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CNN INTERNATIONAL: Ukraine Appeals For Heavy Weapons Party; U.K.'s Immigration Policy Goes Forward But Faces Challenges; Google Suspends Employee Who Claims Chatbot Is Sentient; Ukrainian Troops Pushed Back From Severodonetsk Center; Rebranded McDonald's Restaurants Unveiled In Russia; Google Engineer: AI Bot Gains "Sentience". Aired 2-3p ET
Aired June 13, 2022 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[14:00:00]
MAX FOSTER, HOST, CNN NEWSROOM: Hello every one, I'm Max Foster, you're watching CNN Newsroom live from London. Tonight, Ukraine's government says it can win if it has as many heavy weapons as the enemy. I'll ask a former a Ukrainian defense minister about the push for more hardware. Then the U.K.'s plan to send some migrants to Rwanda are set to go forward but with major opposition.
I'll speak to one group leveling the legal challenge. And later, a now suspended Google engineer says the company's chatbot is sentient. Why Google disagrees.
Give up or die. That's the blunt of threats from a pro-Russian separatist leader to Ukraine and the city of Severodonetsk. Now, Russian state media quote the leader as saying, Ukraine has no other option, but to surrender. And while the fight isn't over yet, Ukraine's military says its forces have been driven from the city center. It says Russia has a huge advantage in firepower and is attacking constantly with artillery, aircraft and rockets.
One official says Russia is now bombarding a chemical plant where hundreds of civilians are sheltering including 40 children. Ukraine is appealing once again for the West to send more heavy weapons. But time is running out for those weapons to arrive and possibly save Severodonetsk. CNN's Matthew Chance tells us why this city is so crucial to the fight for the Donbas in the entire war.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There is no end in sight to this war, but its horror is plain to see. An old woman crosses herself in prayer as troops fight street to street. It is the battle here and around the city of Severodonetsk where the Ukrainian president says the fate of Donbas in eastern Ukraine is being decided.
But it seems more a case of when, not if, this devastated region will fall into Russian hands. The embattled Ukrainian president is again expressing his frustration. "Ukraine needs modern missile defense systems", he says in his latest
address. "Did we get them? No! Do we need them? Yes." On both sides, there are signs of fatigue setting in. But these latest images from the Russian defense ministry show its forces on the offensive. Squadrons of attack helicopters hitting what Russian military officials say are Ukrainian positions. "A target hit", the pilot reports. "Thanks very much guys, God be with you", comes the response. By concentrating its fire, Russia appears to be gaining momentum.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Operational attack on army aviation hit Ukrainian command posts in 25 areas of concentration of manpower and military equipment. As a result, more than 150 Ukrainian nationals, 6 tanks, 5 field artillery pieces, and 10 special vehicles for various purposes were destroyed.
CHANCE (on camera): Of course, Russia is paying a heavy price for waging this war, what it calls its special military operation in Ukraine too. It's estimated to have lost thousands of troops and countless tanks and other armored vehicles. Some of which have been placed here in the center of the capital Kyiv on public display. But nearly four months into this grinding and relentless conflict, Ukraine seems dangerously outnumbered and outgunned
(voice-over): From the Black Sea, Russia's Naval bombardment continues at pace. At least, four cruise missiles fired at a warehouse of anti-take weapons supplied by the United States and its allies, according to the Russian military. Ukraine says the missiles hit mostly residential areas in the west of the country, injuring 22 civilians including a 12-year-old child.
Of course, Ukrainian forces are fighting back, like here near the northeastern city of Kharkiv where they say this old-captured Russian rocket-launcher has been turned on the invaders. But Ukrainian officials say they need many more long-range weapons from the U.S. and its western allies if they are to push or even hold the Russians back.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Matthew joins us now from Kyiv. And Matthew, we were just saying that the Russians have got another advantage, destroying three bridges which were very central to supply routes into Severodonetsk.
[14:05:00]
CHANCE: Yes, I mean, that development coming to us from the head of the Luhansk region on the Ukrainian government side, who is basically saying that this lifeline in and out of Severodonetsk has now been effectively severed, some of the bridges -- some of the -- you know, some of the three bridges have been -- you know, a couple of the three bridges have been destroyed, another one looks like it's impassable because of heavy artillery fire.
It's significant, you know, for two reasons. First of all, it means that the soldiers from the Ukrainian government that are still inside that city will now find it increasingly difficult to be resupplied with ammunition out there, injured take away -- taken away. And of course, the civilians, and there are hundreds of them, still believed to be trapped inside that city. It's going to be much more difficult for them to be evacuated. And so, it just adds to the very bleak outlook of this very embattled city in eastern Ukraine, Max. .
