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Ukraine's Difficult Task of Identifying Fallen Soldiers; Witnesses: Trump Pushed Justice Department to Overturn Vote; Rescue Workers Scrambling to Reach Afghan Quake Survivors; Rights Groups Criticize Junta after Suu Kyi Sent to Solitary Confinement; U.K. Prime Minister to Meet Prince Charles Amid Refugee Relocation Row. Aired 12- 12:45a ET

Aired June 24, 2022 - 00:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us all around the world. I appreciate your company. I'm Michael Holmes.

[00:01:24]

Just ahead here on the program, a moment of relief for Ukraine as the war-torn country is granted tentative status in its bid to join the European Union.

Also --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R-IL): Were any of the allegations he brought up found credible? Did you find any of them credible??

RICHARD DONOGHUE, FORMER ACTING DEPUTY U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Stunning testimony on Donald Trump's private conversations with U.S. Justice Department officials inside the former president's pressure campaign to try to overturn the 2020 election.

And the latest on the search for earthquake survivors in Afghanistan. We will have a live report for you.

ANNOUNCER: Live from CNN Center, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Michael Holmes.

HOLMES: As Russia's war grinds on in Eastern Ukraine, Brussels handed Kyiv some good news on Thursday. After weeks of exhaustive review, the European Council finally said OK to Ukraine becoming an official candidate to join the E.U.

For Ukraine, a reason for hope. European leaders quickly extending their congratulations and encouragement. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz tweeting, "27 times -- yes!"

The Polish prime minister calling it a great day for Europe.

E.U. candidate status was also granted to Moldova and conditional candidacy to Georgia. And all three former Soviet republics now embarking on a dream they shared for decades. European Commission president summed it up this way.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

URSULA VON DER LEYEN, EUROPEAN COMMISSION PRESIDENT: There can be no better sign of hope for the citizens of Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia in these troubled times. Of course, the countries all had to do homework before moving to the next stage of the accension process, but I am convinced that they will all move as swiftly as possible and work as hard as possible to implement the necessary reforms.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: As Ukraine got a political boost from the E.U., another military one coming from Washington. The U.S. says it's sending another $450 million worth of weaponry to Ukraine. And that includes more advanced rocket systems which can launch a barrage of rockets at targets more than 60 kilometers away.

The war is reaching a pivotal point now, with Russia slowly gaining ground in Eastern Ukraine. The White House says it's doing its share of heavy lifting to help Kyiv.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KIRBY, U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL COORDINATOR FOR STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS: This is the 13th time that President Biden has authorized a presidential drawdown package during this crisis, bringing the total amount security assistance that we've provided Ukraine to approximately $6.1 billion just since February 24. Approximately 6.8 billion since the beginning of this administration.

As President Biden told President Zelenskyy when they spoke last week, the United States will continue to bolster Ukraine's defenses in support of sovereignty and its territorial integrity.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now in addition to those advanced rocket systems, the new aid also includes 18 patrol boats, as well as artillery, ammunition and small arms.

But those weapons are not expected to be game changers on the battlefield, at least not right away. According to two U.S. officials, a new intelligence assessment expects the war in Eastern Ukraine to be long and brutal, with heavy casualties on both sides and that Russian forces are gaining an advantage as they learn from earlier mistakes.

[00:05:06] Meanwhile, Ukraine releasing this video of the grueling battle in Lysychansk. It shows burned-out cars, blown-up apartment buildings, even unexploded rockets embedded in the street.

Ukraine says the battle for the city and the neighboring Severodonetsk has reached a pivotal point. Ukraine has said it is losing up to 100 soldiers a day in the fighting, but in many cases, their remains are not even in a condition to be identified. A terrible situation, obviously, for their loved ones.

Salma Abdelaziz reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Inside each of these body bags is a John Doe, remains left in the ruins of the war for weeks that are too decomposed to be recognized.

But among them may be this man, Daniel Zofonov (ph). The 28-year-old policeman was among the fighters believed killed in Mariupol's Azovstal plant in early May. His sister is here to try and identify his remains.

"There was nothing left of him to recognize," she tells me. "For a month and a half, his body lay in the heat."

