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U.S. to Begin Aid Airdrops; Israel Stifles Gaza Relief Effort; Disease Outbreaks in Gaza Due to Lack of Health Care; Alexei Navalny Laid to Rest; Ukraine Struggles to Hold Counteroffensive Gains; Record Low Turnout Expected as Polls Close in Iran; Argentina Politics; Lone Orca Kills Great White; Great Barrier Reef Recovery Efforts. Aired 3- 4a ET
Aired March 02, 2024 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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LYNDA KINKADE, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world. I'm Lynda Kinkade and this is CNN NEWSROOM.
Coming up, U.S. President Joe Biden is calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza as he pledges to airdrop aid to Palestinians.
Russians defy the Kremlin as they pay their respects to opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
And just when will Donald Trump's criminal cases go to trial?
Hearings that could impact the timing are held in courtrooms in Florida and Georgia.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Lynda Kinkade.
KINKADE: U.S. President Joe Biden is calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. He says he's trying to work out a deal that would see hostages returned to Israel in exchange for at least a six-week pause in fighting. But he warns that Israel and Hamas might not reach an agreement by Monday as he had initially hoped.
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QUESTION: Do you think there will be a ceasefire deal by Ramadan?
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm hoping so. We're still working real hard at it. Not there yet.
QUESTION: What is -- what is the biggest holdup right now?
BIDEN: I'm not going to tell you that because that again involved in negotiations.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: President Biden says the U.S. will soon join countries like Jordan, airdropping aid into Gaza. On Friday, Jordan flew three airdrop missions over Gaza City. On Thursday, as people swarmed aid trucks to get food, witnesses say Israeli troops opened fire.
The death toll from Thursday's aid convoy tragedy is now 115, according to the Gaza ministry of health. Many were shot, others were trampled in the chaos or even run over by trucks. Palestinians and Israelis don't agree on exactly what caused the chaos. CNN's Jeremy Diamond is in Tel Aviv with more on the critical aid situation in Gaza.
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JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Thursday's incident is certainly shining a spotlight on the dire humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, particularly in northern Gaza.
The World Food Programme now warning that more than 0.5 million Gazans are on the brink of famine. And we've seen as very few aid trucks have made their way into northern Gaza, leading exactly to scenes like we saw on Thursday.
Thousands of people crowded around and then rushing, swarming those aid trucks, trying to get what they could in order to survive. Aid to the Gaza Strip actually declined over the course of the last month by about half.
That is being fueled by those stringent Israeli inspection measures to get those trucks in but also a lack of security for those aid convoys, particularly amid reports that the Israeli military has targeted Palestinian police forces around those aid convoys.
And so multiple countries now stepping up their aid efforts. President Biden on Friday announcing that the United States will join what we've seen in recent days, which is multiple countries airdropping aid into the Gaza Strip.
But we know that this is really a drop in the bucket because those planes are not capable of delivering as much aid as humanitarian aid trucks crossing by land directly into northern Gaza.
And we've seen, as some of those airdrops have delivered, similar scenes, with people fighting over the very few aid that we've seen actually arrive. Now, amid all of this, countries are still calling for an investigation into what happened on Thursday.
This incident in which, as the Israeli military admits itself, they did indeed fire into a crowd near this aid convoy that was coming in. The French and German foreign ministers each calling for investigations and the United States also saying that it is asking questions. It's still not clear why Israeli troops opened fire. That is one of
the key questions beyond the fact that they've said that there were people approaching their forces in a threatening manner. We don't have many more details beyond that.
But now, of course, the question will be, how will this impact those ongoing negotiations for a temporary ceasefire?
President Biden expressing concerns that it will complicate those talks. That much remains to be seen -- Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Tel Aviv.
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KINKADE: While Palestinians in Gaza are facing the very real possibility of famine, warehouses full of food and medical supplies, rice, wheelchairs and other basics, sit idle in neighboring countries. Our Nima Elbagir has our exclusive investigation into why this aid isn't making it its way into Gaza.
But I need to warn you, some of the images you're about to see are disturbing.
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NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Pallets of food aid with messages of love.
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Air-dropped into Gaza for a desperate population. This is a Jordanian flight with more countries looking to join the aid effort. Among them, the U.S. But this isn't a good news story.
On the ground, a glimpse of how much more is needed to keep starving Gazans from falling into famine. Air drops are inefficient and expensive. You just can't drop enough food for a starving population. To stave off famine, you need thousands of trucks filled with food flooding into Gaza.
But that's not happening. We were granted rare access to this warehouse in Jordan, one of the key waypoints for aid, now a chokepoint.
ELBAGIR: All of the aid that you see here is sorely needed in Gaza. But it's still waiting for clearance.
Why?
