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Sweden and Finland Intends to Join NATO; NATO Chief Says Ukraine Can Win War; Gun Violence All Across the U.S.; North Korea Mobilizes Army To Fight Surging "Fever" Cases; Taiwan Lives With Virus As China Pursues Zero-COVID. Aired 2-3a ET

Aired May 16, 2022 - 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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ROSEMARY CHURCH: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us here in the United States and all around the world. You are watching "CNN Newsroom" and I'm Rosemary Church. Just ahead, in a historic shift, Finland and Sweden say they are ready to drop neutrality and join NATO, spurred on by Russia's war in Ukraine. But it's not just Moscow that opposes the move. We are live in London with details.

Plus, you are looking at scenes outside of a basketball game in Wisconsin, at a grocery store in New York, a flea market in Texas and a church in California. What should be safe spaces instead the site of four mass shootings over the weekend.

And more than a million suspected COVID cases in North Korea has Kim Jong-un calling in the military to help. Details along with the response from South Korea.

Good to have you with us. We begin with a seismic shift for European security as Russia faces the consequences of its war on Ukraine. On Sunday, Finland's government formally announced that it intends to join NATO. Hours later, Sweden's ruling party followed suit.

In Finland, parliament is set to take up the issue in about an hour from now. Lawmakers are widely expected to endorse the decision. From there, NATO leaders have said the approval process could move very quickly. Sunday's announcements mark a historic policy change for two countries that have remained neutral for decades.

And it's likely to anger Russian president Vladimir Putin who has long considered NATO expansion a threat to Russia. But Finland's ambassador to the U.S. told CNN Sunday that Russia's invasion as radically changed the calculus.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKKO HAUTALA, FINNISH AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: I think for us it's mainly a defensive and preventive move. I think we conclude now that the situation has changed rather profoundly because of the Russian attack. And we conclude that we have to increase our deterrence. And of course, since we have already credible national defense, the next step is to join NATO.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHURCH: Ukrainian tanks and artillery are moving in to reinforce the eastern front amid reports Russians are suffering significant losses. The Ukrainian military says in some areas, Russian units are down to less than 20 percent of their original staffing. And British intelligence says Russia's losses may amount to one third of the ground forces it first committed to Ukraine.

Despite those losses or maybe because of them, Russian troops are pouring into Ukraine's Luhansk region after facing counterattacks around Kharkiv. They are focusing artillery and troops in the area around (inaudible) Donetsk. And again, the Russians are accused of firing on civilian targets.

A Ukrainian official said Sunday, the Russians shot at a hospital. And for more, we want to bring in CNN's Clare Sebastian who joins us live from London. Good to see you, Clare. So, next hour Finland's parliament will consider the issue of joining NATO and perhaps vote. And Sweden will also work towards an application to join the western alliance. So, what is the process ahead for both nations and how long will this likely take especially with Turkey concerned about the bid insisting on additional guarantees from both Nordic nations?

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Rosemary, there are edging very close to potential accession talks. Once both parliaments have ratified the decision, which the Swedish ruling party only announced this weekend. Then they can move ahead to accession talks will take place in Brussels. It seems to be pretty clear that they will move ahead. They already meet most of the criteria for membership.

Both of these countries, both have very modern militaries. You know, thriving democracies for example. And then it moves to the NATO members themselves, all 30 parliaments have to then ratify the accession of new countries. They have to have unanimity. So the one potential issue that we see now is Turkey.

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The Turkish president had said that he does not look positively on the accession of Finland and Sweden. He is accusing them of housing Kurdish terror groups. Having said that though, the NATO secretary general does not see this as a potential block to the accession of these countries. And Finland in particular has said that it is willing to hold further talks with Turkey on this issue.

So it looks like, Rosemary, this could move ahead. It could take up to a year to actually, for those two countries to actually see to NATO. But if they do, a momentous moment. This would double NATO's land border with Russia. It would be the ninth enlargement of NATO since its founding in 1949.