ABDELAZIZ: Those are pictures that he carried with him from his son.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): This is how she ID'd Daniel: drawings from his 6-year-old son, tucked in his pocket and somehow intact.

"I prayed to God every day that I would find him," she says. "The weight was unbearable. I feel calmer now that I can finally bury him."

Her relief is extremely rare.

ABDELAZIZ: Authorities have set up a hotline so families can call in, report a missing person, and then they're asked to give a DNA simple. After that, they have to hope for a match.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Inside the morgue, the complex process begins. Tissue is extracted from the deceased. A piece of bone is often the only option.

The samples are then sent to a lab, where analysts work to build a DNA profile. Of the nearly 700 unidentified so far cataloged, about 200 have been paired to the families, according to officials.

The chief forensic expert here is behind tens of those matches.

ABDELAZIZ: How long does it take for you to find one match?

STANISLAV MARTYNENKO, FORENSIC EXPERT: Well, it depends on how many DNA files we have in the database. The more profiles we have, the more matches we make. I guess it will take some years after the war will end to find all the unidentified human bodies. ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): But there are families that will never get

closure. Some bodies are too damaged to collect sufficient DNA.

"We have parents who tell us, I understand you cannot find my child, but at least bring me some of the dirt that they walked on from Mariupol to bury," she says.

The unbearable agony of never laying a loved one to rest.

Salma Abdelaziz, CNN, Kyiv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Well, now to Washington and some stunning testimony about Donald Trump's relentless pressure on the Justice Department to back his conspiracies and overturn the 2020 election.

The January 6th Committee heard from three former Trump administration officials who talked about the former president's demand to seize voting machines, declare the election corrupt, even investigate the bizarre claim that Italian satellites had changed votes from Trump to Biden.

The committee also heard about an Oval Office meeting where Trump wanted to replace his acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, with Jeffrey Clark, who backed his voter fraud claims.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONOGHUE: He said, So suppose I do this. Suppose I replace him, Jeff Rosen, with him, Jeff Clark. What would you do?

I said, "Mr. President, within 24, 48, 72 hours, you're going to have hundreds and hundreds of resignations of leadership of your entire Justice Department because of your actions. What's that going to say about you?"

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, the witness said every time they refuted Trump's election conspiracies, the president pushed back with another demand.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KINZINGER: You also noted that Mr. Rosen said to Mr. Trump, quote, "DOJ can't and won't snap its fingers and change the outcome of the election." How did the president respond to that, sir?

DONOGHUE: He responded very quickly and said, essentially, That's not what I'm asking you to do. What I'm just asking you to do is just say it was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, we've learned from testimony and emails that at least five Republican Congress members requested pardons after January the 6th.

[00:10:08]

The committee also played testimony from former attorney general William Barr, who said Trump's election conspiracies threatened the peaceful transfer of power.

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WILLIAM BARR, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: I think the fact that I put myself in the position that I could say that we had looked at this and didn't think there was fraud was really important to moving things forward.

And I sort of shudder to think what the situation would have been if -- if the position of the department was, we're not even looking at this until after Biden's in office. I'm not sure we would have had a transition at all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: More now from CNN's Manu Raju.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONOGHUE: He just told me, It's your job to seize machines, and you're not doing your job.

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Top justice officials testified about the lengths Donald Trump went to use the power of the federal government to pursue his conspiracy that the election was stolen, despite being told repeatedly there was no merit to his claims, Trump demanding they declare the election corrupt and leave the rest to him and members of Congress.

KINZINGER: Were any of the allegations he brought up found credible? Did you find any of them credible?

DONOGHUE: No.

RAJU (voice-over): Trump's pressure campaign was relentless.

JEFFREY ROSEN, FORMER ACTING U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Between December 23rd and January 3rd, the president either called me or met with me virtually every day.

RAJU (voice-over): All of it came to a head in a tense January 3 Oval Office meeting, when Trump threatened to replace acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen with Jeffrey Clark, a DOJ official who was willing to act on Trump's plan.

RUDY GIULIANI, FORMER ATTORNEY FOR DONALD TRUMP: I do recall saying to people that somebody should be put in charge of the Justice Department who isn't frightened of what's going to be done to their reputation.

RAJU (voice-over): But top DOJ officials balked, including then deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue.

