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Connect the World
Uncertainty after Passage of Controversial Bill; LeBron James' Son Stable after Cardiac Arrest during Practice; Judicial Overhaul Supporters: Needed to Balance Out; Chinese Foreign Minister Ousted in Surprise Shake- up; Geopolitics, Climate Drive up Food Prices; LeBron James' Son Suffers Cardiac Arrest. Aired 11a-12p ET
Aired July 25, 2023 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[11:00:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ELENI GIOKOS, CNN HOST, CONNECT THE WORLD: Welcome to the second hour of "Connect the World" with me Eleni Giokos we're live from Abu Dhabi. Coming
up this hour, a new chapter in Israel after it passes a controversial bill that curbs the power of the Israeli Supreme Court. But will the high court
rule on that law itself? We'll take a look at what lies ahead.
Scorching heat means absolutely no less up and the fires raging across the Mediterranean people are fleeing the disaster pleading for help. CNN is
live from the Acropolis in Athens with the view from Greece. And in a surprise announcement, China's government has appointed a new Foreign
Minister, but we still don't know exactly what happened to the old one.
Well, Israel is still reeling from Monday's parliamentary votes that proved the first major legislation in the government's plan to overhaul the
judiciary. Doctors are staging a strike in protest. One group representing Israel's large tech industry expressing its discontent in a bold message an
ad showing a big black box reading, a black day for Israeli democracy ran on the front page of several Israeli newspapers.
So while Israelis protest, even petitioning the Supreme Court to block the law, it begs the question, will Israel descend into a constitutional
crisis? Hadas Gold is back with us this hour from Jerusalem. Hadas as we're trying to join the dots here in terms of what is next?
Firstly, we know that it's content of the ground. We've been seeing these protests happening for six months now. We saw a part of the bill passing
through the Knesset yesterday, it was a big move, and clearly creating a lot more discussion in terms of what comes next.
HADAS GOLD, CNN JERSUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, there's a few things about what comes next? You can look at what comes next economically.
You can look at what comes next in the security arena economically.
You know, we have already heard from Morgan Stanley, talking about how they are reducing kind of their -- how they view the sovereign credit of Israel?
We are expecting a report for Moody's to come in the coming hours; none of those are expected to be very positive outlooks.
The Israeli shekel has lost some of its power against the dollar in terms of the military reservists; we still don't know exactly what those
thousands of military reservists will do, if they will uphold that pledge of not heeding the call to serve, because this legislation has now passed.
And then on the legal front, on the Supreme Court front, there have already been several petitions, I think, at least five filed already in front of
the Supreme Court, to first issue a temporary injunction to stop this legislation and then to ultimately overturn it.
We have not yet heard from the Supreme Court Justices of whether this will be an injunction will be granted. But this is setting up to a really
fascinating sort of legal journey that this bill could be seeing through because what happened.
This bill that was passed was an amendment to what's known as a basic law, Israel has no written constitution, it has a set of basic laws that were
intended to one day turn into a constitution. So when we talk about a constitutional crisis and Israel is talking about a crisis on those basic
laws, as well as a precedent of previous court decisions.
And so the Supreme Court may end up being asked to rule on itself essentially, on its own powers. And there is a question about how this law
affects the separation of powers. Because, you know, the Israeli Government, Benjamin Netanyahu has always talked about how they're trying
to rebalance this to give more power into the hands of the democratically elected legislators.
But the Supreme Court, of course, may feel different, because keep in mind that Supreme Court is essentially really one of if not the only checks on
the power of the government because of the how the parliamentary system is set up here.
And then there is the big question about whether this government will heed a ruling? Let's -- the Supreme Court says that this bill cannot stand that
in and itself is unreasonable. Of course, this is the exact ruling that this bill is all about. Will the government listen to that?
Now Ron Dermer, the Israeli Minister Strategic Affairs a very important minister, very important ally to Benjamin Netanyahu, somebody who's often
in the room with him. He was directly asked about this earlier today on CNN, and he didn't exactly say yes or no.
He said that Israel is a country of laws, but not a country of rule of judges. So I mean, if the Supreme Court rules on this, that is the rule of
judges, is that not the law? He seems to be saying, you know, we passed this law. That's what we should be listening to.
And we have heard from others, including the Minister of Justice that if since if the Supreme Court strikes is down, they will be crossing what he
called a red line. Major question here and if they do, strike it down, that could be leading to a --
GIOKOS: Hadas I have to interrupt you for a second. We have to cross to our colleagues at CNN, U.S. for some breaking news. Let's listen in.