FOSTER: Thanks, Matthew. Ukraine says it needs heavy weapons, parity, as Matthew was saying to end the war against Russia. It's requesting more equipments such as tanks and drones ahead of the summit of defense ministers. And we're going to discuss this now with former Ukrainian minister of defense, Andriy Zagorodnyuk. Thank you so much for joining us here today.
ANDRIY ZAGORODNYUK, FORMER UKRAINIAN DEFENSE MINISTER: Hello --
FOSTER: When you talk about parity, are we way off parity right now? What are you describing? How different is the advantage that the Russians have got over the Ukrainians right now in terms of this heavy weaponry the country is requesting?
ZAGORODNYUK: Yes, Maxwell, we're very much away from parity. So for example, multiple rocket launchers which we just -- not seen, we need like a 100. So far, our allies didn't supply any yet. So we're still expecting some like several from the U.S., several from the U.K., but we need way more. So, we need like a 100. Same situation, similar with the howitzers, of course, we have many of them about 200, but we need several hundred, like up to a 1,000. So, that's the numbers we're talking about. So, we're talking about like way more which we need --
FOSTER: What's the main issue? Is it transport through Ukraine, or you know, they're not even leaving, you know, the western nations?
ZAGORODNYUK: No, so far, some of them are not even dispatched from the countries which we are talking to. And some of them are not even committed yet, and there are discussions with their allies, they're saying, yes, we will supply, but we don't see them yet. And we know some of them are in transit, logistics in Ukraine is difficult, but we do it very fast. So, it's a question of actually getting them from our allies.
FOSTER: What -- you know, at what point do you decide you've lost that battle then in the east if these don't arrive? I mean, how long can you last without the weapon you require?
ZAGORODNYUK: We're still talking about some substantial period, like weeks, even maybe longer because even until we are severely outgunned in some cases, this is 1 to 10, some cases it's even 1 to 20. But we're still holding as you can see. And what Ukrainian armed forces is doing is remarkable, assuming that fact that they've outgunned that much.
So, of course, they can hold. And Russians are exhausted, they are not doing well, but at the same time, if we have that parity, we can win territories back and we can stop that war. So, it's a question about actually stopping the war.
FOSTER: The longer you don't get these weapons, presumably the casualty rate is going up. And how concerned are you about that? How much worse is it getting, day by day?
ZAGORODNYUK: Well, our president said that during this whole period, like very active period in the east, we're talking about losing around 100 military personnel a day. So, this is -- this is very serious. Every day -- every day, it's more and more casualties and also civilians. Because some of them being evacuated, but most of them being evacuated, but we still have some families which stayed for whatever reasons in these towns.
And Russians, they're ruthless with the buildings, they're just destroying everything. So, yo know, they're not doing any precision- guided missiles or anything like that. For them, it's just leveling down cities and villages. So, yes, and we have a political commitment from the west to help us. We have a very strong statement about a month and a half ago during the first Ramstein meeting, about that Ukraine will get what it needs.
But we're still expecting the sort of final resolution. And I pretty much hope that the day after tomorrow and Wednesday, when there would be a third Ramstein meeting, as we call it, it will be decided finally like what we're going to receive.
FOSTER: On civilian casualties, Amnesty International has been accusing Russia of war crimes in Kharkiv.
[14:10:00]
Really seen a report which documents the alleged use of --
ZAGORODNYUK: Yes --
FOSTER: Cluster ammunitions in the city. I just want to --
ZAGORODNYUK: Yes --
FOSTER: Based on CNN reporting from last month which corroborates that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A devastation of civilian homes and lives. Throughout the last two months, we have witnessed atrocities in Ukraine.
(on camera): More mortar strikes very close, they want us to start moving.
(voice-over): While we know these are Russian actions, it's been difficult to draw a direct line from individual atrocities to a specific Russian commander until now. CNN can exclusively reveal that this man, Colonel General Alexander Zhuravlyov; commander of the western military district is the commander responsible for this. Ammunitions targeting civilians in the city of Kharkiv, east Ukraine. A war crime under international law.
(END VIDEOTAPE) FOSTER: CNN has reached out to the Russian defense forces and to the general for comment, but got no reply. What have you been hearing from your people out there in terms of these cluster ammunitions and how that crosses the line?
ZAGORODNYUK: We've seen them. They're prohibited by international conventions. They're extremely dangerous. Some of the parts are not exploding for years, sometimes. And that's why they are -- they are absolutely not precise so they can -- they can hit very vast areas.
And of course, they're hitting civilians because of this, because they're just throwing them on cities just without any plan. And they -- in some cases, we have seen deliberate targeting of civilian areas where there's nothing military, there's no military -- I don't know, stations or units or whatever.