DONOGHUE: I made the point that Jeff Clark is not even competent to serve as the attorney general. He's never been a criminal attorney. And I said, "That's right. You're an environmental lawyer. How about you go back to your office, and we'll call you when there's an oil spill?"

RAJU (voice-over): Clark even writing this draft letter to Georgia and other states where Trump lost, falsely claiming there was voter fraud and calling on them to convene special legislative sessions.

ERIC HERSCHMANN, FORMER WHITE HOUSE ATTORNEY: When he finished discussing what he planned on doing, I said, "Good (EXPLETIVE DELETED)." Excuse me, sorry. "'F'-ing 'A-hole, congratulations. You just admitted your first step you'd actually take as attorney general would be committing a felony and violating Rule 6C."

RAJU (voice-over): Clark, who had his house raided by the FBI on Wednesday morning, testified to the committee behind closed doors in February, but he took the fifth more than 100 times.

JEFFREY CLARK, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: It is an executive privilege, again, just restated for abundance of caution.

RAJU (voice-over): Trump only backed down from replacing Rosen with Clark when the top officials all threatened to resign in protest.

DONOGHUE: And the other A.G.'s began to chime in, in an internal memo, which essentially said they would leave. They would resign en masse if the president made that change in the department leadership.

RAJU (voice-over): Committee members today also revealing more information about the GOP lawmakers who sought a pardon, including Congressman Scott Perry, who played a central role pushing for Clark to be elevated in the Justice Department.

White House attorney Eric Herschmann saying he believes Congressman Matt Gaetz also was seeking a pardon.

HERSCHMANN: The pardon that he was discussing him requesting was as broad as you can describe, from the beginning -- from the beginning of time up until today. And he mentioned Nixon, and I said, "Nixon's pardon was never nearly that broad."

KINZINGER: The only reason I know to ask for a pardon is because you think you've committed a crime.

RAJU: Now, in addition to Perry and Gaetz, other Republican members apparently also asked for pardons. That includes Louie Gohmert; also Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs and Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Now, Marjorie Taylor Greene has denied this. The testimony that the committee showed was secondhand testimony, saying that they heard that Greene had asked for a pardon through the White House counsel's office. She has denied that. Others, though, have confirmed it, including Mo Brooks, the

congressman from Alabama who said that he had asked for a pardon, a blanket pardon for all Republicans who sought to challenge the election results, overturn the election results; because he said he was concerned that Democrats coming in would weaponize the Justice Department against their political enemies.

Manu Raju, CNN, Capitol Hill.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Ron Brownstein is CNN's senior political analyst and the senior editor for "The Atlantic." He joins me now from Los Angeles.

Always a pleasure, Ron. So let's talk about the testimony, a lot of it about Trump's pressure on the Department of Justice. The DOJ official, Jeffrey Clark, whose house was raided this week, by the way. His meeting with Trump, his effort to further the lies and so on. What struck you most about what you heard?

[00:15:07]

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, first of all, I thought today was the most dramatic, riveting, possibly consequential congressional testimony since John Dean, our CNN colleague now, testified before the Senate Watergate Committee as Richard Nixon's ex- White House counsel in 1973.

It was extraordinary from beginning to end. And among other things, the account of the January 3rd meeting, at which all of this came to a head, and then-President Trump's effort to impose his loyalist as attorney general, fire the acting attorney general. And the deputy general explains there would be potentially hundreds of resignations.

Michael, that felt like the Battle of the Bulge moment, at least for now, in American democracy. I mean, you could imagine that, if it had gone the other way --

HOLMES: yes.

Brownstein: If they have not been able to beat that back, we would have been plunged into chaos and a constitutional crisis, as Mr. Donoghue mentioned.

So I think just the magnitude, understanding that this was not just random violence on January 6th. This really underscores the initial comment from Liz Cheney. This was a multi-month, multi-pronged strategy to subvert the election, and we saw just how close it came to a significant advance in this -- in that meeting.

HOLMES: Yes. It really stood out that there were a few Jeffrey Clarks in the right places around the country. This could have all gone very differently.

One thing that struck me -- and we've been reporting on it a lot -- Trump telling these top Justice Department figures, quote, "Just say the election was corrupt, and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen."

