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Nepal, China Pause Rescue Efforts Over New Flood Risk; Trump Says Putin Won't Attack NATO Territory; King Harald Of Norway Dead At Age 89. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired August 28, 2026 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN ANCHOR: Authorities in Nepal and China have now announced that they're pausing their rescue efforts over the risk of new flooding and landslides in the region.

Officials say a barrier lake formed after debris from Wednesday's flooding dammed up a river, but that barrier lake dam has been overflowing in recent hours, and that's resulted in authorities warning residents to seek higher ground and safety and to remain vigilant.

Some 500 people are now confirmed dead from Wednesday's catastrophe, and more than 1,300 people remain missing. Those include hundreds of foreign nationals. I want you to listen to a tourist describe their harrowing escape from those floodwaters.

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ANJANA RAJA, AMERICAN TOURIST: We saw the gush of water all the way, dirty mud, you know, rising all the way four - four-storey high. We ran for our life. We ran 500 steps all the way up the mountain to be safe.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you hear something before you saw the mud slide? What was it? Please explain.

RAJA: Like waterfall, it felt like a boulder falling down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABDELAZIZ: Now we have reported the breaking news this hour that authorities in both China and Nepal have paused those rescue efforts again because of the fears of more flooding and families of those who are still missing and searching for their loved ones in hospitals and shelters are waiting for more information. Will Ripley has this.

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WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm here at the teaching hospital. It's one of the busiest medical centers here in Kathmandu. It's also the main intake point for flood survivors and also for the bodies of flood victims. So you see this table here. This is incredibly busy right now. More than 1,200 people have registered names of loved ones who are

missing. And if we go over here, there's another concrete pillar with a much, much shorter list of just about 31 names. These are people who've actually been identified, who are survivors, who are being treated here at the hospital. Family members are waiting, hoping that more survivors will be brought in.

But obviously, you see the difference between all of the people here with loved ones who are missing, and the incredibly small number of names of those who've actually been identified as survivors. Still family members we've talked to out here say they are holding out hope for a miracle that their loved ones could be alive, and if they're not, they at least hope to be able to identify their bodies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABDELAZIZ: Now that hope for miracles that Will Ripley describes there is also being shared by many other families around the world. Hundreds of foreign visitors remain missing after the disaster. This is video of a vigil that was being held in New York on Thursday. Among those family members is American Radhika Sharma, whose parents have not been heard from since Wednesday. She spoke with our Anderson Cooper.

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RADHIKA SHARMA, PARENTS WENT MISSING DURING PILGRIMAGE: Last night. I posted my parents' information and their pictures on social media in the hopes that I could just get the word out, and if somebody saw them on ground, they would be able to reach out to me.

I haven't been able to locate them, but what I have kind of have received is just like a community, a huge community of people, who like in the United States, they're just like my brother and I. They're children, family members of aunts and uncles, parents who are on this pilgrimage and who they've lost contact with.

I've made a WhatsApp group. We're trying to slowly get more of the people, especially in the United States, into that group, so that if we get information from the community on the ground, we can share it with each other. It just makes the whole process a little bit more bearable.

They're really hardworking, down-to-earth people. They put both of us through college. They put me through medical school. They just retired a year ago, and finally, after all the work that they put in with us, they were -- and we kind of pushed them to go live your life, go travel, and they are pretty religious, and so they had been exploring and researching this religious pilgrimage to Mount Kailash, which is really, really special to a lot of Hindus. It's the home of Lord Shiva.

So they -- one of their friends who's actually in the group with them, who's lost as well, she had done this tour many times, and so they were going with her and the tour group that she trusted. We just didn't realize that this was going to happen, and our world was going to turn upside down. (END VIDEO CLIP)

ABDELAZIZ: We'll be right back after a short break.

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[04:35:00]

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ABDELAZIZ: President Trump is now downplaying the possibility of Russia attacking a NATO territory, saying he's had quote, good talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Now, these comments are despite the fact that CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Moscow earlier this week to warn Russia against such a move, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Ratcliffe also used the trip to press Russia to cut off support for Tehran as the Trump Administration attempts to isolate Iran financially. Ratcliffe's trip was the first known visit by a senior Trump Administration official in months.

The man known as the Butcher of Bosnia for his crimes during the Balkin wars is dead. Ratko Mladic died in prison. This was in The Hague, where he was serving a life sentence. The former Serbian military leader was convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity, and other atrocities committed against Bosnia's Muslim and Croat populations during the war.

CNN's Nic Robertson has more for us.

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NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Don't be afraid. No one will do anything to you. This is how the world will remember Ratko Mladic, calming crowds of civilians ahead of the biggest mass murder in Europe since World War II, a genocide he engineered, and would go on the run for a decade and a half before being captured and brought to trial. It was July 1995 in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica. The country's bloody civil war was in its third year. Mladic commanded the Bosnian Serb army. His forces brutally slaughtered more than 7,000 Muslim men and boys from Srebrenica.