Well, CNN spoke to dozens of humanitarian workers and donor government officials, who detailed arbitrary Israeli restrictions on aid, often with little to no explanation, impeding a multibillion-dollar humanitarian effort, even as Gazans are desperate to receive it.
ELBAGIR (voice-over): About 1,000 trucks' worth of essential medical aid and food supplies meant for Gaza, collecting dust and waiting to be cleared by Israeli officials. ELBAGIR: I mean, these are baby wipes.
MARWAN AL-HENNAWY, JORDANIAN HASHEMITE CHARITY ORGANIZATION: Yes.
ELBAGIR: Why are you still waiting for permission on baby wipes?
AL-HENNAWY: I don't know.
ELBAGIR: I mean, you have bandages.
AL-HENNAWY: Yes.
ELBAGIR: We're coming up over here, you've got wheelchairs, crutches. In that kind of war situation --
AL-HENNAWY: Yes.
ELBAGIR: -- these are really, really important things for people -- medicines, vitamin C over here.
AL-HENNAWY: Yes. Yes. And this is what we think -- what we believe, it is a crucial need that needs to be sent immediately to Gaza. There's no excuse why it's still in our warehouse.
ELBAGIR (voice-over): It's not just here that they're confused. Previously, Israel has said it's restricting military use items and provided a list. Now humanitarians tell CNN, they have not received an update. So they're relying on guesswork.
CNN has obtained documents from three major participants in the humanitarian operation, a ghost list, compiled by organizations piecing together the most frequently rejected items.
Among them anesthesia, crutches, generators, water purification tablets and filtration systems, solar panels, ventilators, tent poles, X-ray machines and oxygen cylinders.
Publicly, the Israeli government agency, COGAT, claims that it has abided by a 2008 banned items list. In private, COGAT has said that that document is now obsolete, according to a humanitarian official in direct contact with the Israeli unit. The human cost of miscalculating is immeasurable.
For months now, even one rejected item means trucks like these filled with aid can be turned back, even after waiting for days to get into Gaza.
And on the ground, the reality is that, without these critical supplies, people like Dr. Ghassan Abu-Sittah, a renowned war surgeon, are working in conditions even he has never seen.
DR. GHASSAN ABU-SITTAH, BRITISH-PALESTINIAN SURGEON: Because we didn't have any antiseptic, I had made a solution of washing-up liquid and vinegar and some saline. And so, I would have to pour that over the wound and then scrub the wound down. It's probably the most -- the darkest moment of my life because you're
doing it -- the patient is screaming, the child is screaming, knowing that, if you hadn't, that child would be dead by the end of the day.
ELBAGIR (voice-over): Dr. Abu-Sittah's experience in Gaza is not unique. What you're about to see here is very disturbing. With very little basic medicine, doctors are making decisions they never thought they would have to make.
DR. HANY BSAISO, ORTHOPEDIC SURGEON (from captions): Without anesthesia. Where is the mercy?
ELBAGIR (voice-over): Dr. Hany Bsaiso turned his kitchen into an operating theatre to save his niece's life after she says she was hit by an Israeli tank in her house. He amputated her leg with a kitchen knife without anesthetic.
BSAISO (from captions): She's like my daughter. I am cutting off her leg.
ELBAGIR (voice-over): Ahed Bsaiso miraculously survived. At just 18, she has already experienced enough pain for a lifetime.
When aid does come into Gaza, thousands gather, clambering onto the trucks, even as Israeli gunfire rings out. Torn between fear and hunger, over 100 killed and hundreds more injured.
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Yet, you can see here, people still clinging to what little they manage to get. The Israeli army says it's not responsible for what happened here. But as our investigation shows, at the very least, Israel created the conditions for this tragedy -- Nima Elbagir, Al- Zarqa, Jordan.
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KINKADE: Chessa Latifi is deputy director of Emergency Preparedness and Response at Project HOPE and joins us from Los Angeles.
Good to have you with us.
CHESSA LATIFI, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, PROJECT HOPE: Thank you for having me.
KINKADE: So you have colleagues working in Gaza.
How many are on the ground right now and what are they telling you about the conditions?
LATIFI: We have about 30 national staff right now that are in Gaza, plus an additional two teams of emergency medical staff that are specifically trauma surgeons and emergency medical doctors and nurses that are currently in Gaza. And what they're telling us is absolutely horrific. Every morning, it's waking up and making sure that everyone has
survived. But what they're telling us is what everyone is saying. They are out of food. There is not water. The lack of health care access is severe and also just how incredibly dangerous everything is.
KINKADE: And can you describe for us the amount of food coming into Gaza now compared to what entered before the war?
LATIFI: Before the war, about 500 aid trucks were coming into Gaza daily. And right now, I think the average is probably around 90 to 95. And so it's a significantly lower amount while they need a significantly higher. And it just does not meet -- it does not meet the needs that we have right now.