[11:05:00]
(CNN NEWS CENTRAL)
[11:20:00]
GIOKOS: Welcome back to "Connect the World". I'm Eleni Giokos in Abu Dhabi. Now, we've been following Israel's plan to overhaul the judiciary, very
important vote that occurred yesterday that passed through the Knesset in a day of what we've seen in terms of intense protests, so many questions
about way to from here.
Well, my next guest is the Chairman of the Israeli Bar Association, one of the several groups petitioning the Israeli Supreme Court to throw out the
reasonableness law. Amit Becher calls it an unconstitutional law that undermines the fundamentals of the Israeli democracy and a wrongful use of
the Knesset authority to pass basic laws. And Amit Becher joins me now via Skype from Tel Aviv. So, great to have you with us, thank you so very much.
Look, so many questions. Hopefully you can answer some of them. The very Court, the Supreme Court, that will lose authority to overrule government
decisions now has, I guess, the power to strike this vote down because of the appeals that we've seen coming through. Does it still yield that power?
Are you expecting an indictment soon? What is the next step here?
AMIT BECHER, CHAIRMAN, ISRAELI BAR ASSOCIATION: Thank you for having me. The law that was passed yesterday actually undermines the ability of the
court to judicial review, decisions of ministers and the government as a whole on the basis of reasonableness. Now, it must be understood in Israel,
we are very firm democracy.
And despite that, we don't have a constitution. We don't have a bill of rights. We don't have even a constitutional framework. But what we do have
is a long lasting historical heritage of total independence of the Supreme Court. Now, the bill that was passed yesterday undermines that. This is why
we think it's an unconstitutional law as you very correctly mentioned. We think that they this is exact time that the Supreme Court --
GIOKOS: Does the Supreme Court yield the power now? But does that Supreme Court yield the power now to strike this down? Does it still have that
power to do so?
BECHER: We definitely believe that they have, because the exact body institution that is protecting the democracy of Israel is the Supreme
Court. And they have the right, Supreme Court have said in the past, that when Knesset uses unlawfully, its power to bring in basic laws, which are
minor chapters of the future, and future constitution. The Supreme Court rightly has the right, and I think it has the moral duty at this moment.
GIOKOS: The ability to do so. I think you mentioned Israel doesn't have a constitution. You mentioned that Israel doesn't have a constitution, but
other countries without a written constitution; I can give you examples like the UK say that the body of court rulings makes up an unwritten
constitution. Would you say that that is the case in Israel as well?
BECHER: We resemble England, and the English law very, very much in this manner. We, the problem are in Israel, that we are relatively young,
relative to England, or to the United States, only 70 years 75 years old. And, you know, Israel, democracy is a miracle in our geographical area. We
came out of 75 years ago, from a devastating nation in a very, very unstable area.
And we are able to, in one hand, build a strong country and in the other end, strong democracy. So many of those, it came out of rulings of a very,
very, very strong Supreme Court. And yes, it's part of the legal heritage in Israel. I think this is what makes us a strong democracy. And we should
keep it this way.
GIOKOS: I want to, I want you to listen into to an interview we had earlier today, and the country's Minister of Strategic Affairs said that what was
passed in the Knesset yesterday was the most moderate parts of the bill. I want you to take a listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RON DERMER, ISRAELI MINISTER OF STRATEGIC AFFAIRS: There are many checks that the Supreme Court has on the executive and legislative branches and
government that maybe a lot of people are not aware of. There's all check and no balance. That's the problem that we've had in Israel. Over the last
30 years of the focus of this reform, is to try to restore the balance between the branches of government.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[11:25:00]
GIOKOS: All checks and no balance. Do you agree with that?
BECHER: I totally disagree with Minister Dermer. And I'm very sorry for those words said. Because what we lack in Israel, and the only protection
of democratic values, they're standing against power of the government, any government, left to right. The nature of government and ministers is they
want to well, that that's a political nature.
It's a positive nature. But on the other hand, liberal democracies have all the other checks and balances. In Israel, the only check and bounces are
the core independency of the Supreme Court and the Attorney General. Those are two institutions that because we do not have a constitution, Bill of
Rights, and all of those things we spelled before and we don't have strong separation between the central government and local government and other
defenses that we -- .
GIOKOS: Let me ask you this thing.
BECHER: Yes.
