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CNN International: Malaysia May Renew Search 10 Years After MH370 Disappeared; Haiti State of Emergency Extended; President Biden Delivers Fiery, Forceful, Political Speech; Trump to Host Hungarian Authoritarian Leader at Mar-a-Lago; Groups Fight Total Abortion Ban's Impact in El Salvador. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired March 08, 2024 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:30:00]
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: In the early hours of March 8th, 2014, Flight MH370 was heading to Beijing. But after taking off from Kuala Lumpur, it dropped off radar after turning unexpectedly to the west, then vanishing. Fragments of the aircraft have washed up on the eastern coast of Africa, but the plane and its black boxes have never been found.
BIANCA NOBILO, CNN ANCHOR: Let's bring in CNN's Anna Coren, who is live now in Hong Kong for us. And how are the families holding up 10 years on, and is there any chance that the technological advancements that have happened over the last decade could potentially lead to more -- to fresh discovery, to closure for them?
ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, certainly that is what the families are hoping for. You know, it's hard to believe that it has been 10 years since MH370 disappeared with those 239 people on board. It is without doubt one of the greatest aviation mysteries that has yet to be solved.
But certainly for the families of those victims, it has been an agonizing search for answers and for the truth. Now, as you mentioned, there are talks of renewing search efforts for the wreckage, which is giving these loved ones hope they will finally get the closure they so desperately want.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COREN (voice-over): Somewhere in the depths of this vast, seemingly endless Indian Ocean is believed to be the resting place for the 239 souls on board MH370, the Boeing airliner that vanished a decade ago.
Multiple searches spanning hundreds of thousands of square kilometers found nothing. Dozens of pieces of floating and washed-up debris, the only evidence of the 777. For the families and loved ones of those who made that fateful flight on the 8th of March 2014 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, it has been an agonizing 10 years.
At a memorial in Malaysia, time has not eased their anguish and pain.
SARAH BAJC, PARTNER PHILIP WAS ONBOARD MH370: Families need closure. The world needs closure and somebody needs to be held accountable.
COREN (voice-over): Sarah Bajc hasn't spoken to the media for many years.
COREN: So lovely to meet you.
COREN (voice-over): Her partner, Philip, was on board MH370 and the search for answers consumed her life as it did for so many others who shared in the collective anger, frustration and grief.
BAJC: Waking up in the middle of the night and expecting him to be there, that still happened for a while. And maybe that's because of the lack of closure.
COREN (voice-over): She believes closure only comes once MH370 is found. And there is now renewed pressure from the families and a verbal commitment by the Malaysian government to reactivate the search.
ANTHONY LOKE, MALAYSIAN TRANSPORT MINISTER: This is the biggest mystery of the aviation in the whole world and we must solve this mystery. It is a commitment and a promise that the search will go on.
COREN (voice-over): Malaysia has agreed to speak to Ocean Infinity, the U.S. marine robotics company that ended its last search in 2018. But world-renowned aviation expert Richard Godfrey believes they'd be looking in the wrong place again. Armed with new information from the latest technology, he believes he knows the coordinates of the crash site and the area they need to search, 1,500 kilometers off the coast of Perth.
RICHARD GODFREY, AVIATION ENGINEER: I think it will only take one more search. Search technology has improved. The crash location has been more narrowly defined. It will take them, I think, just a few weeks to find MH370.
COREN (voice-over): A bold statement, yet one families cling to.
Jiang Hui, who lost his mother on MH370, has taken Malaysia Airlines to court on behalf of the Chinese families that represent nearly two- thirds of the victims.
He says he knows his hard-working mother, who instilled the same ethos in him, is driving her son to find the truth.
JIANG HUI, MOTHER WAS ONBOARD MH370 (through translator): I can find her shadow in me, he says. Whatever I am doing now is what my mother wants me to do.
COREN (voice-over): As for Sarah, the trauma has forced her to rebuild her life, running an eco-tourism resort in Panama with her new husband. But she says on this day, her thoughts are always with Philip.
BAJC: I make my coffee exactly like Philip used to drink it. And I sit and I think about him and maybe look at some pictures. And then I put it away. You know, I don't think that you can effectively walk forward.
You can't walk forward with positivity and confidence if you're always looking backwards.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COREN (on camera): Yes, Maxi and Bianca, so difficult for all these people connected to MH370. But as we heard from Richard Godfrey, he is certain the plane can be found. And that's thanks to four pieces of information. Boeing, Inmarsat, the satellite company that tracked MH370, data from oceanographers and finally, whisper data.
[04:35:10]
This is new technology using radio amateur signals. He says all of these four different data align. That is why he believes there is now an accurate crash site location. And of course, the black box that must be found. That will have all the answers to the questions. And obviously, most importantly, it's those families that need those answers so that they have that closure that they need.