KINKADE: Of course, we know that Israel has blocked some aid from entering by land, pushing France, Jordan, other countries to bring it in by air. The U.S. president announced on Friday that America was sending airdrops.
What sort of problems can occur when you have an airdrop?
LATIFI: An airdrop is chaotic. It is dangerous. We know that the people in Gaza are starving, that they don't have enough water, that they don't have the basic necessities. And so there's this increasingly desperate situation.
And just dropping aid into Gaza without a coordinated mechanism of delivery is -- it's inefficient. Again, it is dangerous. It is not the way that we should be able to deliver the aid that the Palestinians in Gaza need.
KINKADE: Yes.
And, of course, it's not just the bloodshed and the disease but also trauma survivors have been living this hell in Gaza for months, right?
LATIFI: Yes. Yes, the mental health issues that are happening now and will happen in future are tremendous. And you have an entire generation of Gazans that are now growing up in war. Most of them are now displaced from their homes. They are not in school. They may have lost family members.
It's absolutely traumatic. I think it's something that most of us cannot imagine. And the effects are going to be around for generations.
KINKADE: Give us an indication if you can of how much aid is sitting on the border of Egypt and Gaza.
And what more can Egypt do, to facilitate the transfer of aid?
LATIFI: There is somewhere around 1,500 trucks that are sitting at the border, at the border between Gaza and Egypt right now. Project HOPE was just able to get in around nine tons of medical supplies this week. But we've been working on that for months. It has been sitting in
Cairo airport for months. The mechanisms to import and to move items over to Gaza have been changing on the inside (ph) but also it's very difficult to get them through Israeli security into Gaza as well.
And so there really just needs to be a set mechanism, a set protocol, that is not changing and that is efficient and moves quickly so that we're able to get the things that the Gazans need into the country.
KINKADE: And of course, it's not just the war and malnutrition. Many people are also suffering because of disease. Talk to us about the number of people dying because of disease right now.
LATIFI: The health needs are absolutely tremendous. There's no access to primary health care. There's no access to emergency health care. Women are giving birth in the streets and in tents without the capacity to -- for health facilities to help them and to have a C- section and to stay in hospitals. It's just not there.
Lack of health care is a serious, serious issue. The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine at Johns Hopkins put out a study earlier this week.
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That said that if the war stopped today, if there was a ceasefire today, still 11,500 people would die of hunger and disease.
KINKADE: It's just horrific. Chessa Latifi, we appreciate the work you and your team are doing on the ground in Gaza. Thanks so much for your time.
LATIFI: Thanks for having us.
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KINKADE: Well, many Russians braving the cold and the risk of a police crackdown to pay their respects at the grave of opposition leader Alexei Navalny a day after his funeral. Thousands of people showed up as he was laid to rest Friday, an open act of defiance to the Kremlin.
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KINKADE (voice-over): Navalny's supporters chanted his name and some called president Vladimir Putin a killer. That's despite a heavy police presence and the threat of detention.
The monitoring group says more than 100 people were arrested while attending memorials for Navalny across Russia. But his supporters say it's worth the risk.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Alexei Navalny is the man who gave us hope that Russia could be a different country, that we deserve better. His faith in us, his optimism gave us energy. He is the man who gave us hope that Russia could be a happier country.
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KINKADE: These are live pictures. As you can see, its just after 11 in the morning on Moscow, the day after Alexei Navalny's funeral. And you can see there just all the flowers that have been laid. People still coming out to pay their respects. CNN's Matthew Chance was at the site of Navalny's funeral in Moscow and he filed this report.
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MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CHIEF GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came in their thousands to pay their last respects.
Supporters of the late Russian opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, lining up outside the Moscow church ahead of his funeral, an act of bravery and defiance in a country where dissent, even grief for a Kremlin critic, is rarely tolerated.
CHANCE: Let me ask you about the risks because the authorities have not particularly welcomed this event. People have been detained for paying their respects to Alexei Navalny.
Are you concerned about the risk you are taking?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
CHANCE: Why?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because it's my slogan, not to think about risks, do what you should do.
CHANCE: Do you hold Putin responsible for the death of Alexei Navalny?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, yes, definitely, no doubt. No doubt.
CHANCE (voice-over): The Kremlin denies it. They say that --
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, they said.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If they ever say and agree with what they have done, then I would be the first to applaud.
CHANCE: All right, well, this is the hearse, the van, which is taking the body of Alexei Navalny into this church on the outskirts of Moscow, where Russia will finally bid farewell to one of its most prominent opposition figures.
You can see thousands of people from all over the region have turned out to pay their respects, clapping as his body enters for that funeral service.
Are you surprised that the authorities have allowed this funeral to go ahead? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know what to say about it, because I think it would be a huge mistake to not allow it to do it, because there's so many people and they came here to pay the last respect to Alexei.