CHURCH: Alright. Thank you so much, Clare Sebastian, joining us there live from London. Alright, well, joining me now from Los Angeles, CNN European affairs commentator Dominic Thomas. Good have you with us. So, Dominic, after decades of neutrality, Finland has formally

declared its intention to join NATO and Sweden isn't far behind. The irony of course is that one of the reasons Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine was because he felt threatened by NATO encroaching on Russian soil.

And now, of course, as a result of his war on Ukraine, he will have NATO right on his door step if Finland ends up joining the western alliance, which certainly looks likely. So, Putin now threatening retaliation. What form might that retaliation take do you think?

DOMINIC THOMAS, CNN EUROPEAN AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Well, Rosemary, that's a really great question. It's very hard to predict what that will be, but is absolutely clear as you've just mapped out that everything President Putin certain claimed as his justification for further incursions on Ukraine have backfired. He has now people that are more committed to NATO than they ever were before. More committed to increased defense spending with public support behind that.

As we saw with the situation in Ukraine, the fact that Ukraine was not a member of NATO or the European Union, meant that the western alliance had set a kind of red line, that they were willing to provide infrastructural military support, but not troops on the ground. And so I think that that's important in this bigger context. So, it's hard to see given the fact that at this particular moment, the Russians have not crossed over into E.U. or NATO territory.

Whether the talks of Finnish and Swedish accession will change that particular dynamic, but if not from what I, you know, have heard from listening to and watching military analyst, there are all sorts of other ways in which interference can take place, from cyberattacks, from retaliation on energy policy, forcing these countries to make decisions at a moment when the E.U. in general is struggling to go along there.

So I think those are the sorts of things that we will have to look at, but strangely enough there has not been a specific and forceful reaction from Russia and at the moment to these particular announcements and we are sitting and waiting to see what that might look like.

CHURCH: Alright. And of course, Russia's war in Ukraine was supposed to take just a matter of days, now it's into its third month due to extraordinary resistance from the Ukrainian military and its people. And resulting in humiliation for Putin and of course significant losses for his military.

How much do you worry that a cornered Putin with no off ramp to save face might turn perhaps to a nuclear option, particularly as Finland and Sweden take steps to become NATO members in the months ahead?

THOMAS: Yes, I mean, so much of this, Rosemary, is about sort of really two very different ways of seeing the situation. For President Putin, you know, NATO enlargement has always been a problem and yet we talk so much about an Article V of the treaty. That an attack on one is an attack on all, and we therefore see this as the motivating security determination for Finland and Sweden.

What's also there of course is Article X, which is about the open door policy, which has NATO repeatedly states this. It's written in its treaty that it's an organization that's dynamic that's based around enlargement, that will bring in countries that are committed to the Euro Atlantic Alliance and that's why it's gone from 12 to 30.

So, Putin's actions right now have served as the catalyst, have given oxygen to a kind of rejuvenation of a NATO that have shifted dramatically from its post-Second World War, post-Cold War kind of identity. So of course, one is very concerned about what a cornered Putin would look like.

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Having said that, what we saw last week with these bilateral discussions that were taking place for example between the U.K. and Sweden and Finland to provide security support without either automatic NATO accession or as kind of a gray area as they were sort of moving towards that, might also be an incentive for Putin to come to the negotiating table before more and more countries end up joining this organization.

But at this moment, we are yet again, Rosemary, in a moment of tremendous kind of uncertainty and unpredictability in terms of how President Putin is going to react to this particularly as it plays out on domestic front for him. Rosemary?

CHURCH: Yes. It is a real concern. And I want to mention, too, that Turkey is very worried about Finland wanting to be a part of NATO and says certain conditions need to be met first saying both Finland and Sweden need to stop supporting terrorist groups in their countries, provide clear security guarantees and lift export bans on Turkey if they want to join NATO. So, what's that all about exactly and how might this slow the process of membership down?

THOMAS: Yes. Well, as with all these organizations like the operations of the E.U., the fact you have 30 members, the fact that you need unanimous votes, the fact that each of these independent leaders has to get this ratified through their home parliaments, means that it's a slow, time consuming, incredibly complex diplomatic and political effort.