GIOKOS: Yes, let me ask you this. Government says that they are now allowing four month period to find consensus. You have one that the IBA has
the ability to paralyze the legal system if you decide to take action against the government. So what are you planning right now, in terms of
intervention?
BECHER: First of all, I hope that the leaders, the political leaders of the country, especially the government leaders, because there are those who are
pushing up and pushing forward those, this legislation will stop and understand. Understand that when they are writing basic laws, which as I've
said, are the minor chapters or the only chapters of the future constitution, it does not; they shouldn't possess or have the majority
power.
When you're writing the rules of the game, everybody has to write them together. And I hope they stop and have the time to bring the country to
peace. But if they don't ask us, and other very, very close allies, all across the Israeli civil societies, leaders of economy, leaders of the high
tech industry, leaders of the military, of the military, soldiers. Other partners in the Israeli society will stand together against shaking the
attempts to shake the democracy.
I think this is a positive angle to see what's happening now in Israel. The society, we've seen hundreds of thousands of people in the streets.
GIOKOS: After your appointment, we have indeed, I mean, after your appointments, which was quite interesting, because you know, when the IBA
has a vote in a new leader, it doesn't really make waves. But you were, you know, it became really important when you were appointed as the chairman of
the IBA, because you were very vocal about being against the judicial overhauls. How does this affect the IBA, because you do play quite a
pivotal role in all of this?
BECHER: It's true, and I will, it was not an appointment. It was an election. And the important thing about that is that the first time
majority, the vast majority of lawyers in Israel came out and voted. And it was a strong message that the professional body in Israel, the Israel Bar
Association represents all practicing lawyers.
We are the people that represent, represent all of this citizens and government when they take a lawyer and meet one, we represent all of them.
And in a vast majority, they said we are against this traditional overhaul. I think it is a very strong message. It's a strong message domestically and
internationally because the Israel society is standing out against these challenges.
In Israel, historic days, but I believe that the, what we see that all of the society groups are standing together. It's a unique situation, and I
believe it will be, we will be coming out stronger. But in these days, it's a major, major historic days here.
GIOKOS: Amit Becher, thank you very much for joining us today, great to have you on the show. Much appreciated for your time.
BECHER: Thank you for inviting me.
GIOKOS: Right and deadly violence in the West Bank. Hamas says three of its members were killed today in an armed clash with Israel's military. The
Israeli military says the man fired on soldiers during a routine patrol in Nablus and the soldiers returned fire in response. Inch by inch, Ukraine
says it is taking back territory from Russia.
[11:30:00]
Ahead we are live from southern Ukraine as the arduous counter offensive pushes forward. Plus no food, no water and lingering injuries and trauma,
we have an exclusive report on the horrors experienced by Russian prisoners fighting and dying in a war that they were little prepared for.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GIOKOS: In a surprise move, China's Foreign Minister Qin Gang has been removed from his position and replaced by his predecessor Wang Yi. It is
not clear yet why the decision was made since Qin was here seen and was considered a trusted aide of Chinese leader Xi Jinping. His ouster comes a
month after he made his last public appearance, and it's fueling major speculation about his whereabouts.
Joining us now, Marc Stewart is following this story for us from Tokyo. A lot of questions about where Qin Gang is and why he was removed from his
position, do you have any answers for us, Marc?
MARC STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, there is a long list of questions Eleni, and there was a lot of intrigue. But as far as the
official role from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it's very cryptic. In fact, this afternoon, there is, the country was operating under the
assumption that Qin Gang was still the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
But obviously that is not the case. In fact, I had a briefing earlier today or on a Tuesday, I should say in China, a spokesperson was asked, you know
where is Qin Gang? Where has he been?
And the official response here is no information to provide. And then hours later we learned up his departure. He was last seen one month ago after
meeting with government officials from Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Russia. But after that his presence really was a complete disappearance, if you will.
He was supposed to meet with an official from the EU. He was not seen there. He was invited to meetings with the ASEAN nations the Southeast
Asian nations. He was not there and then we get this news today. As far as what transpired it's not very clear we know Wang Yi has served in this
position before and he too is seen as a trusted adviser to Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
[11:35:00]
But Qin Gang during his time in office really was the face of Chinese foreign policy in the sense he is the one who sent out the rebuke and used
harsh language or strong language I should say, after the spy balloon shootout.
He's also the one though who played a big role in Secretary of State Antony Blinken's visit to China. So the narratives still very much Eleni to be
written still to be determined. We simply do not know.