Mladic's central and blood-soaked role in the breakup of the former Yugoslavia began years earlier, a front-line commander in 1991 spearheading Serb forces against Croatia. Over the previous three decades, had risen rapidly through the ranks of the Yugoslav army, but it was Bosnia's battlefields that made him hero to many Serbs, defender of their dwindling fortunes,

[04:40:00]

he was born in 1943 during the Nazis' World War II occupation, close to the crucible of much of his later killing, Bosnia's capital Sarajevo. He grew up imbued with Serbian ideology of Orthodox Christian faith and defense of ethnic kin. He got his chance in May 1992. Bosnia's Serbian political leaders picked him to head their forces.

Bosnia's Muslim leaders wanted independence for Serbs to remain part of Yugoslavia. Mladic laid siege to Sarajevo, shelling and sniping its poorly prepared civilian population. More than a quarter million people died in the course of the three-year war, leading to charges of war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity against Mladic.

When peace came in 1995, Mladic went on the run. In the early 2000s, he was still drawing an army pension in Belgrade. There were reports of sightings, rumors of arrest, a stroke, even suicide. Eventually, in the summer of 2011, he was captured living on a Serbian farm with a cousin.

RATKO MLADIC, FORMER BOSNIAN MILITARY OFFICER (through translator): I am General Ratko Mladic.

ROBERTSON: At last, he was brought into the dock in the tribunal in The Hague. His right arm appeared limp, almost useless. During the hearings that followed, he would complain of fatigue and illness, citing past heart problems. But Mladic remained combative and uncooperative.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Mladic, if you -

ROBERTSON: He was removed from court during his sentencing, shouting it was all lies. In November 2017, he was convicted, handed life in prison for genocide and crimes against humanity. His death ends one of the darkest chapters in Europe's recent history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABDELAZIZ: We'll be right back after a brief break.

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[04:45:00]

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ABDELAZIZ: Welcome back. Let's go back to one of our top stories this hour. The death of King Harald V of Norway. For more on this, I want to bring in the senior reporter at Norway's public broadcaster NRK, Tove Bjorgaas. I understand, Tove, that you're just outside the Royal Palace right now. Can you give me a sense of what's happening around you? Has this news of the king's passing sunk in? Is there mourning around you?

TOVE BJORGAAS, SENIOR REPORTER & FORMER WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, NRK: Definitely, people started coming to the Royal Castle here in the center of Oslo already yesterday when they learned that the king was terminally ill and in hospital. And today, people are streaming to the castle behind me. Maybe you'll be able to see the actual castle where the flag has been lowered to half-mast on top of the castle.

I just saw parliamentarians walk by. The Norwegian Parliament is only a couple of blocks away from here. There has been an outpouring of grief and support ever since the news broke yesterday and this morning at about 8:35 local time, the Royal Castle announced that King Harald V had passed.

ABDELAZIZ: You're talking about an outpouring of grief. Can you describe to me the legacy of this king and how people are remembering him right behind you there?

BJORGAAS: They remember him as a very inclusive monarch. He passed away at the age of 89, but even in his last years, he was speaking about Norway as an inclusive society where -- where all people are welcome, immigrants, people of different sexual orientations, and he always came out to see the people, to join the people.

He traveled to every single municipality of this country. There's only more than 300 of them, and he only lacked two when he passed away. So people really feel that he's been really the king of all Norwegians, and that he has seen every single person.

And I think especially people remember what happened after the horrible terror attack in 2011, when a large number of children were killed on an island here outside of Oslo, when the king took such part in people's grief.

And today, people want to be here for him and for his family to -- to remember who he was for -- for each and every person here in Norway, and there has been polls in recent years and months showing that even though the support for the monarchy might not be as strong, it has been in the past, the support for the king is very, very strong. King Harald has been a very popular monarch.

ABDELAZIZ: You're describing something that was very similar to what happened here in England when the Queen passed away. There was such a sense of connection to who she was as a person. There was a sense that she was the mother, the grandmother of the nation. Is that very similar where you are in Norway? And I also understand if you could explain to me, he shifted legacy, he shifted tradition. In what way has he changed the monarchy?

BJORGAAS: Well, he has -- first of all, I think you're very much correct in your comparison to England there. A lot of people yesterday said that he's the grandfather of all Norwegians, and especially young people who don't -- do not remember the former king who passed away when I was young in 1991, but he has shifted the monarchy in opening a lot of - or tearing down a lot of barriers, I think also to what a monarch can do. His children has been -- have been allowed to marry whoever they -- they want.

[04:50:00]

The king, who is now being sworn in, Haakon VIII, he married at one point a single mother. His own daughter married an American last year. He has been -- he had his own experience where he had to fight for 10 years to be able to marry his own wife, the Queen, Her Majesty Queen Sonja, back in the 1960s, and so he had, I think, a strong sense, a feeling of how difficult that was. And so he wanted to be able to move Norwegian society forward, also showing his own children, that that even if you're royalty, you're -- you're allowed to -- to be as -- as other Norwegians are, and I think that has also shifted Norwegian society in a more inclusive direction.