When it comes to the reasons that the Turkish president is giving right now, I just really -- I just do not buy those. I think they are distractions from the bigger issue. Is that this -- that Putin's, essentially, actions have created such incredible geopolitical uncertainty that the Turkish leader, who enjoys, and I mean this (inaudible) very important trade relations with Russia that finds himself in a very interesting kind of geopolitical situation.

Member of NATO, but of course not a member of the European Union. Very much a bridge culture between these two kinds of spheres, is wondering, you know, in this dynamic where essentially what we're seeing right now is that there is no such thing as neutrality. You're either with the Russian leader or you're against him. And that puts a leader like the Turkish leader, Erdogan, in a very

complicated position and I think he's trying to see how this will play out and work out, and perhaps even paradoxically waiting to see what President Putin's reaction is going to be before he goes full out committing to this, Rosemary.

CHURCH: Alright. Dominic Thomas, always great to get your analysis. Appreciate it.

Well, the potential expansion of NATO comes as Russian troops are facing setbacks on the battlefield. On Sunday, NATO secretary general said the conflict is not going the way Moscow planned adding Ukraine can win this war. CNN's Suzanne Malveaux has a look at where things stand right now.

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SUZANNE MALVEUX, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It almost looks like fireworks, but these explosions aren't for show. They are incendiary munitions, it's yet another day of crushing Russian firepower aimed at the besieged city of Mariupol.

Over the, weekend a large convoy of cars and vans carrying fleeing residents managed to leave the city. An aid to Mariupol's mayor says up to 1,000 vehicles arrived in Zaporizhzhia, which would be the largest single evacuation from Mariupol since the fighting began. One man says that it was a harrowing journey.

NIKOLAY PAVLOV, MARIUPOL EVACUEE (through translation): We barely made it. There were lots of elderly people among us. It was tough. People went through hard things before. They were nervous. The trip was devastating, but it was worth it.

MALVEAUX (voice-over): Meanwhile, further east, Russian troops are zeroing in on the town of Severodonetsk, where 15,000 people still live. But Ukrainian military says that Russian forces have suffered significant losses as they try to push through the Luhansk and Donetsk regions.

Areas of the north, near the city of Kharkiv are back under Ukrainian control after Russian soldiers retreated from there. NATO secretary general says these are major setbacks for the Russians.

JENS STOLTENBERG, NATO SECRETARY GENRAL: They failed to take Kyiv. They're pulling back from around Kharkiv. Their major offensive in Donbas has stalled. Russia is not achieving its strategic objectives.

MALVEAUX (voice-over): But some Russian forces are getting additional help. About 600 Chechen fighters and others described as volunteers are on their way to the war zone. Chechen units have played a prominent role since the invasion began. Suzanne Malveaux, CNN, Lviv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHURCH: And still to come, a community in mourning. Buffalo New York is reeling from a racist shooting at a supermarket over the weekend. The latest on the investigation just ahead. And there were other deadly shootings in the U.S. Sunday, including one at a California church.

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And we will have that plus details on gun violence that took lives at a Texas flea market.

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CHURCH: Deadly gun violence erupted again in the U.S. Sunday. A day after a mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, California authorities say one person is dead and four others critically wounded after a gunman opened fire at a church in Laguna Woods. A suspect believed to be an Asian man in his 60s is in custody. Authorities say churchgoers detained the suspect, took his guns, and tied house his legs with an extension cord before police arrived.

And in Houston, Texas, authorities say an alteration between five men at a flea market ended in a shooting that left two people dead. Three others are hospitalized in critical condition. Two suspects were detained one of whom was taken to a hospital.

And new details are emerging about the racially motivated shooting at a Buffalo, New York's supermarket that killed 10 people. We have learned the 18-year-old suspect was scouting the area ahead of the shooting with one official saying he told authorities he was targeting the black community.

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Investigators are reviewing a 180-page manifest posted online and attributed to the suspect. In it, he allegedly details how he had been radicalized online and believed white Americans were being replaced by people of other races. And we are also learning nearly a year ago the suspect was sent for a mental health evaluation after making a generalized threat at his high school, though that threat was not racially motivated.