NOBILO: Anna Coren for us in Hong Kong. Thank you very much for that report.
Ongoing widespread violence by criminal gangs in Haiti pushes officials to extend a state of emergency in the capital. Details on that just ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: In Haiti, amid widespread gang violence and speculation over whether the Prime Minister will step down and call for elections, a state of emergency has now been extended until April the 3rd.
NOBILO: Sources tell CNN dozens of people broke into a warehouse at a major port terminal in Port-au-Prince Thursday. That terminal, a major link in Haiti's imported food supply chain. More on that story now from CNN's Patrick Ottmann.
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PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Haiti's government on Thursday extended the state of emergency in the capital for another month. But it's unclear what impact, if any, it will have on the out-of-control gang violence.
Haiti's Prime Minister Ariel Henry still continues to be missing in action as he appears to be unable to return to his own country. He has not issued any public pronouncements. It is believed that he remains in Puerto Rico.
The U.S. has called on Henry to form a transitional government and say when elections can be held in Haiti, that is a step that Henry has resisted up until now, saying the conditions are not right in Haiti to hold elections. But clearly, he's facing more and more pressure from inside and from outside of Haiti to get out of office, to move out of office, and show what the plan of succession for Haitians will be.
It is unclear, though, how Haiti could hold elections of any kind while the security crisis continues to worsen and worsen. All eyes are on a force of soldiers in Kenya, 1,000 troops, who have -- their government has agreed to send them to Haiti to take on the gangs, but no update as of yet when those troops will deploy.
And Haitians that I have spoken to in the capital, Port-au-Prince, say even those who manage a stockpile of food and water are running low on supplies, and they say that Haitians simply cannot wait any longer for help, that it has to arrive now.
Patrick Ottmann, CNN Havana.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NOBILO: Before we go, a programming update for you.
Starting on Monday, CNN International will feature a new lineup in the Europe primetime hours.
[04:40:00]
"AMANPOUR" and "ISA SOARES TONIGHT" remain at their current times. But at 3 p.m. Eastern, that's 8 p.m. Central Europe, CNN NEWSROOM's Jim Sciutto will debut.
It will be followed by "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" at a new time of 4:00 Eastern. That's 9 p.m. in Europe.
NOBILO: We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from the U.S. and all around the world.
NOBILO: We want to get back to one of our top stories that we're following this hour for you.
FOSTER: And that is the U.S. president's annual State of the Union speech. Joe Biden came out swinging with a forceful, energetic message aimed at defusing fears that he's too old for the job.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CROWD CHEERING: Four more years. Four more years.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NOBILO: During his hour in primetime, the president repeatedly took shots at Donald Trump, but he only referred to him as my predecessor, never by name. And then said that his predecessor represents a dangerous past.
Joe Biden, who's already the oldest president in U.S. history, sought to portray his age as an advantage rather than a liability, stating that he has a positive vision of the future and knows what endures. Honesty, decency, dignity and equality.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The very idea of America is that we're all created equal. Deserves to be treated equally throughout our lives. We've never fully lived up to that idea. But we've never walked away from it either. And I won't walk away from it now. I'm optimistic. I really am. I'm optimistic, Nancy.
My fellow Americans ...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: President Biden is now looking ahead to the campaign trail, of course, zeroing in on critical battleground states like Michigan that could determine the outcome of the election.
CNN's Jeff Zeleny is there.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF U.S. NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: The president's address was closely watched here in battleground Michigan. Largely two key issues, the economy and foreign policy, particularly Israel's war in Gaza, have been critical issues of concern here in Michigan.
Now, there's no doubt Michigan is one of the most important states on the presidential map because, of course, it is part of that blue wall that President Biden flipped from Donald Trump in 2020.
But we spent some time with some Biden supporters this evening who said the president exceeded their expectations.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that overall it was a different side of him that came out. He was, like I said, very confident, very reassuring of the things that he has done for our country. And I didn't get a glimpse of anything involving age or the lack thereof of being able to deliver and be the president of the United States.
[04:45:00]
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People will try to make it an issue, but I think they should look beyond the age. When you think about it, both of them are old. But I'd rather have a president who's old, that's very knowledgeable and thinks of people than to have a president that's old and self-centered.
ZELENY: Now, some supporters before the speech conceded being apprehensive about how the president would do. Again, they say he exceeded their expectations. The question is, can that be sustained over the next eight months as the campaign with Donald Trump certainly intensifies?
But there is no doubt, here in Michigan among Democrats, they were pleased by the president's performance. The tough part, of course, comes next.
Jeff Zeleny, CNN, Detroit.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NOBILO: In his pre-battle to Mr. Biden's State of the Union address, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump focused on the southern U.S. border using his anti-immigration rhetoric that he sometimes does.
