, individuals and organizations around the world to raise awareness of environmental issues.

It will be a day of action, dedicated to conservation, environmentalism and sustainability, crucially. Follow us online and on TV, follow the hashtag #CallToEarth, on social media. It has been decades since ABBA last released an album.

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HOLMES: But now long suffering fans of ABBA singing, "Thank you for the music."

Get it?

They had faith that the now elderly Swedish legends would, eventually, reunite. Now the group has taken a musical voyage with a new album.

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HOLMES (voice-over): CDs, vinyl, music listed in alphabetical order in a store, flashbacks to a different time.

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HOLMES (voice-over): And one of the biggest bands of that nostalgic era is back with their first album in 40 years.

The Swedish supergroup, ABBA, dominated the music scene in the '70s, with hits like "Dancing Queen" and "Mamma Mia" --

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HOLMES (voice-over): -- before breaking up in the early '80s. Their fans, lined up, once again, in record stores to buy the new release, "Voyage."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I grew up with ABBA, so, for me, it is the music and group is important.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have to be like 40, 50, to have this connection with ABBA, to have experienced ABBA when you were young.

HOLMES (voice-over): The new album has 10 songs from the quartet of two formerly married couples, who sold more than 385 million records during their decades-long reign on the radio.

One greatest hits album surpassed 1,000 weeks on the U.K. album chart earlier this year. The group reunited to create a digital concert series that begins in May, in which avatars of the band will perform with a live band.

The members, now in their '70s, say the new tunes will still have their signature sound, maybe just a little more mature now.

BJORN ULVAEUS, SINGER-SONGWRITER, ABBA: There is an element of something that comes with age, I think, in the whole album, not that it sounds like four tired geriatrics; that's not what I'm saying. It sounds -- there's -- there is a lot of energy in it.

HOLMES (voice-over): While fans are mostly thrilled with the record, music critics are mixed. Some love it, some say it is average and delivers a sound that is stuck in the past. But the band says it's an authentic sound, built on the melodies and voices that made them famous and doesn't overly rely on computer enhancement.

ULVAEUS: We have done our best, as we are now, in the age that we are now and it is up to the audience to see whether they like it or not. And of course, it doesn't sound like great but it sounds like ABBA.

HOLMES (voice-over): A trip down Memory Lane for some longtime fans and a chance for the super group to show a new generation, an oldie is still a goodie.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Thank you for spending part of our day with me, I'm Michael Holmes. "MARKETPLACE AFRICA" is coming up next. I will see you in about 15 minutes.