On Tuesday, U.S. President Joe Biden and the first lady are set to travel to Buffalo to visit the families of the victims. CNN's Joe Johns has more now from Buffalo.

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Big picture, one of the victims of this mass shooting is the entire city of Buffalo, a city that describes itself as the city of good neighbors, now dealing with 13 shot, 10 dead and what police are calling a hate crime. People here can take small solace in the fact that the attacker came from outside the city driving almost three hours to inflict these atrocities on Buffalo, New York.

The governor of the state speaking at a memorial service here in Buffalo on Sunday said in her view, there is another possible contributor, social media platforms.

(BEGIN VIDE CLIP) KATHY HOCHUL, GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK: I'm calling out the social media platforms where this hate can be spewed and people are learning how to create guns and violence and weapons. And what this dissemination, this virus called white supremacy. White supremacy and nationalism and this idea of replacement theory. Have you heard of this? Well, if you're watching Fox News, you're familiar with it because they talk about it all the time.

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JOHNS: The picture of the individual victims is only now coming into focus. Among the dead, a woman in her mid-80s named Ruth Whitfield, described by her family as a church lady whose husband is in a nursing home. Also, there was a security guard who tried and failed to stop the shooter, in his mid-50s, his name is Aaron Salter. And there was Pearl Young, also described as a worshipper and a lover of God who attended the Church of God in Christ. She was in her mid-70s. Joe Johns, CNN, Buffalo, New York.

CHURCH: Joining me now is Mathew Littman, executive director of 97 Percent, a group working to reduce gun violence. Thank you so much for being with us on this very tragic day for the United States. An America, I mean, it really has a very real gun problem, doesn't it? Four mass shootings in the U.S. just this weekend.

Ten people killed, three injured in the Buffalo supermarket shooting Saturday. The biggest U.S. mass shooting this year. The next day another mass shooting at a church in Laguna Woods, California where one person was killed and four critically injured, and two other mass shootings over the weekend. One in Milwaukee. I mean, and the other Houston. What is -- what's happening in this country do you think?

MATHEW LITTMAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 97 PERCENT: -- why not and she said, look at all these shootings. You know, just-- you can't leave the house and it is scary. I think what's happening here, Rosemary, is we have gun sales in the United States where huge before the pandemic. They have increased tremendously since the pandemic started. So we have hundreds of millions of guns in this country. And as you talked about it, your correspondent talked about before, we have all these conspiracy theories, all this hate cropping up.

And the combination of people who maybe should not have a gun and all of this hatred is what we're seeing now in this rise in gun violence and that's not even to mention that two-thirds of the deaths from guns in a yearly basis are people that commit -- they commit suicide with a gun.

So most of the gun deaths in this country are suicides, and then we see all these terrible mass shootings as well and the numbers are going up not down.

CHURCH: Yes. I mean, it's just a tragic situation to watch unfold. And the Buffalo shooting suspect only 18 years old, allegedly a white supremacist radicalized online and casing out that supermarket before his attack, targeting a predominantly black neighborhood. Authorities say he was motivated by racism, buying into racist

conspiracy theories and allegedly posting that 180-page manifesto online. How should the U.S. be dealing with this type of online radicalization? What more needs to be done to take some of this material down? Is that even possible?

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LITTMAN: Well, Rosemary, I would say that that's not my area. My area that we focus on is gun violence and what you do about gun violence and (inaudible) specifically and bringing people together, gun owners, people who don't own a gun because mostly even gun owners and non-gun owners feel the same way about gun issues. Studies show that all the time so you want to talk about Buffalo and so do I.

Last, year this person threatened to shoot up his school, right? And what could have happened in Buffalo is that's what's called a red flag law in New York. Are you familiar with that term?

CHURCH: Yes.

LITTMAN: Okay. So that means that the police or the school could have petitioned the court to take away the person's gun and they did not. And that's a law that exist for people don't use enough. Gun owners favor red flag laws. Non-gun owners favor red flag laws. We need to use the laws like that that we have in place to prevent people like this from being able to have a gun and do something like this. There's a law in New York that could have helped in this case and it was not used.