When that type of evidence we've heard from the committee emerges, particularly when it comes to the former president, what pressure does that put on the Department of Justice? Because that sounds like an order.

BROWNSTEIN: I think -- look, right. I mean, he is basically telling his attorney general and deputy attorney general, Facts be damned, law be damned. You need -- you know, you need to step out and help me overturn this election.

And, you know, it goes to -- I mean, what this hearing today did, among other things, was continue the -- the accumulation of evidence. Through all these, it's pretty compelling.

That Donald Trump was told over and over again that he lost the election, that the claims of fraud were bogus, that the things that he was attempting to do, particularly in pressuring the states and vice president, Mike Pence, were against the law. That the course of action that John Eastman was pursuing, urging on him would lose, as Eastman himself acknowledged. I believe he said, nine-nothing at the Supreme Court.

And yet Trump pressed forward, making these demands of officials over and over again, in the knowledge that he lost. And that certainly, I think, you know, is an important legal consideration about his state of mind.

And you know, you talk about the pressure on these Justice Department officials, these Justice Department officials, under Trump, withstood the pressure, stood up to his pressure campaign. And I think, you know, they really actually put a strong contrast with both the Republican elected officials today, who are not stepping out and saying this was wrong, and also on their successors in the Justice Department --

HOLMES: Yes.

BROWNSTEIN: -- who asked whether what Donald Trump did was culpable, or a crime.

HOLMES: It certainly does expose the fragility of the American experiment and how easily this could have gone a different way. And I guess to that point, what about these members of Congress allegedly asking for preemptive pardons?

Matt Gaetz wanted one. Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs, Louie Gohmert, Scott Perry. All asking for pardons, apparently. And you know, even talk of a blanket pardon for anyone involved in January 6th and the vote.

What does that tell you? What does that tell you?

BROWNSTEIN: It tells me that this is not localized to Donald Trump, you know, that the effort to overturn the election and the willingness to subvert democracy, if that's what it takes to retain power, is now pretty broadly in effect in the Republican Party. I mean, people forget that two-thirds of the Republican state

attorneys general joined a lawsuit to throw out the votes in four states on what is clear, no evidence. Two-thirds of the Republicans in the House voted not to certify the election.

We have dozens of Republican candidates running in 2022 who are election deniers. In fact, there are Republican election deniers seeking the nomination to control the machinery of the 2024 election in every swing state that will decide the 2024 election.

And you still have two-thirds, three-quarters of Republican voters saying that the election was stolen from Trump.

I think all of this goes back to the core failure of the Republican -- the Republicans who know better to come out and basically join Cheney and Kinzinger and offer kind of confirming voices that say, Look, here's the evidence. This is what he did. This is a threat to democracy.

[00:20:04]

And as long as so few Republican elected officials refuse to do that, the deniers who really don't care whether it was true and simply want to retain power by any means necessary, they will continue to have the upper hand in the party.

HOLMES: Yes, yes. You make a great point, too. There are all these people being elected in key positions in various swing states. They could have a real hand in 2024. And --

BROWNSTEIN: This is not over.

HOLMES: Yes, exactly. Ron, good to see you, my friend. Thanks for that. Ron Brownstein there.

BROWNSTEIN: Thank you.

HOLMES: Well, the January 6th Committee has met behind closed doors with a British filmmaker who documented the final weeks of the Trump presidency.

Alex Holder's three-part series, "Unprecedented," will be released this summer. He told CNN's Don Lemon Trump called January 6th a sad day. But said the people who went to Washington were very angry about an election they believe was rigged.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALEX HOLDER, DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER: My position was, that, it was a staggering answer to that question. And so the idea of trying to see whether or not he may even potentially dilute his position, or change it wasn't for me to do. I asked the question; he gave me an answer. I'm not going to persuade him.

Do I think he's wrong? Of course. I think -- I think it was obviously a tragic event. And the fact that he called them smart, and also, I thought it was very interesting, was the fact that he used the word that he thought, you know, these people think the election was stolen. And that was also quite interesting, as well. Because why do they think that?

And for me, I feel that he's essentially admitting that the reason why they were there was because of the fact they believed in his position on the election.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Did he at any point acknowledge that he lost?