GIOKOS: Marc Stewart, thank you so much. Well, Ukraine says it is making progress in its counter offensive in the South. Ukrainian forces are
inching forward on a couple of fronts. They say they're driving Russian forces back as they try to close in on the embattled city of Bakhmut. But
that's just part of Ukraine strategies. CNN's Alex Marquardt is connecting us with more from the southern city of Odessa.
Great to see you, Alex, there's been so much happening in Ukraine over the past few days. But the issue of Bakhmut and the fate of Bakhmut still hang
in the balance. Ukraine says they're making headway.
ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Eleni I think inching forward, as you put it is the right way to put it. It has
been a very intense battle in and around Bakhmut for so many months now. Russia does control so much of that city. Of course, Ukraine trying to
reclaim it by encircling it now, they have made little gains, pushing into Russian defenses to the north of the city.
But now what we're hearing from a variety of sources is that they may be making gains to the south of the city in that encirclement motion, near
settlements and villages that are to the south of Bakhmut. And we are also told that and see reporting that Russia is taking heavy losses.
This is that southern front or the southern part of Bakhmut is quite important because that is how Russia has been able to resupply itself on
roads going into the city that that would also offer higher ground if Ukraine were able to take it back as they tried to assault the city and
reclaim it for Ukraine.
Meanwhile, on the southern front, we're also getting word from Ukrainian authorities and outside monitoring groups that they do appear to be making
some progress there. The goal in the South has been to prod along that very well defended Russian line to try to break through.
Essentially the goal is to try to split the Russian troops and cut that land bridge in half that runs from Crimea to Russian occupied Donbas. So
what we know from the Ukrainian military is that they have been making progress on two different fronts driving towards the southern cities of
Berdiansk and Melitopol both, of course occupied by Russian forces.
The Institute for the Study of War, for example, which is an outside monitoring group, says that Ukrainian forces have been able to recapture
around 1.7 kilometers as they drive forward towards Melitopol. Eleni, I did ask the Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov the other day, what a
successful counter offensive would look like.
And what he said is that if the Ukrainians were able to split that land bridge, split those Russian forces and eventually, he says tried to reach
the Sea of Azov that would weaken Russia. But of course, that would be far, far from pushing Russian forces out of Russian occupied Ukraine, Eleni.
GIOKOS: Yes. Alex Marquardt, thank you so much. Good to see you. Well, as the war drags on, Russia is looking to replenish its ranks by getting
people who are older to serve in the military. Lawmakers today passed a bill passing, raising the minimum age, the maximum age for being drafted
from 27 to 30. There are still a few steps before this becomes law.
This comes a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed legislation rising the age for military reservists by five years. Now it's believed
Russia has sent some 15,000 prisoners to the frontlines in eastern Ukraine since January with little training or combat experience.
Many of them are dying or returning home badly wounded. CNN's Nick Paton Walsh obtained rare and exclusive testimony from one surviving prisoner as
well as the mother of recruits who died just two weeks after deploying and shared a horrifying story from the battlefield. Their names have been
changed for their safety.
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, since about last fall, it appears the convicts have been a pretty
substantial part of Russia's frontline strategy originally recruited by the Wagner mercenary group in their tens of thousands. The scheme then taken
over by the Russian Ministry of Defense, seemingly thinking there was something successful in it that they wanted to own wholesale.
But now we're hearing pretty rare testimony directly from Russians who survived or in one case lost dear son to that particular violence. And this
indeed shocking to hear quite how appalling the conditions they endure are. Here's what we heard.
[11:40:00]
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WALSH (voice over): Russia is often cruelest to its own, the bleakest fate, prisoners recruited by the Ministry of Defense, basically as cannon fodder.
These so called Stormzy battalions surrendering here of death rates hard to fathom. Here are two rare stories, one of incredible survival, and another
of a young and quick death, told to CNN a great risk from inside Russia.
Ex-Con Sergei barely made it back. Now he works two jobs and can't sleep because his ear still rings from Shell Shock. We first talked when he'd
been shot for the second time, but he was still sent back injured. From 600 prisoners recruited with him in October, he says only 170 are alive and
only two of them without injury, sent again and again in waves to attack Ukrainian positions.
SERGEI, RUSSIAN PRISONER RECRUIT: I remember most clearly the last of the nine concussions I had, we attacked. RPGs drones flew at us. Our commander
yells on the radio, I don't care, go ahead. Don't come back until you take this position. Two of us found a small hole and dived in there. A drone
threw a grenade at us and it landed in the 30 centimeter gap between us.