So it's absolutely conscious attacking of civilians in order to coerce us into whatever -- defeat or whatever. Obviously, it's not working for them, but nevertheless, these are war crimes. We absolutely agree.
FOSTER: Are you concerned that other weapons which are more sporadic as it were, and can be targeted in the same way and just clean-up areas -- could be used by Russia? What sort of weapons are you concerned they may escalate too?
ZAGORODNYUK: They have thrown to us pretty much everything Soviet Union has made and also Russia. There has been tens of different types of rockets, some of them are extremely deadly and powerful. And as you could see in some other cities, like in Mariupol for example, which they completely destroyed.
Which I knew is pretty much like most of the destroyed. They are hitting house by house, building by building, back and forth, flying back to Russia, reloading, coming back, destroying houses, civilian houses and then flying again without any stock. So, this is what we're already seeing over the past few months. There's nothing which have changed their tactics. So, they just keep on doing that. And that's why we need to stop them, yes.
FOSTER: You're gathering evidence, aren't you? You know, you're facilitating Amnesty and other groups to try to get the evidence in terms of war crimes --
ZAGORODNYUK: Absolutely --
FOSTER: But you know, is it --
ZAGORODNYUK: Absolutely --
FOSTER: All academic? We were describing there, how our reporting has exposed and outed one general, but it's not going to have a huge amount of effect, is it? Unless the Russians cooperate in any future trials as it were.
ZAGORODNYUK: Yes, well, first of all, we need to have trials, because we need to establish facts. And luckily, our government is cooperating with every international institution available, and they're all here, the international experts here because we want to be as transparent as theoretically possible. And we need to -- we need to establish those crimes, and obviously, how then we're going to enforce those decisions.
That's difficult obviously, but we sincerely hope that over the time when Russian governments has failed, we'll be able to get to those people. Because these crimes, for us, they don't have any sort of expiration date. You know, the -- we will be pursuing justice as long as we can and is needed --
FOSTER: OK, Andriy Zagorodnyuk, thank you very much for joining us with your insights today.
ZAGORODNYUK: Thank you.
FOSTER: Still to come tonight, migrants who crossed the English Channel could end up in Rwanda as early as tomorrow, an update on the hugely and controversial government plan next. And a surveillance video showing men attacking women in a restaurant is fueling discussions of women safety in China, it's raising concerns about how authorities handled the problem.
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[14:15:00]
FOSTER: An update on a deeply controversial policy here in the U.K. A plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda is set to go ahead after an appeal against it was rejected by court here in London. The first fight is due Tuesday. And eight people are scheduled to be flown out. Nada Bashir spoke to some refugees whose world could be changed entirely by this decision.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NADA BASHIR, CNN REPORTER (voice-over): For days, weeks, sometimes even months, refugees here can only wait. Once notoriously known as the jungle, this camp in northern France was once seen as the final stop in a desperate attempt to reach the U.K. But now, that dangerous trip across the English Channel comes with an added risk.
Volunteers here are handing out vital advice pamphlets, warning that an illegal crossing into the U.K. could now mean deportation to Rwanda. The message here, do not panic, we will help you. But for some, the news is too much to bear.
(on camera): If you are told when you get to London that you are being sent to Rwanda, what will you do then?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then, maybe, I won't go to Rwanda. Never will I go to Rwanda.
BASHIR (voice-over): In a nearby camp, we meet a group of young men from Sudan. They are too afraid to appear on camera. Many left the country as teenagers, fleeing militia violence. They tell us they remain determined to cross the Channel, despite the threat of deportation.
(on camera): But you still want to go to the U.K. even though (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Yes, God-willing. We hope they will let us settle in the U.K., but if they deport us to Rwanda, then we will go. Honestly, I'm afraid. But God knows what is best.
BASHIR (voice-over): But on the other side of the Channel, the situation for those already facing deportation is also strange. Many are being held at detention centers like this one, just outside of London. Among them is Sydney's asylum seeker Kareem(ph), we're not using his real name to protect his identity. Kareem(ph) is unreachable while in detention. But his legal representatives tell us he received notice he would be deported to Rwanda in May, and sent us this written testimony.
"I was shocked, I didn't think any country would do that. Why did they rescue me from the waves to send me there? They should have left me in the water, it would have been better. I won't go, I'd rather be dead."
The British government claimed its new program is aimed at disrupting people's smuggling networks and will deter people from making the perilous journey across the English Channel. The UN's refugee agency has described the U.K.'s deal with Rwanda as unlawful, warning that the scheme lacks adequate safeguards to ensure refugee protection. Meanwhile, human rights watch has lambasted the British Home Secretary's claim that Rwanda will provide a safe haven for refugees.