In a Truth Social post, Trump criticized his successor for undoing his immigration policies. Take a listen to that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Joe Biden is on the run from his record and lying like crazy to try and escape accountability for the horrific devastation he and his party have created, all the while they continue the very policies that are causing this horror show to go.
We cannot take it any longer as a country. Joe Biden's sad excuse for a State of the Union address aside. Here are the facts.
When I left office, we gave Joe Biden the most secure border in U.S. history. We gave him remain in Mexico -- very tough to get, but I got it. Safe third agreements, the asylum ban, Title 42, 571 miles of border wall, rapid deportations and much more.
We had the safest border in the history of our country.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: But Mr. Biden -- Mr. Trump rather, appears to be taking a break from the campaign trail.
NOBILO: The Republican presidential candidate is preparing to host Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at his Mar-a-Lago estate in the coming day.
CNN's Sunland Safadi has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TRUMP: Respected all over Europe, probably like me a little bit controversial, but that's OK.
SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In style and in substance --
VIKTOR ORBAN, HUNGARIAN PRIME MINISTER: I like them opening and he's like that. SERFATY (voice-over): Former president Donald Trump and Hungarian
Prime Minister Viktor Orban are two leaders sharing one playbook.
TRUMP: Some people don't like him because he's too strong. They sat a strong man running your country.
SERFATY (voice-over): Hard charging --
ORBAN: The globalists can all go to hell.
SERFATY (voice-over): -- brash and antagonistic.
ORBAN: Accusing us is fake news and those who make these claims are simply idiots.
SERFATY (voice-over): Publicly praising each other.
TRUMP: He doesn't allow illegals into his country. He put barbed wire fences all over. He has soldiers every 10 yards.
SERFATY (voice-over): Echoing each other's rhetoric.
ORBAN: We make America great again.
SERFATY (voice-over): And policies on immigration.
ORBAN: We stopped illegal migration. We have actually built that wall.
TRUMP: We had the strongest border in history. We built 500 miles of wall.
SERFATY (voice-over): Russia and the Ukraine war.
ORBAN: If at the time of Russian invasion on Ukraine Trump would have been the president of United States there would be no war now. I'm absolutely sure.
TRUMP: I'll meet with Putin. I'll meet with Zelenskyy. They both have weaknesses and they both have strengths and within 24 hours that war will be settled. It'll be over.
SERFATY (voice-over): LGBTQ rights.
ORBAN: Hungarian people rejected sexual orientation programs in schools without parental consent.
TRUMP: On day one I will sign a new executive order to cut federal funding for any school pushing critical race theory, transgender insanity and other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content on our children.
SERFATY (voice-over): And their treatment of a free press.
ORBAN: I don't want to give them any ideas. They know best how to write fake news.
TRUMP: Fake news is all you get and they are indeed the enemy of the people.
SERFATY (voice-over): In the U.S. Orban has become an icon in some far-right circles. Even as his government seen by many as authoritarian has changed election rules to his benefit and threatened his political dissenters and rivals.
STEVE BANNON, FORMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: What Orban represents at one level that is the MAGA, America First Movement here.
SERFATY (voice-over): Scoring him prime speaking spots at the conservative Confab CPAC attracting the adoration of some of the Republican Party's top right-wing voices.
[04:50:00]
SERFATY: And the two will be sitting down privately at Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago Resort which only underscores the alliance, this friendship that has only grown in size since they first met nearly five years ago. Now, notably of course, this comes at a very important time for Trump as he is on track to clinch the Republican nomination.
Sunlen Serfaty, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NOBILO: Donald Trump has until Monday to come up with $83.3 million. On Thursday, the federal judge overseeing the E. Jean Carroll defamation case denied Trump's request for a few extra days to get his finances together and post the bond. Saying Mr. Trump's current situation is a result of his own dilatory actions.
FOSTER: In January, a federal jury awarded Carroll more than $83 million in damages as a result of Trump's defamatory statements denying that he raped her, saying she wasn't his type and accusing her of making up the allegation to boost sales of her book.
Now, a U.S. House committee has advanced a bill that could lead to a nationwide ban on TikTok in the U.S.
NOBILO: If enacted, the measure would give the social media platform about five months to divest from its parent company, ByteDance, which is linked to China. If it doesn't, TikTok would be banned from U.S. app stores, including Apple and Google. Lawmakers are concerned that Americans' personal data collected by TikTok could end up in the hands of the Chinese government.
FOSTER: But TikTok is pushing back, saying the government is attempting to strip 170 million American users of their constitutional right to free expression.
It also says the move will damage millions of businesses, deny artists and audience, and destroy the livelihoods of countless creators across the country.