My friend was covered with shrapnel all over. Yet I was untouched somehow, but I lost my sight for five hours.
WALSH (voice over): He only stayed in hospital that time and got home as doctors made him an orderly. He has nightmares that he is told to be first
out of the trench again. But daily life in the trench was a nightmare too, of frostbite, hunger and thirst.
SERGEI: Sometimes we didn't eat for several days. We didn't drink for several days. It was a four kilometer Walk to Water. And thank God it was
winter, we were drinking the snow.
WALSH (on camera): If a person didn't want to fight, what happened?
SERGEI: Sometimes the commander reset people. He zeroed them out killed them. I only saw it once, a fight with a man who stole and killed his own
people. I didn't see who of the four people around him shot. But when he tried to escape, a bullet hit him in the back of the head. I saw the head
wound. They carried him away.
WALSH (voice over): For some it never got that far. Andrei was 20 when he was jailed on drugs offenses and 23 when he was sent from prison to the
front. This training was fleeting. His mother Yulia said he'd yet to grow into a man still kidding about.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really its sea, sun and sand here, sunburn, then the wind chaps your face, and -- it rains.
WALSH (voice over): Like with many prison recruits, he just disappeared. But it was on May the ninth, Victory Day in Russia when presidential pomp
in Moscow marked the Nazis defeat. Andrei called her the night before to say his unit would attack at dawn.
YULIA, MOTHER OF RUSSIAN PRISONER RECRUIT: We were arguing. It is horrible to say, but I already thought of him like he was dead. He left knowing
everything. Every say I told him no, no. no. And he didn't listen to me. When he said, "We are going to storm," I wrote him, "Run, Forest, run."
WALSH (voice over): We think these ruins are near where he died. Up to 60 others Yulia hurt, died in the same assault that day. Yulia got nothing, no
body. Just a letter from the military saying Andrei had died the very day he left jail.
YULIA: The hardest part was that I was afraid he would kill someone. Because I can live with my son as a drug addict, but with my son as a
murderer, it was difficult for me to accept it.
WALSH (voice over): The horror Russia inflicts on Ukraine it seems match nearly by that done at home.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WALSH: Now Sergei also told us that there aren't really normal rotations of troops in his positions along the Russian front line where you take those
exhausted to the back, allow them to refresh and then send them back into the fight again.
You only leave the trenches he was in when you're injured, or when you die, utterly shocking conditions and it's really a snapshot on the appalling
morale that those Russian units must be experiencing. And that could make Russia particularly fragile if Ukraine's counter offensive gains weight.
Nick Paton Walsh, CNN London.
GIOKOS: Well, still to come, some rare good news from the IMF, but it's also warning choppy waters could still be ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:45:00]
GIOKOS: Around the world, a perfect storm of extreme circumstances means food could get about to get a lot more expensive amid war. Wheat prices
have risen sharply following Russian strikes on the Ukrainian ports on the Danube River. And intense weather is also threatening food security and
pushing prices higher.
Meantime, the IMF has raised its global outlook for 2023 by 0.2 percentage points, saying the global economy is showing more resilience than
economists previously thought. However, growth remains weak by historical standards, so good news, as well as bad news. Anna Stewart is here to make
a bit of sense out of all of this.
Look, we're worried about supply of grain, we've seen the impact of the war, and we know what that can do to food inflation. So let's start with
that in terms of the prognosis on the inflationary outlook.
ANNA STEWART, CNN REPORTER: Yes, concerns have certainly been heightened since the Grain Deal that covered the black sea ports with Ukraine. Since
that deal has now evaporated, there's even more pressure on how to get grain safely out of Ukraine. And the attack on a port in the Danube River
has certainly heightened the risk there operationally.
And you have to question whether there'll be able to export as much food as they would like from that port. And bearing in mind that Ukraine before the
invasion accounted for around 10 percent of global wheat exports around the world. You can understand how big an issue this is for global food prices,
and particularly for regions, particularly in Africa and Asia, developing countries who really rely on Ukraine for wheat, corn, and other food
exports.
So we've certainly seen this in the prices we saw yesterday, wheat prices were up 8 percent. I will show you though, where they sit in terms of the
last year and a half in terms of the peak that we saw in March of last year, shortly after the invasion, you can see that wheat prices have
actually come down around 40 percent since then.
So in terms of the impact on grain prices relating to the war in Ukraine, we're not at that peak, but they might be climbing higher if attacks like
the one we saw this week become more frequent, Eleni?