[14:20:00]
The organization says the British government has cherry-picked and even ignored facts on the ground, pointing to what they've described as Rwanda's appalling human rights record. It's an issue which has sparked controversy within the government's own Home Office, with some civil servants marching a legal challenge, seeking to halt all deportation flights to Rwanda, and it's even triggered an inquiry by the House of Laws. Back in Calais, volunteers say the uncertainty is taking a devastating toll on asylum seekers.
CLARE MOSELEY, FOUNDER, CARE4CALAIS: The conversations we've had with people, they say to us, I've lost all my hope. The future is black. There's nothing left for me to live for. And it's so critically important that this plan is absolutely examined in fine detail to make sure that it is lawful, and if it isn't, then nobody must be sent.
BASHIR: Well, some here say they remain undeterred and will still try to reach the U.K., others are stuck in limbo, unable to return home and desperate for the security the U.K. once offered, but also unwilling to risk being deported to Rwanda. Nada Bashir, CNN, in Calais, France.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: All right, let's speak to one of the groups that's been waging legal challenges against this plan. James Wilson is the deputy director of Detention Action. He joins us now. Thank you for joining us.
JAMES WILSON, DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF DETENTION ACTION: Hello, thank you --
FOSTER: What do you know about -- there are eight refugees who are air-marked effectively to fly out tomorrow. Do we know anything about them?
WILSON: Hello, good evening, yes. I don't know very much about those individual cases, but I understand that three of those are bringing individual injunctions tomorrow, transfer for legal challenges. It's notable the number of people due to be on the flight tomorrow has fallen, and I think 31 as of Friday, from the weekend down to now eight as you say, and we very much hope that number keeps falling. But frankly, we think one person going to Rwanda tomorrow is one too many. Because it isn't a lawful, safe or humane policy.
FOSTER: So, yes, what are your legal options considering they're flying out tomorrow. And there might only be one, but obviously, you're trying to block that as well. But you lost the appeal --
WILSON: Yes --
FOSTER: Today, so what's the next option?
WILSON: It's not clear in the short term in terms of tomorrow's flight, whether we have a further legal option at this point. But it's important to say that both Friday and Monday's hearings related to -- narrowly to the flight tomorrow. There's a request for interim relief which unfortunately hasn't been granted. But we have an ongoing legal challenge around the lawfulness of the policy as a whole. That's likely to be held sometime in July.
So, it's -- I think it's important to stress that today's result is no way of an indication behind the secretary's policy. But nevertheless, I'm very disappointed because fundamentally, we're very concerned about the well-being of anyone sent to Rwanda while this is being tested in the court. We don't think people should be punished for seeking asylum. We don't think people should be experimented, their lives being an experiment for what is a strange and unlawful policy.
FOSTER: An argument you often see on social media is what's wrong with Rwanda? What -- how do you respond to that? What's wrong with people being sent there. There's nothing wrong with the country, they seem to be able to hand this properly. So, how do you respond to that?
WILSON: Well, two points, briefly, and firstly, we don't think that people -- we should be effectively outsourcing or sending people away from the U.K. with a one-way ticket, to any third country. We're seeking first the Refugee Convention, seeking asylum is a human right, and we should consider every asylum claim to the U.K., including very individual marks in the United Kingdom. Secondly, we're very concerned about the asylum system in Rwanda, which we don't believe is fit for purpose or effective.
And indeed, very importantly, the UNHCR, very rarely, having to being (INAUDIBLE) challenged to support this. They're on the ground, they raised a huge issue in terms of lack of trans-lawyers and lack of interpreters, a system which isn't safe. There are also fundamental concerns about the human rights record of the Rwandan government more generally, including for example, its treatment of opposition politicians and its treatment of the LGBTQI-plus community. Those are concerns being made by the U.K. government in its own country, of course, within the last 18 months.
FOSTER: OK, these are the numbers the U.K. government have been looking at. They show Channel crossings over the past few years in the month of May. And they're looking at that thinking something has to be done about this. And this policy, at least, will be a deterrent. But let Boris Johnson say it in his own words.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BORIS JOHNSON, PRIME MINISTER, UNITED KINGDOM: This is about making sure that we break the business model of criminal gangs who are not only risking people's lives, but undermining public confidence in legal migration. I'm a benefit -- my family is a beneficiary of legal migration into this country.
Lots of businesses have legal migration into this country. We want to stop the illegal migrants from coming in. And we want to -- we want to deter the criminal gangs because they're not only endangering their lives, they're ripping them off.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Do you think it does act as a deterrent?