And Alexei for us and, for me personally, was like, I don't know, Russian Nelson Mandela or Russian Martin Luther King. So ..
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CHANCE: People are chanting his name now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. His last name.
CHANCE (voice-over): Death may have silenced Navalny but his name is now on everyone's lips. Inside the church, the funeral service was short; no political speeches, just blessings over his open casket.
Later at the cemetery, Navalny's distraught parents kissed their 47- year-old son goodbye. His wife and children, concerned for their own safety, stayed away. But so many came in their place.
Outside, crowds of mourners waited patiently for a last glimpse, for the cemetery gates to open and for Russian police, on close guard here, to finally wave them through.
CHANCE: All right, well, this is the site inside the cemetery and the memorial to Alexei Navalny. People are coming here to lay their flowers. And as you can see and also to file past the actual grave site which is there.
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People are picking up soil and throwing it into the ground onto the casket as a final farewell to that opposition figure.
CHANCE (voice-over): A figure who, in death, as in life, is drawing thousands of Russians, critical of the Kremlin, onto the streets -- Matthew Chance, CNN, Moscow.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: Mourners around the world showed solidarity with those inside Russia as tributes and memorials to Navalny appeared in many cities.
The gates of the Russian embassy in London were covered in flowers. People left signs too, one reading, "You can kill Navalny but not the opposition."
Mourners also gathered in Spain, dozens coming together in Barcelona to pay their respects to the dissident.
And this was the scene in Berlin, Germany's chancellor celebrated Russians who turned out for Navalny's funeral, saying they, quote, "took a big risk for freedom."
For more, we're joined by Sebastian Shukla from Berlin. Good to have you with us. So talk to us about the importance of
Germany in Navalny's life.
SEBASTIAN SHUKLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Lynda. For Germans and for Alexei Navalny, Germany was a place that was very close to his heart because, don't forget, when he was poisoned in August 2020, he was flown on a private jet directly from Russia to the German capital, where he then spent several weeks.
In a hospital here in Berlin while doctors ran tests to try and figure out what exactly had happened to him, the diagnosis then came that he had been poisoned with that nerve agent, Novichok.
Now once he was well enough to leave hospital again, he left and he convalesced in southern Germany, which is where he began the investigation that ultimately uncovered and where CNN joined him and conducted his last news interview to level the accusations that the Russian government was behind his poisoning.
So the pictures that we saw yesterday evening, of mourners gathering in the German capital, were particularly poignant. And it was a very somber mood. People there were hugging, there were tears. Children were even laying flowers.
But I spoke to a couple of people there who told me that they had watched the events unfold in Moscow yesterday and albeit's an incredibly sad and somber moment for Russia in general, the outpouring of grief and the number, the sheer number of people, who came out to say goodbye to Alexei Navalny, was important within itself.
And they said to me that they actually felt that it showed that potentially Russia does have a future and that there are people who are still prepared to protest against the government -- Lynda.
KINKADE: Yes, the scenes coming from Moscow, where it's truly just incredible. Of course, someone who wasn't there was Navalny's widow. She didn't attend his funeral because of fears for her own safety.
Will she continue his mission?
SHUKLA: Yes, we don't know where Yulia Navalnaya, Alexei Navalny's widow, watched the proceedings yesterday. But she will continue to be -- and she has already made it clear that she will be the main part of carrying on Alexei Navalny's legacy.
And we we've seen her already picking up that mantle by -- she met with President Biden, for example, and she spoke in the European Parliament in Strasburg earlier this week.
But one of the most poignant moments of yesterday, of which there were many, was a particularly moving tribute from Yulia Navalnaya, where she actually hinted about the process and what steps may come next. I'm going to read a portion of it to you.
"I don't know how to live without you but I will try to make you happy up there for me and proud of me. I don't know if I can handle it but I will try."
And the trying element of that is key, Lynda, because I think that she will try now to pick up the mantle of Alexei Navalny and to drive on his message. After all, she does share a similar, if not the same surname, to Alexei Navalny -- Lynda.
KINKADE: Right. Sebastian Shukla, we appreciate you. Thanks so much for joining us.
Straight ahead, we'll go to the front lines in Ukraine, where the country's military is fighting to hold its ground, outgunned and outnumbered against Russian forces.
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KINKADE: Well, Ukraine has signed a major security agreement with the Netherlands as fighting intensifies on the front lines. Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the deal includes about $2 billion in military aid from the Netherlands this year, with more assistance spread out over the next decade.
The Netherlands also agreed to support Ukraine's bids to join the E.U. and NATO. On the front lines, Russian forces are pounding areas of Eastern Ukraine. The commander of Ukrainian forces in the region acknowledged Russia has achieved some local successes but said Ukraine's defensive line was holding.