GIOKOS: Yes, really interesting. I mean, look, we know the IMF always likes to refer to the weather when they're looking at their outlooks. But now the
weather is really playing an important role. Climate change is going to absolutely impact some of what we're expecting in terms of real data and
numbers.
STEWART: Yes, heat inflation is becoming an increasing focus, I think, for economists around the world. And we see this in the updates the World
Economic Outlook. Interestingly, the IMF, as you say, has actually upgraded the growth forecast for this year. But the warning on inflation is really
quite severe, and particularly on food inflation.
And this is after many of us have seen inflation actually come down a little bit, particularly in terms of food inflation. Now they mentioned the
risk of war and the impact that could have and also the Grain Deal falling through with Russia and Ukraine. And they also talk about extreme weather.
Now some of that related to climate change.
[11:50:00]
And we have seen all sorts of terrible farming impacts from China to the U.S., most recently, the monsoons in India, who was India last week to
actually stop exporting some rice products to the world to try and keep a lid on inflationary prices for rice within their own country that has an
impact throughout the world.
Also the El Nino and I've got this quote from the chief economist from the statement says it saying, El Nino could bring more extreme temperature
increases than expected, exacerbate drought conditions and raised commodity prices.
And actually a few analysts in the last few weeks have been saying that El Nino perhaps hasn't actually been taken into account enough looking at
commodity prices, not just this year, but next year, so that could also cause the prices to rise, Eleni.
GIOKOS: Anna Stewart, great to have you on, thank you so much. All right, we're going to have a short break, we'll be back right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GIOKOS: Right, breaking news that we've been following. Bronny James son of four time NBA champion LeBron James suffered a cardiac arrest while
practicing basketball Monday. His family has released a statement thanking medical and athletic staff and saying Bronny is now in stable condition and
no longer in ICU.
I want to bring in Sports Anchor Andy Scholes to shed some light on this shocking news worrying news about Bronny James, but he's now out of ICU,
which is encouraging. What more do we know?
ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Well, Eleni, that's the good news. Within a day he was already out of ICU and in stable condition. And you know,
that's definitely positive considering went into cardiac arrest there while practicing on the basketball court. But Bronny James, you know, he's a very
highly thought of high school prospect.
His games, when he played in high school were highly attended by you know, many people wanting to see what LeBron James son could do on a basketball
court. LeBron himself would go to many of those games. And he was set to play basketball in college at USC, and that's where he was practicing when
he went into cardiac arrest.
And the family put out a statement about what happened on Monday saying that yesterday while practicing Bronny, he suffered a cardiac arrest.
Medical staff was able to treat Bronny and take him to the hospital. He's now in stable condition, and no longer in ICU.
The family thanked the people who are there to help Bronny in his time of need. And Eleni, you know, definitely a scary situation, basically every
parent's nightmare to hear that their child had a medical emergency.
And, you know, for the James family Bronny has played, you know hundreds of thousands of minutes of basketball on the court and nothing like this has
ever happened. So I'm sure it was scary, not only for the family, but for him as well. Dr. Sanjay Gupta was speaking earlier on CNN, he said now
what's important is trying to pinpoint what caused this.
What was the reason behind the cardiac arrest because now you know if they can pinpoint that his basketball career is not over? You know, we all of
course, hope he is going to be fine and be able to live a long healthy life. But I'm sure Bronny and the James family would also on top of that,
love him to be able to continue his basketball career.
And we've seen these things happen before in the game of basketball. There's college basketball player a few years ago, collapsed on the court.
He was actually in a medically induced coma for a few days. Doctors were able to diagnose what happened to his heart and he was able to continue his
basketball career and just this last month was drafted into the NBA.
His name was -- county Johnson. So you know there is hope for Bronny James. But for now Eleni, you know there are still a lot of questions of what
caused this to happen. And of course everyone hoping the best and that Bronny is going to be OK.
[11:55:00]
GIOKOS: Yes, I mean such a good point; priority is that he gets better. And then of course, second is what this means for him in the future, really
important questions. Of course, it's something we'll be covering throughout, Andy Scholes, really good to see you. Thank you so much for
bringing us up to date on Bronny James.
We will be covering the story extensively as we get more information. Well, thanks so very much for joining us for "Connect the World". We've got "One
World" up next with Zain Asher. From me Eleni Giokos in Abu Dhabi, I'll see you tomorrow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[12:00:00]
END