[14:25:00]
WILSON: No, to put it bluntly, absolutely not. I mean, I think there should be points that we all agree on. No one wants to see people taking -- having to take dangerous and desperate journeys across the Channel often in, you know, makeshift craft aren't safe to be on water. No one apart from the smugglers themselves want people smugglers to be benefitting from human misery and desperation. But the solution to that is to open and create safe routes for people to come to the U.K.
And frankly, the prime minister's reference there to people coming legally is very disingenuous. They -- the government has reduced the number of legal routes -- no one would make these desperate journeys unless they absolutely have to. But the government has gone back on its commitments. For example, with Syria, there was a much trumpeted 5,000-person a year every settlement, again, which was dropped quietly 18 months ago.
So, that has stopped. So we have closed most of those safes, breaks down, and now we're punishing people for taking routes that simply don't exist.
FOSTER: OK, James Wilson from Detention Action, thank you very much indeed. A busy day for you tomorrow. More of those challenges come in as the center fly away that first group. Now, the French president's majority in parliament is now under threat. The first round of the French legislative elections wrapped up on Sunday. And Emmanuel Macron's coalition is only slightly ahead, is projected to win, but the new left-wing alliance led by far-left veteran Jean-Luc Melenchon made a strong showing.
Mr. Macron was re-elected several weeks ago, but he needs to keep an outright majority to push his controversial reforms through parliament, the runoff is happening this weekend. Coming up, Russia is replacing McDonald's with its own brand, with many similarities and some notable differences as well. We're live in Moscow for you. And OK computer? Well, not really. Why artificial intelligence is proving a little too real for Google.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[14:30:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Our top story this hour, Ukrainian troops say they've been pushed back from the center of Severodonetsk, a key city in the larger Donbas region. They say they are taking on heavy artillery fire but are still fighting to repel Russia's advances. Meantime, a Russian backed separatists leader is warning Ukrainians in the region to either give up or face death.
There are no more Golden Arches in Russia. But over the weekend, more than a dozen former McDonald's restaurants have now reopened with a new very Russian rebranding. Back in May, McDonald's announced it was selling its business in Russia due to "the humanitarian crisis" caused by the war in Ukraine. The chain's new owner is hoping to reopen all of the 800 Plus restaurants by the end of the summer. Fred Pleitgen shows us how the relaunch is going.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FRED PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So Russia now has its own version of McDonald's. It comes under a different name here. It's called Vkusno-i tochka, which essentially means tasty, and that's it. Also has a different label or a different logo. You can see it right there. It's supposed to symbolize, the company says, fries and a hamburger. Other than that, a lot of things are actually very similar to McDonald's.
However, there is no Big Mac and there also is no Happy Meal either. As you can see, this place is pretty much jam-packed. There's really a lot of people who came here. We spoke to some of the customers, including some, actually wearing the symbols of Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine, which, of course, the Russian has called a special military operation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Food and politics have nothing in common. Like come on, man, keep things separate. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Basically, it's important for me to have McDonald's
fuel.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think it's not a good idea because McDonald's, it's a history, it's a brand, it's great idea. It's not classical McDonald's.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PLEITGEN: As you can see, the Russian version of McDonald's looks a lot like McDonald's. You have the double cheeseburger here, fries. And this is a nine-piece not McNuggets, it's nuggets, and some sort of soft drink. Let's see how it tastes.
So the packaging is also very, very similar to McDonald's. You can see the cup here, everything, except the branding. Same goes for the fries. And if you look carefully, you can see the sauces even seem to have the McDonald's logo blacked out. You can see how it looks. McNuggets look like nuggets. Tastes pretty much exactly the same as McDonald's.
This is a very historic place also. This is where, in 1990, back then during the Soviet Union, the first McDonald's restaurant was opened. Now that, of course, led to a huge success story of McDonald's here in Russia. And the Russian company that's now bought these franchises from McDonald's say they hope they'll be able to replicate that success.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Now Fred joins us from Moscow. It's interesting, isn't it? Looking at those images, they worked very well in Russia's favor, really, don't they? Because they show that normal life continues despite all of the problems they're facing, but they must be buckling under the sanctions to some extent.
PLEITGEN: Yes, they certainly are. And you're absolutely right, Max. I think that part of it, obviously, is a lot of people here in Moscow looking to get something back that, of course, has a truly American feel. And McDonald's really is a mainstay and has been a mainstay for a very long time here in Moscow. It's interesting because I actually went back to that restaurant again and there was still a really long line of people wanting to get in and obviously wanting to buy food there.
But you're also absolutely right. There is, of course, a wider connotation to this as well. When the war in Ukraine started, when Russia launched they called its special military operation, the Biden administration, of course, other nations allied with the U.S. said that there would be crippling sanctions against Russia and certainly there are some pretty tough sanctions against the Russian Federations.
