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South Korea in Limbo after Failed Attempt to Detain Yoon; Mike Johnson Retains U.S. House Speakership with Tiny Majority; Officials to Investigate Absence of Barriers during New Orleans Terror Attack; Israel Pressed to Reveal Location of Detained Palestinian Doctor; U.S. Surgeon General Warns of Link between Cancer and Alcohol; Determining Whether Either Ukraine or Russia are Ready for Talks; Former CNN Correspondent's Personal Journey to Syria. Aired 4-5a ET

Aired January 04, 2025 - 04:00   ET

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

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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN ANCHOR AND SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us in the United States and around the world. I'm Fred Pleitgen in London. And here's what's ahead on CNN NEWSROOM.

Protesters are gathered this morning outside the official residence of South Korea's impeached president, a day after a failed attempt to arrest him.

U.S. president-elect Donald Trump learns he will be sentenced for his hush money conviction 10 days before taking office.

And that news comes the same day Trump lent a hand to House Speaker Mike Johnson, securing his reelection.

And one of our former CNN correspondent colleagues now works to help children affected by war and disaster. She recently returned to Syria. We'll talk to her about what she saw in the post-Assad period of the country.

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PLEITGEN: Beginning in South Korea, though, you saw the pictures of those protests taking place. And opponents of South Korea's impeached president have been rallying near his official residence for hours now.

That's where investigators tried to detain him yesterday but were blocked by his security detail. The arrest warrant against Yoon is valid until Monday, so they may try again.

Yoon has devoted followers, though, just like the U.S. president- elect, Donald Trump. And as Mike Valerio reports, they're ripping some pages from Donald Trump's political playbook.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) MIKE VALERIO, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An unprecedented scene in South Korea as investigators move to arrest embattled president Yoon Suk Yeol. After 200

soldiers and members of the president's security team blocked their way, the investigators turned back empty handed.

Outside, the president's supporters rejoice, waving South Korean and American flags alike. Yoon's supporters channeling pro-Trump slogans, even

wearing these MAGA style hats, which say, against unconstitutional impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): If President Trump takes office later in January, I hope he will be able to sympathize with South Korea's

rigged election, since President Trump also suffered from the last election, too.

VALERIO (voice-over): South Korea is one of the U.S.'s closest allies with almost 30,000 troops stationed there. The country faces one of its worst

political crises in years that started in December, when amid a series of scandals and calls for his impeachment, President Yoon declared martial

law, shocking the democratic nation.

In a few hours, lawmakers quickly gathered to overturn martial law but not before the army entered the National Assembly trying to stop politicians

from voting, following the president's alleged orders to shoot the doors if necessary. That led to the 64-year-old being stripped of his presidential

powers after members of his own party voted to impeach him.

Thousands now call for his resignation. He's accused of leading an insurrection for which he could face the death penalty.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): I believe that the president should be arrested rapidly and the appropriate procedure must be

implemented to reset the peace in the country.

VALERIO (voice-over): Meantime, his lawyers called the attempted arrest illegal and vowed to take action. The first session of the impeachment

trial is set for January 14th. Yoon, a prosecutor himself said he's willing to defend himself but after Friday's clashes, doubts loom over the

president's willingness to face the law -- Mike Valerio, CNN, Seoul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN: And 10 days before the inauguration in the United States, the U.S. president-elect Donald Trump will appear at a sentencing hearing for his hush money conviction. But the judge that ordered that hearing on January 10th also says Donald Trump will not be punished.

On Friday, Judge Juan Merchan ruled that Trump's conviction will stand but he will not face legal penalties. Still, Trump will be the first convicted felon sworn in as U.S. president.

The judge indicated the case is essentially over, writing in his opinion, quote, "A sentence of an unconditional discharge appears to be the most viable solution to ensure finality."

Trump's communications director responded, saying, quote, "President Trump must be allowed to continue the presidential transition process and to execute the vital duties of the presidency unobstructed by the remains of this or any remnants of the witch hunts," as they put it.

Meantime, Republicans in the House defied concerns about a lengthy stalemate and selected a Speaker on Friday.

[04:05:03]

Mike Johnson won in the first vote, unlike the 15 rounds of voting that took place two years ago. But Johnson needed Trump's help to keep the gavel and he'll have the narrowest majority in nearly a century. Kristen Holmes has more.