HOLDER: No. And I'll tell you something. When I interviewed him for the first time in the White House about a month after the election, I had this debate with -- with our director of photography, Michael, about whether or not the president actually believed that the election was rigged.

And I was of the opinion that, of course, he doesn't really believe the election is rigged. This is just sort of Donald Trump rhetoric. But after that interview, when he left, and I was now thinking about what had just happened, my entire position changed.

He absolutely, genuinely believes that he won and that the election was stolen from him.

LEMON: And in that moment, you changed your mind?

HOLDER: Absolutely. I changed my mind in the point that he didn't really believe it. My -- my conclusion was that Donald Trump genuinely believes that he won the 2020 presidential election. And that is terrifying!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, that documentary will be released on Discovery Plus, which is owned by the same parent company as CNN.

Now, a short time ago, the U.S. Senate passed the bipartisan gun safety bill, an attempt to address the plague of mass shootings right across the country. The final vote was 65-33, 15 Republicans joining Democrats to ensure final passage of the first major gun legislation in 30 years.

Gun safety advocates say it doesn't go nearly far enough, but it is a start. The bill now goes to the House, where Speaker Nancy Pelosi says it will be taken up first thing Friday morning.

Now, among the highlights, the bill advocates, allocates, rather, resources for mental health, crisis intervention, and school safety. It provides grants for states to enact red flag laws. And it closes the so-called boyfriend loophole, which had allowed some domestic violence offenders to buy and own guns.

Passage of the Senate bill came on the same day, though, that the U.S. Supreme Court dramatically struck down a New York state gun law that had been on the books for more than a century. In a 6-to-3 decision, basically along party lines, the court ruled

that New York's conceal carry law was unconstitutional, because it restricts who may carry a concealed gun in public, which was kind of the point of the law.

The stunning ruling is expected to have far-reaching impacts on hundreds of gun statutes already in effect, as well as any new laws that are passed in the future.

It brought a heated dissent from the liberal justice Stephen Breyer, who blasted the ruling as short-sighted. He wrote this, quote: "I fear that the court's interpretation ignores the significant dangers and leaves States without the ability to address them."

New York state officials, for their part, were livid after the decision was handed down and immediately vowed to fight back in the state legislature. Here's New York City Mayor Eric Adams with his reaction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR ERIC ADAMS (D), NEW YORK CITY: We cannot allow New York to become the wild, wild West. The decision ignores the shocking crisis of gun violence every day, engulfing not only New York, but engulfing our entire country.

[00:25:11]

The opinion claims to be based on nation's historical past but does not account for the reality of today. It ignores the present, and it endangers our future.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: The current New York law is still in effect, pending action by lower courts.

Humanitarian agencies are scrambling to get aid to a remote area of Afghanistan. Coming up, we will have a live report on the earthquake that has devastated parts of the nation, leaving more than 1,000 people dead.

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HOLMES: It has been two days since a powerful earthquake devastated parts of Afghanistan, killing more than 1,000 people, and rescue workers are struggling to reach survivors.

Humanitarian agencies are trying to get aid into the area, but many of the devastated villages are remote and difficult to reach.

However, the U.N. refugee agency says it successfully dispatched humanitarian aid to cover the needs of about 4,000 people. Officials say more than 2,500 houses were destroyed after the quake struck in the early morning hours on Wednesday on the coast and Paktika provinces. CNN's Vedika Sud is in New Delhi covering this. She joins me now with the latest. Of course, there are a lot of access issues, communications issues, roads. What are the main challenges right now?

VEDIKA SUD, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Michael, the official death toll still stands at 1,000. We're still expecting that death toll number to rise in the coming hours and days.

But I want to start with this video that has been shared by IFRC. You can get an aerial view of the destruction of the Gaon (ph) village in the Paktika province.

Now, the Paktika province is one of the severely impacted regions in the Eastern part of Afghanistan near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

What you see here are homes that have been completely destroyed by the powerful earthquake. We know from the locals and the aid agency officials in the area who have reach, some of them that as of now, that people have had to sleep out in the open. They have no shelter. They have no roofs over their heads.

I now want to go to another image shared by UNICEF in Afghanistan, of this young man. He sits on top of a pile of rubble. Again, in the Gaon (ph) village, in the Paktika province.