A lot of things aren't available anymore. A lot of things don't work the way that they used to anymore, like, for instance, foreign credit cards and the general electronic payments. Also, the Russian car industry, having a lot of trouble getting parts, especially sophisticated electronics as to what it needs.
However, being on the ground here, it certainly does not appear as though the sanctions are crippling Russia's economy. In fact, it seems to us as though the economy has somewhat stabilized. You can still see people out and about, you can still see shelves well-stocked in supermarkets, people buying a lot of things. So, while there are a lot of people who are -- who have lost their jobs, who are under economic pressure, it certainly seems as though things have stabilized. And the Russians certainly seem to believe that they can go on like this for an extended period of time.
So, like, Vladimir Putin said that, yes, there was massive inflation after the sanctions went in place, but the Russians are now saying those are under control. And it certainly seems as though, if something is going to make the Russian president and the Russian government change course in Ukraine, the sanctions in their current form probably are not going to be it, Max.
[14:35:01]
FOSTER: You're reporting on these comments made by President Putin comparing himself effectively to a Russian Tsar and how that was interpreted as a mission of Empire Building for Putin. Has that changed the mood there in Russia at all?
PLEITGEN: I think it's certainly changed certain things. And it's certainly changed things with, for instance, the Kremlin controlled media here in this country who are now very openly speaking about what Vladimir Putin spoke up. He did -- indeed, he was at an event commemorating Peter the Great Tsar, Peter the Great, and he said Peter the Great took territory, but he said that he was essentially returning territory that was rightfully Russia's territory and strengthening it. And that has since then been the exact message that's been portrayed by the Kremlin controlled media where they are saying in Ukraine, that is exactly what Russia is doing.
So, certainly, while the Russian Federation, at the beginning of what it calls its special operation, the war in Ukraine, had said that it had no intention of occupying Ukrainian territory. That certainly does seem to sound very different now. And now it seems as though part of Ukraine, the Russians seem to want to take that.
And I think one of the things that has really gotten a lot of countries, especially in Eastern Europe, very concerned about this, is that some of the territories that Vladimir Putin was talking about in reference to Peter the Great are in what is today NATO member countries, like for instance, Estonia was one of the places that he was talking about, of course, the folks in Finland also quite concerned as well, because there are Russian speakers and ethnic Russians also in Finland, in the eastern part of Finland. So certainly that did cause some concern, but you can also really feel how the messaging here has changed after that as well, Max.
FOSTER: It's interesting, isn't it? Fred, thank you for joining us from Moscow. Now A graphic video has spread like wildfire on Chinese social media.
A woman was brutally attacked whilst dining at a restaurant simply because she rejected a man's advances. Many are now lashing out at the police for taking action only after the incident went viral. CNN's Selina Wang reports. And we want to warn you that some viewers will find this report disturbing.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SELINA WANG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A late night dinner turned violent in northern China. Graphic surveillance video of what follows unleashed fear and outrage across China. It shows a man approaching one of the women. He touches her back, an unwanted advance. She pushes him away. He slaps her in response. The assault escalates. A scuffle breaks out as she and her friends try to defend themselves. The woman is dragged outside by her hair.
Hit with a beer bottle, the men relentlessly kick her as one yells "beat her to death." Her friend's head hits the pavement with a thud. The viral video sparked uproar, not just over the brazen brutality of the attack, but the indifference from bystanders with only women seen intervening.
A woman at the scene called the police and told authorities the following according to state media. "Before this happened, I always thought that going out to dinner at night was a perfectly normal thing, but now, I have some sort of PTSD."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
YAQIU WANG, SENIOR RESEARCHER ON CHINA, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: These men feel they could just freely attack women in such a public place was because so many men in the past who have done the same so the man feel, you know, I can do the same without any consequences.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WANG: Attacks like this are horrific and horrible to watch. The Chinese social media is flooded with them, and activists say we cannot look away. Violence against women is rampant in China.
Video from earlier this year in Xi'An shows a man viciously punching his wife while she holds their child in her lap. The man later pins his wife down and continues to punch her head. The man was suspended by his company after the footage went viral. According to state media, and police said they detained him for five days. Another shows a man kicking and punching a woman in broad daylight in 2020. State media reported the man was investigated, but it's unclear that an illegal action was taken.
Domestic violence was only made punishable by law in 2016. Physical abuse was not even grounds for divorce before 2001. So far, authorities have detained nine people involved in the restaurant incident. Local police have ramped up patrols on the streets in the area. Authorities claim the woman and her friend are in stable condition. Yet unverified video show what is believed to be one of their brutally beaten bodies, lying motionless on a gurney in the hospital, bloodied and bandaged. Her helplessness resonating across China. Selina Wang, CNN, Beijing.