Ukrainian soldiers tell CNN they're very much counting on the U.S. to come through with more military aid, which is currently stalled by Republicans in Congress. Ammunition shortages are making it harder for Ukraine to hold its ground against Russia's advances. CNN's Nick Paton Walsh reports.
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NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Not even tree cover means safety. They're firing to defend the tiny gains of Ukraine's counteroffensive. But now, they are outgunned by Russian troops trying to surge forward. You can hear how many shells they fire back.
No U.S. aid means Ukrainians risk losing, right here, right now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (from captions): 401 -- target infantry. High explosive around.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (from captions): Roger that. Targeting.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (from captions): One round, fire. WALSH: they feel like they're fighting really with one hand behind their back, such a shortage of shells here. They get to do that, if they're lucky, about 10 times a day.
WALSH (voice-over): Back in the summer counteroffensive, they would fire 80 a day.
WALSH: The cat is called Diva (ph).
WALSH (voice-over): Down in the bunker, it is strange to hear men who live underground to avoid death be so familiar with Republican procedural dysfunctionality.
ANTON, UKRAINE'S 65TH MECHANIZED BRIGADE (from captions): I hardly understand the Republican policy on aiding Ukraine. The biggest issue is lack of ammunition and the tiredness of soldiers. Most of my guys spend two years here.
WALSH: Do you have a message for the people in Washington?
ANTON (from captions): We are very much waiting for aid. We urgently need it. More rounds equals saving more lives.
WALSH (voice-over): That drone footage shows the remains of last night's failed Russian assault. This is what was a key prize in the counteroffensive, the tiny village of Robotyne, still Ukraine's but now another front line where Russia is hitting back hard.
This thermal night imagery shows their latest bleak tactic. It's a quad bike, carrying three Russians, charging at the front lines to simply see how far it can get.
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KOKOS, 15TH NATIONAL GUARD (from captions): It's more maneuverable than armored vehicles. It's hard to hit with artillery, so we have to use drones. We heard from prisoners of war that they are given pills before assaults. They just keep on coming and coming.
WALSH (voice-over): But while Russia seems to squander infinite resources, Ukraine must be more ingenious and crowdfund. This 3D printer to make tiny components for about 10 attack drones a day. Without more artillery, they say only these drones hold Russia back here.
It is a bleak and fierce fight which is more the nearby town of Orikhiv. Russian airstrikes have left it looking like defeat rather than a symbol of Ukrainian tenacity it is.
WALSH: It's time to come back here, it's just worse and worse and you just don't even really imagine what people can do to survive here or what there is really worth left fighting over.
WALSH (voice-over): And on the road out, these, a stark warning Ukraine is preparing for bad news. Six months ago, they were trying to search forward with new Western armor here. Now they prepare to lose. Only one thing changed and it was in Washington, not in their hearts -- Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Orikhiv, Ukraine.
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KINKADE: Well, much more to come on, CNN NEWSROOM including the U.S. president's comments about the possibility of a ceasefire in Gaza and plans to begin airdropping aid.
Plus Donald Trump appeared in a Florida courtroom Friday. The day saw two hearings in two different cases. It could impact his schedule in the coming months. We'll explain. Stay with us. You're watching CNN.
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KINKADE: Welcome back.
U.S. President Joe Biden said Friday that airdrops of humanitarian aid for people in Gaza would begin soon. He remains hopeful that a deal for a six-week cease-fire and the release of hostages could be in place before the start of Ramadan, which is about a week away. CNN's MJ Lee has more.
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MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: President Biden on Friday offering a blunt assessment of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and saying that the amount of aid that is currently going into the Strip is simply not enough.
He said that it is imperative that Israel do so much more but that, in the meantime, the U.S. is going to begin airdrops of aid and food and other help into the Gaza Strip. He said that this would help alleviate the situation.
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And that this was the U.S. trying to pull out all the stops to help the civilians there. Take a listen.
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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No excuses because the truth is aid flowing to Gaza is nowhere nearly enough now. It's nowhere nearly enough. Innocent lives are on the line and children's lives are on the line and we won't stand by and let -- until aid -- until we get more aid in (INAUDIBLE).
And we should be getting hundreds of trucks in, not just several.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE (voice-over): The president also once again calling for a temporary cease-fire and hostages deal, saying that this would help a lot in bringing in more humanitarian aid into Gaza.
LEE: And when he was leaving the White House Friday evening, he told me that he was still hopeful that a deal could be reached before Ramadan. Now our understanding right now is that the U.S. airdrops of aid into Gaza could begin in the coming days.
But White House officials are also making clear that the logistics behind that and doing it in a safe way to not harm the civilians who are in Gaza is going to be incredibly challenging -- MJ Lee, CNN, at the White House.