Michael, we don't know his name. We don't know how old he is. But he is the face of helplessness, of the desperation people there feel at this point while they wait for aid to reach them.

A quick word on the aid and relief ops in the area. We do know that the UNHRC, UNICEF and the World Food Programme have been able to dispatch aid to these people. But there are a lot of challenges they're facing at this point.

Firstly, and most importantly, we're all aware of how the international community has been hesitant to deal with the Taliban. And because of that interaction being very minimal at this point, there are communication gaps when it comes to rescue ops and getting relief material to these people.

We've also spoken to analysts inside Afghanistan. One of them has told CNN that whatever has been taken to these areas will take a lot of time to get there. This is patchwork as of now, he says. This is just a band-aid kind of solution. There has to be a long-term solution to this problem.

We all know about the conflict in this area. And these people, essentially, have been suffering for decades. There's not enough infrastructure in the area. There's not enough money to save them from natural calamities like earthquakes, and these people wait for that aid to get them as we speak, Michael.

HOLMES: All right. Vedika Sud covering (ph) things for us. We'll check back in with you next hour. Thanks for that.

[00:30:04] Now, we are receiving word of stunning losses for Boris Johnson's conservatives in a pair of British by-elections. Labour took the Wakefield seat by a 12 percent margin. And a Liberal Democrat won the Tiverton and Honiton by-election by a whopping 30 percent. The swings were incredible.

These are losses that cast even more doubt over the scandal-plagued prime minister's political future.

Now, there's much more to come on CNN, including reaction to Myanmar's deposed leader being put in solitary confinement ahead of another trial. My discussion with the U.N. special rapporteur coming up.

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HOLMES: Human rights organizations and aid agencies are condemning Myanmar's transfer of former leader Aung San Suu Kyi to solitary confinement.

Seventy-seven-year-old Suu Kyi has been under house arrest since the military coup in February last year. But Myanmar's junta moved the Nobel Peace Prize laureate to separate confinement, as they put it, in prison earlier on Thursday.

She's being held on at least 20 other criminal charges, and her lawyers, who are under a gag order, can only meet with her on trial days.

The United Nations special rapporteur on Myanmar called for swift action.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM ANDREWS, U.N. SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR FOR MYANMAR: The longer we wait, the more inaction there is, the more people are going to die, the more people are going to suffer. And the people of Myanmar just can't take another year of inaction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: And Tom Andrews joins me now from Kuala Lumpur.

It's good to see you again, sir. Tell us, first of all, about what you see as the significance of this latest move of Aung San Suu Kyi to solitary in jail. And what do we know about how she is?

ANDREWS: Well, Michael, you know, this is part of what I -- what I think is a doubling and tripling down on -- by the military junta on their strategy of fear and terror in the population.

They've launched a scorched-earth strategy, attacking, literally, and burning to the ground villages and homes of those who are their opponents. There are now 14,000 prisoners now in prison, not as -- as visible as Suu Kyi, but in prison, nonetheless.

They have detained over 1,400 children. And among them, 61 children are being held hostage so that they can grab their -- their parents who remain at large.

[00:35:04]

So this regime is deeply unpopular in the country. The economy is in freefall. Half the population is now below poverty level. And the basic institutions are all collapsing. Education, health care.

Thirty-nine thousand children are going to die this year alone from preventable diseases in Myanmar, because they have not received their routine immunizations. So it is a complete disaster.

HOLMES: Yes. It all seems rather dire. When it comes to Aung San Suu Kyi, I mean, she's 77 years old now. She's already been sentenced to 11 years, and there is this raft of other criminal charges issued by the junta. How do you view those charges and the junta's reasoning for her detention in the first place?

ANDREWS: Well, they're all preposterous. This is not a system of justice. In fact, it is exactly the opposite. This is just a bizarre theater that's going on.

And somehow, they're trying to -- try to justify her detention and the detention of thousands of others on the pretense that they have violated the law. These are trumped-up charges. No one takes them seriously.

A judicial process is completely opaque. These trials are taking place enclosed prisons. It is a sham; it's ridiculous. And no one should take it seriously.

But, of course, the fact that she is in prison for who knows how long and 14,000 others are in prison. And remember, just last week, they announced that those who are in prison who are now on death row, that they're going to begin their executions.