NOBILO: But one of the bill's co-sponsors in Congress says that response proves his point. Just listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MIKE GALLAGHER (R-WI): The pressure campaign that TikTok put in place today, where they forced a pop-up on the app that called members of Congress and also told a lie that we were forcing an outright ban, which this bill is not, proves the danger. They sort of proved the entire point. Imagine if those lies were allowed to spread on topics like our election or a foreign war.
So that's what we're trying to guard against. And in our construct, the users can continue to enjoy the app so long as we fix the ownership problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NOBILO: A bill that would require law enforcement to detain any migrant who commits burglary or theft passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday.
FOSTER: Yes, all Republican -- all House Republicans and 37 House Democrats supported what is called the Lakyn Riley Act. 170 Democrats voted against the bill, accusing Republicans of exploiting the young woman's death for a partisan stunt and targeting immigrants in an election year. It's not clear whether the Democrat-led Senate will support the bill.
NOBILO: 22-year-old Lakyn Riley was found dead after she went jogging on the University of Georgia campus last month. Police say she was killed by a migrant who illegally entered the U.S. at the southern border.
It is International Women's Day, with protests and observances taking place across the globe. Human rights and women's rights in and their groups in El Salvador are still fighting for the country's total abortion ban.
FOSTER: There's shining a light on cases where women who've suffered a pregnancy complication have faced criminal charges. CNN's Isabel Rosales has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Lilian just spent seven years in El Salvador in prison. The 28-year-old was sentenced to 30 years behind bars. Lilian was convicted of abandonment and neglect and later for aggravated homicide in the death of her newborn baby.
She says the child suffered health complications and while under a doctor's care, died just 72 hours after birth.
LILIAN, RELEASED FROM PRISON (through translator): If they had detected the girl's illness in time, she would not have died. I would not have lost so many years of my life in prison. I would not have missed my other daughter's childhood.
ROSALES (voice-over): Lilian said she was undergoing a procedure for a tear in her uterus and was sedated when the baby died. But prosecutors accused her of not taking care of the fetus during pregnancy.
LILIAN (through translator): They wanted to free themselves from blame so they accused me of having killed, abandoned and neglected her. The police came to arrest me at the hospital.
ROSALES (voice-over): El Salvador has one of the strictest abortion laws in the Americas and the government makes no apologies, saying those who break the law will be prosecuted.
But with the help of human rights organizations and women's rights groups, some Salvadoran women are rising up against the country's total abortion ban and harsh criminal penalties.
Abortion advocates argue the ban has put women in prison who have suffered complications during pregnancy like in Lilian's case or in miscarriages.
A campaign over the last decade to free women serving long sentences has led to the release of 73 women from prison. Lilian was one of them.
LILIAN (through translator): I am very happy to have been reunited with my family. I am infinitely grateful to all the people who supported me during this process and who fought for our freedom.
ROSALES (voice-over): Alba Lorena Rodriguez says she became pregnant at 21 after being raped.
[04:55:02]
Five months into her pregnancy, she went into premature labor and the newborn died. She says she was arrested at the funeral of her stillborn baby being.
ALBA LORENA RODRIGUEZ, RELEASED FROM PRISON (through translator): I felt like the world came crashing down on me because I knew I wasn't going to see my girls and that I was being punished for something I hadn't done and that I didn't have a fair trial.
ROSALES (voice-over): It has been 25 years since El Salvador made getting abortions illegal under all circumstances. The country's president Nayib Bukele was recently released from prison elected to a second term and says there will be no change to the abortion laws.
The ban is popular among many Catholics and evangelical Salvadorans in the deeply conservative country. The law has come under scrutiny with cases presented in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
ANGELICA RIVAS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY (through translator): We continue insisting to the state that not only does it have to review the procedures at the judicial level so they are free of gender stereotypes and free of discrimination against women. But it also has to review the legislation and that is one of our demands.
ROSALES (voice-over): According to one Salvadoran abortion rights group no women facing aggravated homicide charges tied to stillbirths or miscarriages remain in prison. But they say seven women are still awaiting trial.
Isabel Rosales, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: International Women's Day has taken on a different meaning this year for the women of Gaza after months of war.
NOBILO: Women living in makeshift camps say of course there is nothing to celebrate this year. They don't have food, water or medicine and they're struggling with their mental health and poverty. Many of them have been forced to move repeatedly as the fighting has spread.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Women worldwide easily await and celebrate this day whereas Gaza's women live in tents and are deprived of rights and unable to celebrate it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): We are going through a tough situation on Women's Day in Gaza as we face the horrors of bombings and there are harsh conditions in tents and suffer from extreme weather leaving no room for celebration.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Well, the UN estimates more than one and a half million people in Gaza have been displaced by the war between Israel and Hamas.
Thanks for joining us here on CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Max Foster.
NOBILO: I'm Bianca Nobilo. CNN "THIS MORNING" is up next after a quick break.