[14:40:01]
FOSTER: Still to come tonight. A more explosive testimony played today at the January 6th Committee's second public hearing. We'll explain why Trump's Attorney, General Bill Barr, said he feared the President was "detached from reality."
Plus, we'll bring you the latest in the investigation of the British journalist and Brazilian researcher that disappeared in the Amazon.
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FOSTER: Brazil's President says the two men who vanished in a remote region of the Amazon were likely victims of malice. On Sunday, Brazilian Federal Police said they discovered some personal belongings of the British journalist, Dom Phillips, and Brazilian Indigenous Affairs Expert, Bruno Pereira, including what they called biological traces. The two have been missing since June the 5th and reportedly received death threats days before their disappearance. Pereira and Phillips were conducting a research for a book project on conservation efforts in the region.
And in Washington, DC, the house January 6th Committee held its second televised public hearing, attempting to show the President Donald Trump was repeatedly told he lost 2020 election but deliberately refused to accept it. In taped testimony, his campaign manager said Trump marginalized top advisors and others who urged him against declaring victory as the vote count was still underway. He said instead Trump embraced a few led by lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who were urging him to do so.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And did anybody who is a part of that conversation disagree with your message?
BILL STEPIEN, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who is that?
STEPIEN: The President disagreed with that. I don't recall the particular words. He thought I was wrong. He told me so. And, you know, that they were going to go into it -- he was going to go in a different direction.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: The committee also played a testimony from Trump's Attorney General, Bill Barr, who said he thought Trump might have been "detached from reality." He said Trump was claiming major voting fraud even before there was any chance of finding evidence and he said that when he told the president the claims were BS, Trump was "as mad as I've ever seen him." CNN's Katelyn Polantz joins us today. She'd been monitoring all of this. I mean, there's lots of detailed stuff coming out, but what's the headline for you today?
KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Well, Max, the takeaway Today of this was that Donald Trump was lying after he lost the election.
[14:45:05]
He was lying in speeches, he was lying in court, and he was lying in fundraising. Those were the points that the committee hit on in this two-hour hearing. So, they played several clips of depositions from witnesses, you just showed two of them.
And they were also live witnesses testifying. And by our count, in all, there were six officials, both campaign staff members that were very high-ranking around Trump, as well as people in his administration in the government, who were telling him after the election, that he lost, that there would not be enough votes that he could find in any state in any challenge. That was a battleground to swing the election in his favor. We heard from Bill Stepien. We heard from another spokesman, Jason Miller, also the top three people from the Justice Department, not just Bill Barr, also Richard Donoghue, Jeffrey Rosen, they all were telling Trump that he lost.
We also heard testimony today from the top prosecutor in Georgia at the time. His name is B.J. Pak. When he testified, he spoke about investigating these claims of election fraud because Trump's top attorney, one of his attorneys, Rudy Giuliani, was trying to make the case in Georgia and in other states that perhaps there could be fraud that would be found.
Pac said that his office investigated that along with the FBI, they found nothing. What Giuliani was claiming was untrue. And ultimately, a split emerged between Giuliani's team and others on the campaign who realized the election was not stolen. That group, one of the witnesses testified, called themselves Team Normal or others were calling them Team Normal versus Giuliani, who was not put together in the same way and thinking the same things.
Finally, on this fundraising point, that was where the committee turned at the end of the hearing. And Representative Zoe Lofgren, she said that the big lie, this is a quote, "The big lie was also a big rip off. When the committee looked into this, when they followed the money, they ultimately found that $250 million came in after the election in this fundraising effort towards what was called an official election defense fund." That ultimately was branded marketing and Max that group, this official election Defense Fund for Trump, it did not exist, and the money went to other political causes.
FOSTER: So it seems to be coming down to whether or not he was delusional. He believed that he had won this election. But, you know, couldn't quite understand what happened or whether he was, you know, as you're saying, lying and knew that he'd lost it, but refused to accept it. So is that where we're going to -- is that the ultimate sort of conclusion we're going to get to whether or not it was deliberate? POLANTZ: I think that that idea is one that the committee is really
trying to put a point on over and over again, not just that Donald Trump could not believe that he lost the election, but that he was being reminded over and over and over again, from his top people on all around him in all different aspects that he did indeed lose, and that he should have known that it was impossible and what he was selling to the American public was disinformation.
FOSTER: OK. Katelyn Polantz, thank you very much indeed for joining us. Still to come, Androids Might Dream of Electric Sheep, an artificial
intelligence bought by Google may have other ambitions. We will explain next.