So it is a response that they go back to their -- their fundamental safe spot in terms of their own view. They do what they do best. They strike fear and terror into the minds and hearts of the population. And I think that's what is going on when you take a visible person like Aung San Suu Kyi and you throw her into solitary confinement and just keep adding charges to her portfolio of charges.

HOLMES: Yes, of course, she is the sort of face of the opposition, of the democracy movement, such as it was.

To the point of not just her but all the others that you mentioned, is the international community doing enough about not just her situation but the situation of all those you talk about in jail in Myanmar? What more should be done?

ANDREWS: Well, the short answer to your question, Michael, is no. The international community is not.

And when you look at the incredible robust response of the international committee to Ukraine, you get a sense of what could be done if there was political will. Nations all around the world applying very strong economic sanctions,

diplomatic, political pressure to try to address that crisis. All of which is simply loosened here in Myanmar.

I'm here in Kuala Lumpur. I've been meeting with officials here. The foreign minister and I met. And Malaysia, think goodness, is trying to take a step forward in this region, saying that ASEAN needs to take a much stronger stand and transform what they've been doing up to this point, which is very, very little, into action, a strategic action plan.

He says ASEAN needs to go from this position of -- of non-interference to a position of taking action. And this is what I think could make a big difference, if the foreign minister of Malaysia can take his diplomatic influence and try to move ASEAN forward.

But it's going to take a lot, but there's not a lot of time, because the entire nation is collapsing before our very eyes.

HOLMES: Yes. Yes, and it should not be hidden from view. And it's important it gets the attention that it deserves.

Tom Andrews, got to leave it there. Thank you so much, as always.

ANDREWS: My pleasure. Thank you.

HOLMES: Still to come here on CNN NEWSROOM, Britain's Prince Charles in Rwanda to meet with commonwealth leaders. Find out why his upcoming sit-down with the British prime minister could get testy. We'll be right back.

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HOLMES: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Prince Charles, and Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, have a busy set of meetings and receptions in the coming hours in Kigali in Rwanda.

They're attending the Commonwealth Leaders' Summit in that East African nation amid a row over the prime minister's plan to send asylum seekers from Britain to Rwanda.

CNN's royal correspondent, Max Foster, with the story from Kigali.

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MAX FOSTER, CNN ROYAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, took center stage at the Commonwealth meeting on Thursday to press leaders to step up their efforts to prevent domestic violence.

CAMILLA, DUCHESS OF CORNWALL: Ladies and gentlemen, we are gathered here for one purpose: to find solutions. It is surely significant that every single member state has unanimously agreed to support the Commonwealth's NO MORE campaign and implement initiatives to prevent domestic violence and sexual abuse.

FOSTER: In the audience, Carrie Johnson, wife of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who has his own separate meetings lined up with Prince Charles on Friday that could be more testy.

Johnson's government is pressing ahead with a policy to send some asylum seekers arriving in the U.K. to Rwanda for processing and possible resettlement.

FOSTER: You're meeting Prince Charles tomorrow. He has reportedly called the policy poor. How will you convince him otherwise?

BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: I think that, you know, anybody who comes in -- and delighted that Prince Charles and everybody is here today, to see a country that has, I think, undergone a complete transformation.

FOSTER: You defend it?

JOHNSON: Yes, I mean, it hasn't come up so far. But of course.

FOSTER (voice-over): Prince Charles carried out his own set of engagements on Thursday, focused on environmental issues, ahead of his bilaterals with Johnson and other Commonwealth leaders on Friday.

Clarence House said it won't be commenting on supposed remarks made in private, except to say that the prince is politically neutral.

Max Foster, CNN, Kigali, Rwanda.

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HOLMES: Before we go, a look at the first official portrait of Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge. The royal couple visited the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England, on Thursday, where the portrait is on display.

The oil painting shows them gazing off into the distance, with Catherine wearing the emerald dress she wore on a trip to Dublin back in 2020.

The artist, Jamie Coreth, says he wanted to show them looking both relaxed and approachable, as well as elegant and dignified.

Thanks for spending part of your day with me. I'm Michael Holmes. You can follow me on Twitter and Instagram, @HolmesCNN. Stick around. I'll have more news in 15 minutes. WORLD SPORT, though, after the break.

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