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KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: On Friday morning, Donald Trump told me that he was all in on Speaker Mike Johnson and he believed he was going to be successful, going to become the Speaker.

And turns out he was correct. Now he had been backing him and really giving him all of his support for some time now, starting out with that endorsement. It wasn't just the fact that he endorsed him but it was also that he did it on the Speaker's timeline.

The two of them had discussed Donald Trump endorsing Mike Johnson on New Year's Day. They had a plan. And then Johnson believed it was so critical that he went to Trump and asked him to do it earlier. And Trump obliged.

In addition to that, Donald Trump, we know, was calling several holdouts, Republican holdouts, trying to convince them of Johnson. And even after two Republicans voted initially against Johnson, Donald Trump called in to a private meeting with Johnson.

And these holdouts, which ultimately won Johnson the speakership. Now he has congratulated Johnson. He said this in a post on Truth Social. "Congratulations to Speaker Mike Johnson for receiving an

unprecedented vote of confidence in Congress. Mike will be a great Speaker and our country will be the beneficiary.

"The people of America have waited four years for the common sense, strength and leadership. They'll get it now and America will be greater than ever before."

Just two things to note here as to why we are told that Trump was all in on Johnson, twofold. One is that he believed that there were no other members who could actually win the speakership, that he believed Johnson was the only person who could get the votes.

But on the other part of this was that he had no appetite -- this is what senior advisers said -- for a prolonged Speaker fight, particularly this close to the inauguration, that he had seen what happened with McCarthy, how it had sucked all the oxygen out of the room.

He wanted it to look as though the GOP, the Republican Party, was united behind him as well, as he wanted all the focus on him, as we are really now just days away, seemingly, from that inauguration, where Donald Trump will be sworn in as President of the United States -- Kristen Holmes, CNN, Washington.

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PLEITGEN: Thomas Gift is the director of the Centre on U.S. Politics at University College right here in London. But he joins me today from Harrisburg in Pennsylvania.

Thank you very much for coming on, Thomas. First of all, I want to get to this Donald Trump sentencing. He's obviously going to be the first convicted felon to take office as President of the United States.

But does this in any way make a difference or move the needle to anyone, really?

THOMAS GIFT, DIRECTOR, CENTRE ON U.S. POLITICS, UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON: Well, thanks so much for having me, Fred. It's great to be with you.

I think the short answer to that is no. One thing that we've seen with Donald Trump is it doesn't matter what he does, right?

Scandal after scandal, mini scandal after mini scandal, essentially nothing budges his approvals, particularly among his hard-Right Republican base. So if January 6th wasn't able to change opinions toward Donald Trump, I don't think that, you know, the decision on this sentencing will.

PLEITGEN: One of the things that obviously we were watching very closely yesterday was the vote in the House on the Speaker. And Mike Johnson obviously won that vote. But essentially, wasn't it Donald Trump that won the vote for him?

GIFT: Well, it's certainly a big win for Donald Trump. You know, Johnson really uniquely bridges, I think, three different factions of the GOP: the MAGA loyalists, the party establishment and then this highly disruptive, kind of drama-driven set of Republicans who are pushing more for systematic upheaval.

But absolutely, this is a big win for Donald Trump. I think his one concern was that all the attention would be detracted away from him. In the leadup to his inauguration, he wanted to make sure that that didn't happen. Certainly didn't want to have a redo of the 15 rounds that we saw with Kevin McCarthy.

So this is a big win for Donald Trump, absolutely. He showed that he can keep his party in line.

PLEITGEN: It was so interesting also because, afterwards, we heard some of the people who had been holdouts saying that, essentially, they changed their minds because of Donald Trump either calling them but in general, to help Donald Trump.

I want to read you one quote and this comes from Mike Johnson shortly after he was elected.

And he said, quote, "I think President Trump is arguably the most powerful president, certainly of the modern era, maybe in all of American history. His voice is a big one. And I was certainly humbled and honored to have him weigh in on my behalf."

How powerful do you think Donald Trump is now, considering he controls the Republican Party?

And the Republicans obviously now have the Senate, the House and the White House as well.

GIFT: Well, you're absolutely right that Trump is going to get what he wants, at least in the short term.

You know, Trump essentially told his allies who were not voting for Johnson, Ralph Norman of South Carolina and Keith Self of Texas, to stop the nonsense and get in line.