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KINKADE: Well, hearings took place Friday in two of Donald Trump's legal matters that could impact when or whether the cases go to trial.
In the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case in Florida, Trump's attorneys argued that the trial should wait until after the election in November. The former president was at that hearing. Judge Aileen Cannon did not issue a ruling or make any formal scheduling moves.
And in Georgia's election interference case, a hearing over whether to disqualify Fani Willis, the Fulton County district attorney, concluded without a decision. Judge Scott McAfee said he'd issue a ruling within two weeks.
The FBI could soon take possession of what could be a spy balloon. It was found off the Alaskan coast by a fishing vessel. It's not certain it is an actual spy balloon but officials felt like it looked enough like one to warrant an investigation. CNN's Katie Bo Lillis has more.
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KATIE BO LILLIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: What my colleague, Evan Perez, and I have learned from our sources is that commercial fishermen off the coast of Alaska found an unknown object that worried them enough that they took pictures of it and contacted law enforcement.
When the FBI saw these images, officials determined that whatever this object was bore enough resemblance to a foreign government-operated surveillance balloon that they wanted to check it out for themselves.
Now FBI officials will meet the fishing vessel when it comes into a port, expected to be sometime this weekend. The bureau will then take possession of the object, transport it to the FBI lab in Quantico, Virginia, and analyze it, as has been done with previous surveillance balloons.
Now all of our sources emphasized that it wasn't clear exactly what the object was and that it may not be a surveillance balloon at all.
But the concern for officials is that it could be another foreign government-operated balloon similar to the Chinese surveillance balloon that blew off course and transited across the continental U.S. in February of last year before being shot down off the Atlantic Ocean. That balloon entered U.S. territory through Alaskan airspace. After
that episode, though, the U.S. widened the aperture of its radar systems so that it could better detect objects traveling above a certain altitude and at certain speeds.
Now these more sensitive radar systems have allowed the U.S. military to spot more unidentified objects in U.S. airspace, not all of which are surveillance balloons. There were three additional shootdowns of unidentified high-altitude objects in the weeks following the Chinese balloon incident.
And just in the last couple of weeks, the North American Aerospace Defense Command -- or NORAD -- sent fighter jets to intercept and examine a small balloon spotted floating over the Southwest, drifting east.
NORAD later said in a statement that the balloon was, quote, "likely a hobby balloon" and that it posed no threat. We will continue to watch, of course, to see what the FBI is able to learn about this mystery object now bobbing across the ocean on a fishing boat on its way to port.
But right now, it's just the mystery catch of the day -- Katie Bo Lillis, CNN, Washington.
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KINKADE: Well, now to Iran where polls have officially closed in the country's legislative elections and counting is underway. Voter turnout is expected to be at record lows as Iranians grapple with an ailing economy and growing distrust in the government. CNN's Frederik Pleitgen reports from Tehran.
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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Iran's supreme leader kicking off voting in a parliamentary election many believed could be key to shaping the country's future.
PLEITGEN: The supreme leader is traditionally the first person to cast his ballot in Iranian elections and he has been urging the population here to come out and vote to ensure that there's high participation.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): The vote also a message to Iran's enemies, he said.
"Both our friends and people who are interested in the Iranian nation, as well as our ill-wishers, from all sides, the observer of the issues of our country and the observer of our dear nation, pay attention to this.
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"Make your friends happy and disappoint your ill wishers."
While some critics have called for a boycott of the vote, authorities have said turnout is key and launched a full-on ad blitz around the country, urging people to vote, a message that resonated with some.
Samani (ph) brought her 4-year-old daughter, Lula Sadat (ph), to the polling station.
"This will make our country more prosperous," she said. "We will be helping people. And this is the order of the supreme leader."
"This morning, I was hesitant," this man says, "but then I heard the leader's speech and then I it necessary to come and vote."
It's the first election since massive protests shook Iran in the fall of 2022 after the in-custody death of Mahsa Amini, who had been accused of not wearing her hijab. With the economy in turmoil and inflation high, some on Tehran's streets skeptical of the vote.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm not going to vote and that because a police chief says something is not useful for me. And so nationally, most of youth people (ph) are not going to.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): The authorities extended voting hours, claiming many people wanted to cast their ballots in an election that could see conservatives tighten their grip on power -- Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Tehran.
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KINKADE: Well, Argentina -- Argentina's new president is promising change to say the economic reforms he's planning to make take a bite out of the country's sky-high inflation.
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KINKADE: Argentina's libertarian president delivered a fiery state of the union address on Friday. Javier Milei vowing to advance his economic reforms with or without political support. CNN's Ivan Sarmenti has more from Buenos Aires.
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IVAN SARMENTI, CNN ESPANOL CORRESPONDENT: Argentinian president Javier Milei opened the congressional sessions for 2024 this Friday evening with the state of the union style speech in Congress.