CHURCH: And why do you think it wasn't used?

LITTMAN: Well, people -- it's a great question, Rosemary, and I'm glad you asked because people don't know that these laws are even on the books in many states. I mean, last year, there was a shooting, I believe it was in Indiana, which had a red flag law which could have been used and was not. And now they've changed those laws in Indiana and made it so that more people know they exist.

In New York, often and even California where I am, people don't know that this exists and that certain things are possible with existing gun laws. Red flag laws are favored by two-thirds of gun owners, for example. And almost 84 percent of all Americans favor red flag law. In many cases, that would be helpful.

Look, Rosemary, we're not getting the numbers of deaths with the gun to zero, but we can certainly stop a lot of these types of mass shootings by using common sense gun law that both gun owners and non- gun owners believe. We need to get together, right?

What we've been doing so for is not working. We need to bring people together around this issue. And that's what we're trying to do. You just named, I think, four mass shootings in the last two days. It's crazy. We need to do something.

CHURCH: I mean, and the polls show that most Americans want to see more gun controls put in place. They want to see something done. And, yet there appears to be very little political will to do something about these mass shootings particularly when assault weapons are involved. So, I mean, that's the problem, isn't it, because it seems at this point, we've reached enough is enough, but the politicians don't appear to think so.

LITTMAN: Well, I think, Rosemary, you're right. I think most people on America, you know, we call ourselves 97 Percent because that's the number that believe in background checks. But the truth is that gun owners and non-gun owners believe in it almost to the same level. That's true on red flag laws.

But I think people don't realize, and certainly a lot of legislators don't realize, as a matter of fact, gun owners, we did a survey Beacon Research in Boston. Gun owners think that 25 percent of gun owners favor red flag laws when the number is 66 percent that favor red flag laws. So gun owners don't even believe that other gun owners favor these laws.

Legislatures don't believe gun owners favor these laws. We need to talk to gun owners. What we're doing so far is not working. We need to talk to people, we need to bring people together around these issues. It is unbearable to have -- to be able to -- to be afraid to leave your house.

I mean, you probably have seen from friends of yours in the United Sates who say the same thing. It's scary out there right now. The amount of hate you're talking about online, plus people of all these weapons who should not have them, we need to do something about it. And the way that we've been working this is not working. So what are we going to do?

CHURCH: Yes. It is a terrifying situation. Something does need to be done. We have reached the point of enough is enough. Mathew Littman, thank you so much for talking with us. Appreciate it.

Well, North Korea won't say exactly how many of its citizens have contracted COVID-19, but Kim Jong-un is sending the military to help with the soaring number of so-called fever cases. Those details and a live report from the region. We're back in just a moment.

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CHURCH: Welcome back, everyone.

Well, North Korea is ramping up efforts to fight 100s of 1000s of what it calls fever cases, after reporting its first outbreak of COVID-19.

CHURCH: Kim Jong-un has ordered the military to help stabilize the country's medicines supply. State media says he strongly criticize the Cabinet and public health sector for its handling of the crisis during an emergency meeting on Sunday.

CNN's Blake Essig is following all of this from Tokyo. He joins us now live. Good to see you, Blake.

So, what more are you learning about this?

BLAKE ESSIG, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Well, Rosemary, just a few days after North Korea identified or admitted its first ever case of COVID-19, fever cases in North Korea are surging with nearly 400,000 new cases reported just this weekend.

According to state-run media KCNA. The outbreak started in late April and has since resulted in more than 1.2 million fever cases, more than 560,000 people are still being isolated with symptoms, and 50 people have died, although it's unclear if those deaths or fever cases were caused by COVID-19. And the reason for that uncertainty -- and the reason why we are calling these cases fever cases instead of COVID cases is because the level of testing is extremely low in North Korea, and the vast majority of those people showing symptoms in all likelihood haven't been tested.

Now, according to the World Health Organization, since the pandemic began more than two years ago, through the end of March, only 64,000 people in North Korea had been tested out of a population of more than 25 million.