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And I think one of the big, you know, benefits for Donald Trump heading into this new Congress is that he can say, basically, I have the mandate. You know, I allowed Congress to be fully unified in the Republican Party.

And, you know, he always has this threat of primarying those who don't essentially fall in line with his agenda. So you know, right now, Donald Trump has all of the winds behind him.

PLEITGEN: What do you think some of these more radical Republicans who, in the end, changed or went back and voted for Mike Johnson at the behest of Donald Trump? What do you think that they will want in return?

In other words, how much trouble do you think that they could create for Mike Johnson as he takes the gavel again?

GIFT: No. That's an absolutely great question. If there's one thing that Johnson won't be able to do, it's stand on principle. He'll need to be a highly malleable House Speaker. That means cutting deals. That means horse trading. That means doing essentially everything he can within the ethical bounds to keep a fractious party in line.

We don't know what kind of concessions Johnson had to make to get the Speaker's gavel but presumably there were some that -- and that was true of Kevin McCarthy when it took 15 rounds for him to be the House Speaker. And odds are it's true with Johnson as well.

You know, Trump's agenda is ultimately going to rise and fall depending on his relations with Congress. So he's going to have to rely on Johnson to be both his interpreter and his enforcer. But the fact that Johnson comes in without resounding support means that that won't be easy.

PLEITGEN: Thank you very much, Thomas Gift, coming to us today from Harrisburg in Pennsylvania. Thank you again.

GIFT: Thanks.

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PLEITGEN: The victims of the New Orleans New Year's Eve ramming attack will be remembered at a special vigil on Saturday. New memorials are also showing up on Bourbon Street.

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PLEITGEN (voice-over): This one is written in chalk and lists some of the names of those who were killed. On Friday, the coroner released the names of 12 of the 14 victims who were run down by the attacker in his pickup truck.

And meanwhile, there are new questions about the explosive devices planted by the attacker. You can see one of them right here. Sources tell CNN they contained a rare organic compound not previously seen in the United States and it's unclear what the compound does. Investigators are now trying to learn how the attacker obtained it.

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PLEITGEN: New temporary barriers designed to prevent a similar attack are now in place in Bourbon Street. But, of course, there are questions why those barriers were not in place on New Year's Eve. Omar Jimenez has the latest on the investigation.

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OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Investigators saying they've determined that 42 year old Shamsud-Din Jabbar set fire to the Airbnb in New Orleans, where he was staying ahead of the attack.

Authorities say he set a small fire in the hallway and strategically placed accelerants around the house as part of his effort to destroy evidence.

All of this, as federal authorities are now warning law enforcement across the country to be on the lookout for potential copycat attacks.

So you're the council member that represents the French Quarter. How would you assess the ability to prevent something like this before New Year's day in this area?

FREDDIE KING III, NEW ORLEANS CITY COUNCILMAN: Well, seeing how it hadn't happened before, I would assume that for us to figure that we had it pretty under control. But after the events on New Year's Day, we clearly have weak spots. We clearly have vulnerabilities.

JIMENEZ: I saw some of those archers on the streets -- you know, those yellow ones on the sidewalks now?

Why weren't those there before?

KING: That is a question for our law enforcement.

JIMENEZ: This is where that truck entered Bourbon Street in the early morning hours of the New Year. There was a police vehicle here, essentially stationed as a makeshift barrier as some of the city's previously installed barriers were under repair.

But even if a vehicle took up this entire street, you can see there still was a good amount of space to go around that onto the sidewalk, which, as we know from video, is essentially what happened.

Now you see some yellow temporary barriers on the sidewalk but those were not there when this attack unfolded.

The city police department has made clear in recent days that barriers previously installed to try and prevent vehicles from coming down the street were under repair ahead of February's Super Bowl in the city and many of the current measures in place are temporary.

But going back years to 2019, a private security firm warned the risk of terrorism, including by vehicular attacks, remained, quote, highly possible and recommended the vertical safety structures that can move up and down, known as bollards, be fixed and improved immediately. That didn't happen.

KING: It's still a bit unclear as to what took so long. We are definitely going to look into this as a council to figure out who had the contracts. If they were tied up, tied up where?

Why was this moving forward?

JIMENEZ: For some business owners who were open at the time of the attack? CHARLES WEBER, CO-OWNER, THE ALIBI BAR AND GRILL: It was traumatic. You know, it wasn't just like a random shooting or something or whatever. This was like you were seeing it all down the street.