ABDELAZIZ: And you're describing something that's very complicated that has to happen simultaneously here. Of course, the royal family has to mourn the loss of a father and a grandfather. At the same time, they have to think about succession, and his son is already lined up for that. Talk to me about the challenges when it comes to succession and what happens next here.

BJORGAAS: So there is a procedure, obviously, for what happens next, so -- so -- so that the new king will become king immediately, and -- and then the -- the -- the -- the queen, the widow, the queen, will now be still called Queen, but she will not be Her Majesty the Queen, but just Queen Sonja, and then and then there -- there are a number of events.

Shortly now, there will be speeches at the Parliament by the President of the Parliament, the Prime Minister, and then there will be a national mourning here in Norway that was just announced. So this has obviously been planned. There will be probably between 10 and -- 10 days and two weeks until the funeral will take place, but there has been challenges for the royal family in recent months.

The Queen -- the Crown Princess, who will now be the Queen Mette- Marit, she just had a lung -- sorry, yeah, she just had a lung transplant. Very recently, she's been struggling with a lung disease for years, and her son, who is not the son of the of the new king, he has actually been convicted in a -- in a for -- for crimes.

So, so there has been scandals also surrounding the Crown Prince's family, but even through this, the support for King Harald has remained strong. But Norway will now enter a new chapter in its history, and -- and that is the next step here. But today, all the focus is on the loss of King Harald and the national mourning that we saw start here already yesterday.

ABDELAZIZ: Tove Bjorgaas, there just outside the royal palace, where huge crowds have gathered to mourn the death of King Harald. You described him as the grandfather, the father of the nation. A period of national mourning has begun, but as you also mentioned there, there is going to be a very quick succession process that begins as well. Thank you so much for joining us and bringing us that sense and that atmosphere around you.

BJORGAAS: Thank you.

ABDELAZIZ: Our preliminary report shows air traffic control and Marine One had communication issues before a jet got too close to the helicopter carrying President Donald Trump. The incident happened earlier this month as Marine One was departing from the White House as a result of the communication breakdown. Commercial planes continued to take off from nearby Reagan National Airport.

Here's part of the exchange that happened when the chopper pilot managed to speak to controllers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARINE ONE: National Tower Marine proceeding as briefed.

TOWER: Marine One, you said you're proceeding as briefed?

MARINE ONE: National Tower, that's Marine One proceeding as briefed.

TOWER: OK, no three minutes. Roger. Proceed as briefed. Marine One, you got traffic rotating off runway one, E 170.

MARINE ONE: Marine One, visual traffic.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABDELAZIZ: Now, normally nearby airports pause their flights for Marine One. On this occasion, an American Airlines regional jet got within the airspace around the helicopter that is meant to serve as a protective bubble. The FAA says the president was never in danger.

After two weeks of relative quiet during hurricane season, tropical storm Dolly has formed in the Atlantic. The storm is well away from land at the moment, moving to the west at 40 miles an hour. Right now, there aren't any watches or warnings in effect. It will dissipate on Saturday, and the remnants will bring rain to the Caribbean this weekend.

[04:55:00]

Stargazers around the world are celebrating a rare celestial event. A partial lunar eclipse, fully visible to nearly 1 billion people. And it happens when the Earth passes between the Sun and the Moon. This casts a shadow on the lunar surface. Experts say this was the best chance to see a lunar eclipse until New Year's Eve, or 2028.

At the peak of the eclipse, the Earth's shadow covered some 96 percent of the Moon. Now, ideally, Earthlings would see a bright ring around the Moon while it surface glows in a rusty reddish color. Astronomer Briley Lewis explains some of the signs at play here.

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BRILEY LEWIS, ASTRONOMER: You can see the bright little sliver. That's still the sun illuminating the moon, where it's not fully in Earth's shadow, and then the rest is where Earth shadow is, you know, blocking out all of the sunlight that usually illuminates the moon.

So a lunar eclipse like this happens at a full moon, when the sun would usually be fully illuminating it, and we can see it's really starting to get there, and that reddish color is something that you would be able to see right now if that bright bit of sunlight weren't quite so bright.

So in a total eclipse, the reddish color comes from the fact that the only light illuminating the moon is actually light that has passed through Earth's atmosphere. This is why I got into astronomy, right?

Is that it's something that connects all of us. It's something that humans have been doing for thousands of years. Like the first recorded lunar eclipse was almost 3,000 years ago, and on like an ancient Babylonian clay tablet.

ELEX MICHAELSON, CNN ANCHOR: Wow.

LEWIS: So it's cool to think that this is something that has connected people across time and across our entire planet.

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ABDELAZIZ: Thank you so much for watching. I'm Salma Abdelaziz. CNN Headline Express is up next.

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