Making matters worse, experts say that the country lacks significant health care infrastructure, and is unlikely able to treat a large number of patients. And then there's also the fact that almost none of the countries' 25 million people had been vaccinated.

North Korea has secured -- hasn't secured excuse me any vaccines through organizations like COVAX despite being eligible.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who has been pictured visiting pharmacies in Pyongyang, wearing a mask has since declared a major national emergency ordered all cities nationwide to lockdown and has since said that the current outbreak is the greatest turmoil to hit North Korea since its founding more than 70 years ago. Rosemary.

CHURCH: All right. Blake Essig, keeping a very close eye on that, joining us from his vantage point there in Tokyo. Appreciate it.

Well, Taiwan is emerging from the COVID pandemic and returning to a more normal everyday life after learning what not to do from China's strict zero COVID policies. That story and more when we return.

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CHURCH: Shanghai is planning for life to return to normal next month after declaring its outbreak under control.

Starting Monday, supermarkets, pharmacies, and other businesses are set to gradually reopen.

Well, China's strict zero COVID efforts are proving to be a stark contrast with Taiwan's pandemic policies.

CNN's Will Ripley has more now from Taipei? WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Zero COVID, chaos captured on Chinese social media. Shanghai factory workers in a frenzy, friction likely fueled by long weeks of lockdowns.

Panic and fear. On a day, Shanghai reported less than 300 new cases. On the same day in Taiwan, more than 36,000 new cases. 140 times more than Shanghai, which has a bigger population.

Here in Taiwan, the mood is calm, not chaotic. The island gradually reopened, emerging from almost two years of pandemic seclusion.

Taiwan's former vice president, a leading epidemiologist, says the goal is no longer zero infections, but effectively controlling the virus.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHEN CHIEN-JEN, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT OF TAIWAN: This zero-COVID policy is very difficult and is mission impossible.

RIPLEY: What is possible, he says? Maximize hospital capacity, boost vaccination rates. Most adults in Taiwan have at least two doses. Even the high risk elderly population.

Only about half of China's elderly are protected against COVID-19, a symptom of the Mainland's sporadic vaccination campaign, and reliance on homegrown vaccines often less effective.

In Taiwan, Omicron symptoms usually mild. Hospitalizations and deaths, relatively low, businesses bouncing back.

CHEN: People have to leave normally, go to school normally, and work normally, when we are ready to deal with the virus.

[02:39:58]

RIPLEY: Even as Taiwan's cases hit record highs, no mainland-style lockdowns. No violent clashes. No food shortages. Diners fill the tables at this Taipei rescue

OSCAR CHEN, OWNER, LIANG XI HAO RESTAURANT: I think we need to overcome our fears and tread carefully step by step.

RIPLEY: Not everyone is ready to relax the rules, especially parents of young children, still not eligible for vaccination in Taiwan.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel like the government has not considered children in their move towards living with the virus.

RIPLEY: Any plan that allows kids to play is better than brutal lockdowns in China, says this dad.

JEFF HUANG, PARENT OF 5-YEAR-OLD (through translator): If we still get harsh restrictions like the mainland after vaccination, there'll be very painful, and there'll be no point in getting the vaccines. O. CHEN: My brother is now in Shanghai and it is really tough for him. He has been under quarantine for 45 days without being able to leave his home.

RIPLEY: Tough times in China described as cruel by Taiwan's premier. The islands leaders say life will go on, even if it means learning to live with the virus.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RIPLEY (on camera): Taiwan's reopening further isolates China as essentially the last major economy in the world to cling to the zero- COVID approach that the vast majority of experts say just isn't possible.

Despite lockdowns, despite contact tracing, the Omicron variant is simply too contagious. I can tell you living here versus living in zero-COVID Hong Kong. I know so many people who every day are posting on social media, they're positive with COVID.

And yet Rosemary, there's not a sense of fear, people are staying home, writing it out, going on with their lives.

CHURCH: Yes, what a contrast. Will Ripley, joining us from Taipei. Many thanks.

Well, for our international viewers, "WORLD SPORT" is up next. For everyone here in the U.S. and Canada. I'll be back with more news after a short break. Do stay with us.

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