JIMENEZ: The extra barricades are a welcome sight for him.

WEBER: It's very nice to see them.

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And we know we have more to go. I'm happy to see them all. And I'm happy to see, you know, all the police officers.

JIMENEZ: Now obviously here in New Orleans, we've got the Super Bowl in a month. So I actually asked that city councilman if he feels satisfied with the security measures in place right now.

Well, he said those sidewalk archers are just a start for the wider safety picture that he wants to see. But then on the up and down bollards that were being repaired at the time of this attack, that approval for repair only went into effect in November but it was known they weren't effective for years. So why the delay?

Well, we learned Friday that the city council is putting in place a fact finding committee to try and answer just that -- Omar Jimenez, CNN, New Orleans.

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PLEITGEN: The man who blew up a Tesla Cybertruck outside a Trump hotel in Las Vegas wrote of political grievances before his suicide.

Matthew Alan Livelsberger, a decorated U.S. Army Green Beret, said the incident was intended as a wakeup call and not a terrorist attack. Police say he shot himself in the head just moments before the explosion.

Livelsberger traveled from Colorado to Nevada to carry out the bombing. Surveillance video shows him at an EV charging station in Arizona. The active duty soldier wrote that he needed to cleanse his mind "of the brothers I've lost," as he put it, and to relieve himself of, quote, "the burden of the lives I took."

Final preparations for the state funeral for the late U.S. President Jimmy Carter are set. The days-long goodbye to the former Democratic president will begin in the coming hours in his hometown of Plains, Georgia.

His body will lie in repose at the Carter Presidential Center in Atlanta for two days, then lie in state at the U.S. Capitol in Washington until his state funeral on Thursday and return to Plains, Georgia, for burial later that day.

Jimmy Carter served for one term as the 39th president from 1977 to 1981. He died on Sunday at the age of 100. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is growing more grim by the day. Now

Israeli officials and Hamas are restarting talks in hopes of moving closer to a ceasefire agreement.

But how much can these talks achieve?

We'll go live to Jerusalem next.

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PLEITGEN: Israeli officials are back in Doha, trying to hammer out a deal with Hamas for a cease-fire and the release of hostages. It's the first time the two sides have come together since the end of August.

Since then, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza has worsened. Much of Gaza is becoming less livable as Israel continues to pound the enclave. Emergency workers say an Israeli strike killed three Palestinian children near a mosque in northern Gaza on Friday. The need to get humanitarian aid into Gaza is becoming more acute by the day.

But with Israel restricting the flow of traffic into the area, those on the ground are fighting to survive both hunger and war.

Much of Gaza's health care system has collapsed and what remains is in grim condition.

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PLEITGEN (voice-over): Nurses at the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza shot this video that you're seeing here, showing the situation. They're saying there's no food, no running water and that the conditions are unsanitary.

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PLEITGEN: I want to bring in our own Paula Hancocks, who joins me from Jerusalem.

And Paula, you know, with these talks about to start, it feels like we've been here so many times.

Is it possible that this time they achieve real headway?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fred, it's certainly possible. And that is the desperate hope of those in Gaza. It's the desperate hope of the families of the hostages that are still being held in Gaza. So we know that the two sides are in Doha today, that they will be having these indirect talks.

We heard that the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, had a security cabinet meeting yesterday on Friday to hammer out the mandate, the parameters of what his team could agree to.

Now it is working level at this point, so we don't have the individuals in Doha here that that can make the big calls. And we're not expecting a breakthrough. But we are hearing positive signs from both sides.

Hamas giving a statement, confirming its, quote, "seriousness, positivity and its endeavor to reach an agreement at the earliest opportunity."

Both sides, though still blaming the other for the fact that this hasn't been done already. And as you say, Fred, we have been here many times before.

Now meanwhile, Israel is coming under increasing pressure to confirm the location of a prominent Palestinian health director. This is Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya. He was detained a week ago while the Kamal Adwan Hospital was raided.

And we are hearing from international groups, from U.N. experts, that they are increasingly concerned about his well-being.

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HANCOCKS (voice-over): These are some of the last images of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya seen in public. The prominent Palestinian hospital director was arrested by the Israeli military late last month after a raid shut down Kamal Adwan, the last major functioning health facility in northern Gaza.