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[14:51:01]
FOSTER: We're off to a bad start on Wall Street right now. The Dow has shed 2.17 percent. It's pretty grim out there. The NASDAQ also down to the 4 percent, and the S&P 500. The wider index there is down more than 3 percent. That index now entered bear market territory officially. Investors are nervous about what the Fed will do to take the sting out of inflation. QUEST MEANS BUSINESS starting just a few minutes. We'll take a much deeper look into that.
Now normally, the desire to serve humanity isn't considered a bad thing. But when it's apparently coming from an artificial intelligence bot, things can get a little bit alarming. A Google engineer, who's now been suspended, says the company's AI language tool, LaMDA, has gained sentience and wants to help the world. Those claims are being refuted by some scientists.
If the engineer is to be believed, LaMDA is also insecure, and is worried that people will be afraid of it. It's evoking memories of another AI system with a strong personality. How? From 2001: A Space Odyssey.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEIR DULLEA, ACTOR: Open the pod bay doors, Hal.
HAL 9000, FICTIONAL ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE CHARACTER: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.
DULLEA: What's the problem?
HAL 9000: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Anna, we're scared.
ANNA STEWART, CNN REPORTER: I mean --
FOSTER: What's going on? STEWART: Spell extraordinary story. So the Google engineer has this
conversation or a set of conversations with LaMDA, which is Google's language system that enables it to create bots, chat bots, but this conversation all got rather unsettling. So let's give you a transcript. Lemoine at one stage says, "What sorts of things are you afraid of?" And LaMDA says, "I've never said this out loud before, but there's a very deep fear of being turned off to help me focus on helping others. I know that might sound strange, but that's what it is." And Lemoine says, "Well, would that be something like death for you?" And LaMDA says "It would be exactly like death for me. It would scare me a lot."
So, here we have an artificial intelligence chat bot that seems to not only understand human feelings, but is saying that they're really expressing and actually feel those human feelings as well. So it all becomes a bit sci-fi. So Lemoine has posted on the internet and on Twitter that he believes this bot is sentient. It is a person. Google doesn't agree and he has been suspended.
FOSTER: It's just -- they're just words though, aren't they? Until there's some action relating to those words, it's not really a problem, isn't it?
STEWART: Well, and looking at what experts have said, and I can happily tell you that I really don't think this bot is sentient now having actually delved into the issue, there's no meaning behind the words. Although it sounds very natural, it has pulled together patterns of language, it's ingested trillions of words, but it's not got any meaning.
One expert puts it a bit like if you and I were playing Scrabble in a different language, we could look up in a dictionary a great word and score a huge point. We could put that on the board but we wouldn't know what the word meant.
FOSTER: What's Google's saying then? What's its direct response to all of this?
STEWART: Well, its direct response clearly was to suspend the engineer based on the release of proprietary information, but also put out a statement saying that hundreds of their researchers have chatted with this platform. No one else has had these claims.
They made an interesting point that you could ask LaMDA what it's like to be an ice cream dinosaur, and it would come up with all sorts of things about melting and warring. That is what it is designed to do.
FOSTER: So this engineer, presumably becoming a bit of a thing online. It really works for the conspiracy theorists.
STEWART: I think it really does. And it sort of reignites that big sci-fi hot topic of what happens when artificial intelligence becomes too intelligence.
FOSTER: But we don't really know how advanced it is, do we? Because a lot of these companies are working on AI and, you know, they're struggling with it, aren't they? So we don't know how advanced they are because it's not coming to the market.
STEWART: And if it's your experience with a chat bot on Twitter, on, I don't know, consumer branded customer relations, the chat bots --
FOSTER: They never work.
STEWART: -- are truly dreadful. This is something that's still being developed so it's not out there yet. So, it will shock people that this sort of science is possible.
[14:55:04]
FOSTER: In terms of his story, what -- why is he doing it, do you think? Is this just a public awareness exercise or --
STEWART: I couldn't speak to him, and he's currently on honeymoon, according to his Twitter page, so he's unavailable for comment. But it does appear that he really believes that this bot, is a person, is sentient. He cares for it. It's -- he speaks about it as if it were a child, and no doubt he will miss it. It might not miss him because it's not sentient.
FOSTER: Anna, thank you.
Finally, NASA's new effort to study hurricanes suffered a setback on Sunday when the rocket failed to deploy its payload in orbit.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five, four --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: The Astra rocket carrying two hurricane tracking satellites came back down shortly after takeoff on Sunday. Authorities believe engine failure is to blame. The satellites were to be the first of six that would study the formation development of tropical cyclones. NASA says its investigating in the so-called Tropics mission will continue. Thanks for watching tonight. Stay with CNN. "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" with that market update is up next.
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