The first one since he took office last December and facing lawmakers were rebuffed some weeks ago, his army run vehicle saying a love of the regulations and badges back (ph). The congress, dominated by the opposition, he announced a new package of bills and began by stating that Argentina is in the most critical moment in its history.
An important part of his speech was to criticize the inheritance received and what he called the impoverishing model. The last few years were an economic disaster, an orgy of public spending, he said. In the message, the libertarian president also announced new cuts and
other reforms. Argentina faces high inflation which predates Milei but has grown to more than 250 percent after the new president devalued the currency by 50 percent last December.
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It has increased tensions with workers and unions, sparking more strikes and protests. This was the first time a president launched (ph) ordinary sessions in the evening as the U.S. president annual state of the union address.
In Argentina traditionally, this happens at noon. Milei seems to have decided to emulate some American conventions. He did this in December, when he gave his inauguration speech outside the congress, as U.S. presidents usually do. Here in Argentina, presidents used to deliver their first address to the nation in the chamber of deputies.
Although this Friday, Milei warned congress that he would make changes with or without the lawmakers, one of the most important parts of his speech was invitations to governors, former presidents and political leaders to a pact, then guidelines that aim to reconstruct Argentina.
After 70 minutes, Milei finished this address, asking for patience and trust -- Ivan Sarmenti, CNN, Buenos Aires.
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KINKADE: Cubans are learning to live with a five-fold increase in fuel prices that took effect yesterday. It's the biggest jump there in decades and quite a shock in a country where many people earn less than $20 a month. CNN's Patrick Oppmann has more on how Cubans prepared for the extra expense.
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PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Just about everything that has four wheels is now lined up at a gas station all across Cuba because, starting on Friday, the price of fuel is going to jump up more than 500 percent.
So you see people in old American cars, old Soviet era cars, Chinese cars filling up and many times, many cases, siphoning out that fuel to fill up again. People have been waiting for hours, sometimes more than a day to fill up their cars, because the price is going to jump up so dramatically.
It's the largest price hike that people say they can ever remember taking place. Cuba, of course, receives, has received fuel for decades now from allies like Venezuela and Russia. And that has allowed the government, those donations of fuel, to subsidize the fuel they sell to their people.
The Cuban government points out that, up until now, fuel's been as cheap here than just about anywhere else in the world. Now it's going to cost, if you use a black market exchange rates, about $20 to fill up your car with gasoline, a full tank of gasoline.
And that may not seem like a lot. But remember, $20 is more than what most government workers make here each month. So it is a substantial increase and people are concerned that it's going to lead to higher transportation prices, higher food prices.
And that as already out-of-control inflation gets worse and simply may not be affordable for many Cubans to live here -- Patrick Oppmann, CNN, Havana.
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KINKADE: Well, still ahead, new fears emerge about Australia's Great Barrier Reef. We will hear from the reef (INAUDIBLE) chief scientist on what, if anything, can be done to save it.
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KINKADE: Welcome back.
Scientists are scratching their heads after they saw a lone orca whale spotted killing a great white shark off the coast of South Africa in under two minutes.
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Usually orcas work in teams when attacking prey like great whites. But this is the first time they've seen a lone orca killing a great white and so quickly. Scientists are wondering if the attack could signal some sort of ecological shift and what this change in behavior may mean for the marine ecosystem as a whole.
And scientists in Australia are issuing a dire warning about the southern Great Barrier Reef following aerial surveys conducted last weekend. The surveys found one of the world's great natural wonders is suffering from extensive coral bleaching.
Scientists say it was caused by soaring ocean temperatures and heat stress, thereby fueling destructive bleaching of the reef, which surveys found extensive and fairly uniform across all surveyed reefs.
The latest survey is raising concerns that this year could see a seventh mass bleaching event at one of the world's greatest natural wonders.
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KINKADE: Joining me now from Kansas, Australia's Dr. Roger Beeden. He is the chief scientist of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority.
Good to have you with us. DR. ROGER BEEDEN, CHIEF SCIENTIST, GREAT BARRIER REEF MARINE PARK
AUTHORITY: Thank you. Nice to be here.
KINKADE: So you had teams from James Cook University, the Great Barrier Reef Authority, the Australian Institute of Marine Science conducting two separate studies, inspecting the southern part of the reef.
Overall, just explain what you saw and what is the health of the reef?
BEEDEN: So as you said, are two different types of studies, some of those were in water, those were the ones conducted by James Cook University. And then there was a set of aerial surveys.
And we use different tools to help us to understand what's going on, given that the Great Barrier Reef is so genuinely vast. So the aerial surveys, they're the ones that we use to understand the extent of any impact, particularly coral bleaching.