The question is, where is Dr. Abu Safiya now?

Physicians for Human Rights Israel have filed a petition with the country's top court, demanding his whereabouts after receiving conflicting information from the Israeli military.

An Arab Israeli lawmaker wrote to Israel's defense minister, asking the same question. Former detainees tell CNN he is being held in Sde Teiman detention center, notorious for human rights violations.

The IDF tells CNN Dr. Abu Safiya was, quote, "apprehended for suspected involvement in terrorist activities," accusing him of being part of Hamas. It provided no evidence to back up these claims.

Dr. Abu Safiya sent increasingly dire updates over recent months as Israel targeted the area around, then within his hospital, claiming it was a Hamas terrorist stronghold, a claim the hospital director called nonsense. He repeatedly called for aid, refusing to leave at a deep personal cost.

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He lost his son in an Israeli airstrike. U.N. experts say they are gravely concerned about his fate. Amnesty has called him the voice of Gaza's decimated health sector.

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HANCOCKS: And when the Kamal Adwan hospital was shut down by the Israeli military, the United Nations said that it effectively put about 75,000 people in northern Gaza at risk.

It was the last major health care facility in northern Gaza, now shuttered. The Palestinian medics and activists are accusing Israel of targeting health care facilities. Israel maintains its stance that it believes Hamas is using them for command and control centers -- Fred.

PLEITGEN: Paula Hancocks in Jerusalem, thank you very much.

U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has claimed he would quickly end the Russia-Ukraine war once he takes office but he hasn't explained how he will make that happen. Just ahead, we'll examine whether either side is ready to negotiate an end to the war. Stay with us.

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PLEITGEN: Welcome back to our viewers around the world. I'm Fred Pleitgen in London and this is CNN NEWSROOM. Let's take a look at our top stories this hour.

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PLEITGEN (voice-over): Protesters against South Korea's impeached president have been gathering outside the official residence in Seoul. You're seeing pictures on your screen right there.

It was the site of an earlier standoff, where authorities attempted to detain Yoon Suk-yeol after he declared martial law.

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PLEITGEN: With the smallest majority in nearly a century, Mike Johnson will keep his job as the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

[04:30:00]

Johnson was reelected to the post on the first ballot on Friday, after president-elect Donald Trump called the holdouts.

Trump himself will be sentenced in the New York hush money case on January 10th. The judge in the case says, that while Trump's conviction stands, he will not face any legal penalties.

U.S. President Joe Biden is blocking a $14 billion takeover of the U.S. Steel company. He says it's a matter of national security. CNN senior White House correspondent Kayla Tausche has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) KAYLA TAUSCHE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: President Biden's move to block the $14 billion takeover of U.S. Steel by its Japanese rival delivers on a campaign promise he made last spring, where he said that U.S. Steel should remain domestically owned.

Several months later, after a painstaking national security review that remained deadlocked among his senior most aides, Biden is taking matters into his own hands.

In a statement he put out following the decision, he said it's his responsibility to defend U.S. national security, including by ensuring that American companies continue to play a central role in sectors that are critical for our national security.

Nippon Steel, the company that planned to buy U.S. Steel, as well as the company itself, have both said that they would fight this decision in court. The Pennsylvania governor, the state where U.S. Steel is headquartered, said in a statement that this situation is far from over.

But it comes as this deal has been marred by political headwinds. Both Biden and president-elect Trump vowed that they would not allow this deal to go forward in a bid to protect American manufacturing jobs.

Several senior administration officials familiar with the review tell CNN that the merits of the deal did not necessarily point in the direction of it posing a national security risk and that the majority of members of the committee on foreign investment in the United States that had been reviewing the deal actually believed that it should go through.

It is one of Biden's final acts in office, certainly a shot across the bow to other companies considering receiving a foreign investment. And it all comes before he hands over the keys to his successor -- Kayla Tausche, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN: Thank you very much for Kayla Tausche for that report.

And we will be right back after a short break.

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PLEITGEN: Welcome back, everyone.

And the U.S. surgeon general is putting the spotlight on growing evidence of a link between alcohol and cancer. He's warning that even drinking small amounts of alcoholic beverages could increase your risk of developing the deadly disease. CNN's Brian Todd has more. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Straight off the holiday partying season, a stark warning about the effects of alcohol from America's top doctor. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy today issued a warning that alcohol consumption can increase our risk of cancer and Dr. Murthy called for new warning labels on alcoholic beverages.

DR. BENJAMIN WEINBERG, GASTROINTESTINAL MEDICAL ONCOLOGIST, MEDSTAR GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL: I think it really helps raise awareness that alcohol is a risk factor for certain diseases, including cancer and that even lower levels of alcohol use can still be associated with the development of certain cancers.

TODD: The Surgeon General's Office says alcohol is now the third leading preventable cause of cancer in the United States, behind tobacco and obesity.

Dr. Murthy said in a statement that alcohol is responsible for about 100,000 cases of cancer and 20,000 cancer deaths every year in the U.S. compared to 13,500 deaths associated with alcohol-related vehicle crashes every year.

Dr. Murthy says a majority of Americans are unaware of this risk. How ignorant of it have we been?

WEINBERG: Yes, so he showed in his survey data that less than half of Americans were aware that alcohol is a risk factor for the development of cancers, whereas more Americans were knowledgeable about other things, such as radiation, tobacco smoke, ultraviolet radiation from the sun.

TODD: The surgeon general's advisory says the link between alcohol consumption and cancer risk is well-established for at least seven types of cancer breast, colorectal, esophagus, liver, mouth, throat and the larynx or voice box.

We asked MedStar Georgetown oncologist, Dr. Benjamin Weinberg, what exactly alcohol does to the body to cause some cancers.

WEINBERG: Alcohol is broken down into acetaldehyde, which is a breakdown product that can inadvertently cause DNA damage, directly hurting our cells and sometimes causing cells to grow rapidly, causing cancers.

Another mechanism is that it can they can induce inflammation, which can be bad for our cells and also bad for our DNA. They can also raise levels of certain hormones like estrogen, which have specifically been linked to the development of breast cancers.

TODD: Is any amount of booze OK?

Does moderate drinking say two drinks a day for men, one for women raise our risk?

WEINBERG: I would say try to drink one drink or less per day and one drink to keep in mind is five ounces of wine, 12 ounces of beer, 1.5 ounces of spirit. It's not a bottle of alcohol. It's not a six pack of beer. So people need to be aware of those quantities.

TODD (voice-over): And some of the major spirits companies have been preparing for this news. Top brewers Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch InBev and major spirits producers Diageo and Pernod Ricard have all been boosting their portfolios of nonalcoholic drinks to address an increasing number of consumers who are ditching alcohol.

TODD: Now as far as those new warning labels that Dr. Murthy is recommending are concerned, only Congress can mandate those.

On the question of whether the incoming Trump administration will support new labels, it is worth noting that President-elect Trump does not drink. And Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's choice for Health and Human Services Secretary, no longer drinks -- Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN: Perhaps nowhere outside of the United States is the start of the new Trump administration being awaited more than in wartorn Ukraine. President-elect Trump has repeatedly expressed a desire for a quick end to the Russia-Ukraine war.

He says he wants to get both sides to the negotiating table, using a combination of incentives and threats, although it's not entirely clear what that would involve. Trump has suggested meeting with Vladimir Putin, Russia's president. That could occur early in his administration.

But all this comes as Russia is making steady progress on nearly all front lines. And that raises the question under what circumstances Moscow would want to start negotiations right now, as it appears to be grinding down Ukraine's defenses.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN: Joining me now is Vladimir Milov. He is the former Russian deputy energy minister under President Putin. After leaving the Kremlin, he served as an advisor to the late opposition leader. Alexei Navalny.

Vladimir Milov, thank you very much for joining me. And I actually just got back from Moscow about 10 days ago. And there does seem to be a degree of optimism in the Kremlin, that they could get a good deal once Donald Trump takes office.

[04:40:00]

They think that they're hearing the right things from like, for instance, Donald Trump criticizing the Biden administration for allowing the Ukrainians to use those ATACMS missiles against Russian territory.

VLADIMIR MILOV, FORMER RUSSIAN DEPUTY ENERGY MINISTER: Hello. Thanks for having me. This is actually what I hear from Moscow sources as well, that they are full of optimism.

And Trump administration offers a new opportunity, at the very least, for Putin to talk to the U.S. administration directly, bypassing Ukrainians and delivering some of their messaging, which might be resonating with Trump worldview, more than it had with Biden or any other Western Ukrainian allies.