In this case, they surveyed about 50 of the 3,000 reefs that make up the Great Barrier. And those showed extensive coral bleaching because, when corals bleach, they become very visible from the air in the shallow areas around reefs.
The James Cook University surveys were more focused on a smaller number of areas but they also showed extensive coral bleaching on some of the reefs in the southern part of the Great Barrier Reef.
KINKADE: I just want to bring up a before and after shot of a reef of Capital (ph) Island. Just take us through the course of coral bleaching.
And is it predominantly because of a warmer ocean?
BEEDEN: So coral bleaching is a clear sign of stress in corals. They have -- they're animals but they have a relationship with a little algae that live inside their tissues, sort of like our skin.
(INAUDIBLE) those algae photosynthesize and they provide energy to the corals. It's a very, very effective relationship, allows them to build huge structures like the Great Barrier Reef and which represents about 10 percent of the world's reef area.
But the problem is that it's actually quite sensitive to things like temperature. You can get coral bleaching from other effects as well, things like low -- when we get lots of rainfall and that potentially lowers salinity conditions.
But when we see it at scale, it's typically because temperatures are above the level where that relationship between the coral animal and the little algae works. And so the corals actually expel the algae.
And then you can see through there, there's tissue that's sort of skin-like structure, right through the bright, white coral skeleton. That's why it's called coral bleaching. Sometimes is it might be fluorescent. There are other pigments that
they have. Sometimes they can be very -- those pigments can be very vivid. Overall when we see it, it's a sign of stress.
But really importantly, the corals are not dead at that point. So even though they are stressed, if the temperatures come back to the right levels soon enough, then we can actually see extensive recovery from even severely pretty bleached corals.
KINKADE: Wow. Yes, it is, of course -- we're just seeing those aerial shots -- it is one of the natural wonders of the world, a huge tourist attraction. I was visiting the reef this time last year. And it is magnificent.
What can be done to prevent coral bleaching?
BEEDEN: Well, the first thing I just want to add is that the Great Barrier, again, it's truly vast and it's the size of Italy. So even though we've got severe effects (INAUDIBLE) or, sorry, we've got an extensive coral bleaching in the southern part of the Great Barrier, that doesn't mean that we've got the same conditions elsewhere.
And in fact, actually some of the other aerial surveys show much, much less coral bleaching. at the moment we've got some more aerial surveys underway so we can fully understand the extent of coral bleaching this summer.
In terms of what can be done about coral bleaching, the obvious answer to that is that the global community, we need to act on climate change because it's climate change that's resulting in changing water temperatures across the planet.
And we're seeing coral bleaching effects across all of the world's coral reefs. It has been particularly acute and early in the last 12 months because of the El Nino event exacerbating those temperatures.
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But we can do things locally and that's what we're focused on with our Reef Authority. We focus upon making sure that we have a very effective zoning program. So that's actually where you're allowed to fish, where you're not allowed to fish.
We know that reefs that are fully protected bounce back more quickly from impacts like coral bleaching. We also have an extensive crown of thorns starfish (ph) control program to remove that particular pressure.
We also have lots of work going on on improving water quality. And it's the combination of these measures on local scale pressures that can take some of the pressure off as corals are under, having to adjust to a rapidly changing climate.
KINKADE: And just quickly, there is a fear that this could be the seventh mass bleaching event.
What exactly does that mean?
What would it take to describe it as that sort of an event?
BEEDEN: Well, we certainly aren't at that point at the moment. It's the aerial surveys that allow us to understand the full extent of what's going on with coral bleaching. And then we have in-water surveys that tell us about the severity of bleaching.
So what's happening on an individual coral level through to whole colonies and an individual reef. It takes a time to build that sort of jigsaw puzzle of information. You will imagine that when it's a size that this particular system is, that it actually -- you get a lot of variability in there.
And so before we make any statements about what the overall picture is, then we collect all of the information using satellites, aerial surveys and in-water surveys so that we can describe it properly.
So we're not at a point that we would describe it in those terms at the moment. The temperature stress patterns are certainly concerning and that's why we're putting in place the aerial surveys that we're doing right now.
KINKADE: All right. Well, we will check in with you again once you get some more information. But great to have you on the program, Dr. Roger Beeden. Thanks so much.
BEEDEN: Thank you.
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KINKADE: The fashion and design worlds are grieving the loss of one of their most distinctive stars. Longtime style legend Iris Apfel died on Friday, age 102, according to a post on her Instagram page.
The lifelong New Yorker worked alongside her late husband, Carl Apfel, for decades. And clients for their interior design and textiles businesses included nine U.S. presidents. Calling herself a geriatric starlet, Apfel's unique style led to a modeling contract with a top agency when she was 97 years old.
Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Lynda Kinkade, stay with us. CNN NEWSROOM continues with my friend, Kim Brunhuber, after a short break.