So they are counting now on this direct dialogue with the new administration to try to sell some of their ideas and make U.S. abandon military aid to Ukraine and any other forms of support.

PLEITGEN: What do you think, what type of deal the Russians and Vladimir Putin would be willing to get into?

Because what we keep hearing from the Russians is they want to achieve all the goals of the special military operation, although those seem to change from time to time as well. At the same time, we also know that the Russian military is bleeding in Ukraine as well.

What do you think a deal that the Kremlin could sign onto would look like?

MILOV: I would say bleeding is a correct description, which is why Putin badly needs a pause. He has major difficulties with all the resources required for the war. He is running out of money. He's running out of manpower and his military industry is basically -- are producing weapons and ammunition at the maximum possible pace.

And they really cannot extend production anymore. So he would welcome a ceasefire but on his own, Putin's terms. And I think basically that's the major sell that he can offer to Trump.

Imagine Putin offers a ceasefire, a complete cessation of hostilities from the Russian side tomorrow, which will give the American conservative media the opportunity to report that Donald Trump finally brought peace, that he promised so many times.

So I think that's pretty much a valuable bargaining chip for Putin. And for that, at the very least, there's clearly a gap between potential maximum and minimum demands from the Russian side.

Of course, they would bring up the demilitarization of Ukraine and guarantees that Ukraine will not join NATO. But at the very minimum, Putin would demand that the territories of Ukraine that Russia is occupying right now are kept indefinitely under its control, basically freezing the border as the line of conflict as we know it now.

PLEITGEN: I want you to talk a little bit about Russia's wartime economy, because there seem to be two or a lot of paradoxes in it, if you will.

At the one hand, you have a lot of people getting killed and wounded on the front lines. At the same time, you have a lot of people still signing up, some of them, apparently, for money to fight in Ukraine. You have, as you put it, large parts of the budget going to defense spending. But at the same time, the economy seems to be at least heating up and

inflation is high as well.

How is that happening?

MILOV: Well, several things. I think the whole military economy thing was exaggerated by the media so much. If you count, by all the objective merits, you know, workforce sharing, GDP share and fixed investment, that's still less than 10 percent of the Russian GDP while the rest, the remaining 90 percent, are pretty much depressed.

The civil economy that is not affected by heavy military spending, Putin is really running out of personnel. Russia does not really have that many men who could be potentially drafted. We only have, according to the latest population census, we only have 20 million men in Russia aged from 20 to 40.

Mind you that about a quarter of those are already in the military security structures or military industries. About a third either are unfit for military service medically or outside of the country.

So basically, the pool is shrinking. The shortage of labor and the labor market in Russia is really breaking all historic records. So there are not many more men to be drafted.

And also the military industries are exhausting their available capacities and they cannot build new ones because they are cut off from technology equipment because of the sanctions.

So I think what Putin has been doing in the last year really looked like a last push. He accumulated all the resources still available to make some territorial gains -- I would say quite modest at best -- to approach this potential negotiations with the Trump administration in the best possible shape.

But basically, this is all he got. And 2025 will be a much more difficult year for Putin.

[04:45:03]

PLEITGEN: Vladimir Milov in Lithuania, thank you very much for joining us.

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PLEITGEN: And we will be right back. Stay tuned.

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PLEITGEN (voice-over): Emotional scenes in Damascus on Friday as Syrians released from a prison notorious during the Assad regime celebrated their new freedom with dancing and hugs.

Others carried photos of missing loved ones. Rights groups have long documented torture and mass executions in Syria's prisons.

Meanwhile the French and German foreign ministers met with Syria's de facto leader in Damascus on Friday in the first visit by European Union ministers to the country since the fall of the Assad regime.

France and Germany expressed cautious optimism about working with Syria's new government and said the constitutional process must include women and all of Syria's minority groups.

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PLEITGEN: And a former colleague of ours here at CNN had the chance to return to post-Assad Syria on a very personal journey. Arwa Damon covered Syria's civil war for CNN from the beginning, both from the inside and from the areas surrounding it. She would go on to found INARA.

[04:50:00]

A nonprofit organization that provides access to life-altering medical and mental health care to children impacted by the war its aftermath or by natural disasters.

Arwa recently returned to a Syria that seemed unimaginable even a few weeks ago. She described listening to people speaking openly rather than in hushed whispers as before.

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ARWA DAMON, FORMER CNN CORRESPONDENT: I really do feel it.

I mean, the air feels lighter. People feel happier. You hear it in their tone of voice and the expression that's on their face. I mean, it's absolutely amazing.

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PLEITGEN: Arwa's organization, INARA, traveled to other areas to determine what sort of programs are needed and where. INARA is in the process of setting up a mobile primary medical care van. And Arwa Damon joins me now live from Istanbul in Turkiye.

Arwa, first of all, we want to get to the work that you were able to do or start doing in Syria, because I think that the trauma that children have suffered there, both physical and mental, is so different than any other conflict.

Because you had the war, you had children who grew up hearing only bombs or getting wounded. And then you had that economic hardship that ensued afterwards. Describe a little bit of what you found there and what you think you can do.

DAMON: You know, it's very much of a compounded trauma that really attacks a child's psyche on many different levels.

We need to sort of begin to understand what these multiple displacements have actually meant over the course of the last 13 years and then especially the impact on children whose fathers have disappeared.

Because prior to the fall of the Assad regime, mothers used to be able to tell their kids, when they asked where Daddy is, they used to be able to say, well, Daddy is with the regime.

Now children are going to their mothers and saying, well, Mommy, the regime is gone.

So why isn't Daddy home?

And mothers don't know how to explain to a child that Daddy has disappeared and that she doesn't actually have these answers for them.

And then also, especially for those children, the millions of children who either were too small to remember what a life without war was like or those who were born into this war, I mean, Fred, they've never slept on a mattress. They don't know what it's like to live inside a structure with walls.

Their entire life has been tents. You know, hot water, they don't know what it is to have hot water running out of your faucet. So along with this mobile medical van, we also managed to set up in this Damascus suburb called Daraya, which, I'm sure you'll remember, for years was besieged and bombed by the Assad regime.

Something of a community center space for children, where we can also run mental health and psychosocial activities. And speaking to the head of the local organization that provided the space for us, he was saying things like, you know, they've never had a soft surface to run on.

They've never had access to so many toys at the same time. And this is really when you grow to realize not just how much Syria's children were deprived of but how much they actually need.

PLEITGEN: And that that goes exactly to my next question, because, I mean, one of the big things that the sort of interim government that Ahmed al-Sharaa faces is, on the one hand, the international community, seeing -- we just saw the German and French foreign ministers there -- that the sort of social fabric of Syria needs to be renewed.

But at the same time, of course, there is that need for justice for the many people who have been wronged. Their relatives have been killed, people who were imprisoned.

How do you see that shaping up?

Do you think there's a chance to achieve that?

DAMON: From what I'm hearing from people on the ground, from the family members of those who have disappeared, whose loved ones did not emerge miraculously from any number of Syria's prisons, there is still very much a fight ongoing for justice and accountability.

And many will argue that this is actually the crux of what is needed for Syria to be able to not only move forward but also form its identity, because no one wants the same identity that existed for the last 50-plus years, the identity of an oppressed Syrian.

And so what does this next phase look like?

What -- how do Syrians themselves begin to define themselves but also one another?

It's a very rich, diverse society that obviously has seen many fissures. And one of the few things that many will point out, that they say gives them hope, is that there is, at the very least, this determination, this agreement that the status quo that existed under the Assad regime is not something that anyone is willing to go back to.

And then, of course, you have to add to all of that the very real concerns about the uncertainty of Syria's future, what kind of rulers will HTS end up being, granted that it is just an interim government.

But there is this level of awareness, especially amongst the women's political movement, for example, or those of minorities, that they, from this point in time, need to really start making their voices heard, to ensure that they, too, have a seat at the table.

[04:55:05]

As Syria is beginning to discuss its constitution and what kind of a government it wants to see formed and many other crucial and critical matters.

And all of this, Fred, really reminds me of something that I actually heard very early on back in, you know, 2012, from a young Syrian activist who -- and this was when these sort of more extremist groups were beginning to emerge.

But he had said, look, a lot of us are very aware that we quite probably are going to need to have a revolution after the revolution.

And you know what?

Things might work out this time around. They might not. But we are going to keep fighting for the Syria that we want.

PLEITGEN: Arwa Damon, we're out of time, unfortunately. But thank you very much, to Istanbul in Turkiye.

And I'm Fred Pleitgen in London. And we'll be back with more CNN NEWSROOM in just a moment. Stay with us.