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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

New Charlie Hebdo Hits the Street; Police Trace French Terror Networks; U.S. Airport Security Tightened; Cockpit Voice Recorder to Be Downloaded; Boko Haram Gaining Ground

Aired January 14, 2015 - 04:00   ET

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

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: New terror threats and heightened security across France as the new controversial issue of "Charlie Hebdo" hits newsstands. This morning, fears of new attacks as investigators try to track down the terror network that may have helped the gunmen in last week's massacre. We are live in Paris with all of the latest developments.

Good morning and welcome to EARLY START. I'm Christine Romans.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm John Berman. It is Wednesday, January 14th. It is 4:00 a.m. in the East.

We want to welcome all of our viewers in the United States and around the world. It's 10:00 a.m. here in Paris.

Defiance and new threats of violence in response as a new issue of "Charlie Hebdo" hits the streets here in Paris this morning. We have seen people walking around with it already. The cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad is on the cover and, of course, is considered by many Muslims to be offensive. Jihadist Web sites are calling for more terror attacks in response.

Police are seeking out suspects that they believe are connected to the massacres last week at "Charlie Hebdo" behind me and also at the kosher market here in Paris. One man was arrested in Bulgaria's border, along Bulgaria's border with Turkey. That man is expected to be charged in connection with some kind of terrorist activity and most importantly this man arrested in Bulgaria is believed to have known at least one of the suspects.

New evidence is now coming to public view. We have new video now of the moments that followed the attack on "Charlie Hebdo", the Kouachi brothers outside the offices of that satirical magazine. They say they have avenged the Prophet Muhammad. You can see them eerily calm, so calculated as they get into their car and drive off, confronting police with automatic weapons.

All this as attacks against Muslims here in France seem to be rising. A prominent French Muslim group says that there had been more than 50 violent anti-Muslim acts in just the last week.

I want to talk about all this. Joining me here in Paris, our senior international correspondent, Frederik Pleitgen.

Fred, you see the lines at the kiosks all around the city to buy "Charlie Hebdo", but you also hear new concern that this could cause tensions.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Certainly. I mean, there's absolutely concerns here, not just for tensions, but there could be renewed attacks again. One of the things that the French prime minister said yesterday is he said, we have to understand that this threat is still very real. It's coming from the inside, but it's also from within our countries.

And you can see that early this morning, because not only did you see the lines at the kiosks, and it was really everyone that you go to, there's people lining up trying to get this magazine, in most cases, it's sold out.

You see additional police boats on the river here. You see additional troops in the streets here. A lot more than we have seen in the past couple days. At the same time, right now, what France is, of course, doing is in a sort of internal troop buildup, if you will. They have announced they are going to put 10,000 additional troops on the streets.

They're going to put additional security forces on the street. Some of them to guard Jewish institutions, but all of that is happening right now. So, as every day goes by, they're going to have more of these soldiers on the streets, they're going to have more security in play. But, of course, this day is very, very important.

And they are well aware of the fact that many people are angry at this. That this is obviously the first time the magazine comes out since these horrific events here. And that puts them on heightened alert. You can feel that on the streets, you can feel with the security forces, and it's also something that officials are telling us about.

BERMAN: No, it's a good point. We definitely saw more security on the streets than we have seen in the last few days. A lot of that is because the people they called up to staff up are finally, I think, ready to go, that happened last night. But a lot of it also in response --

PLEITGEN: They are more heavily armed. I think that's also -- because if you're in Paris, you very often see security forces at places like the Eiffel Tower as well, but they will have little submachines, they'll have pistols. But now, they have these high powered rifles. You can tell they are preparing for a different threat than they were before.

Remember, you're watching that video, and the police were just absolutely overpowered. And I think that's something that really scares the security forces here.

BERMAN: And now you see, even traffic cops wearing bullet proof vests, which is something you never saw before. Frederik Pleitgen, great to have you here with us. Really appreciate it.

I want to talk now about the investigation, who might have been helping the men behind these pair of attacks here in Paris. Investigators working furiously to connect the plots here to perhaps greater networks that might still be out it there. The question is: are there still members of a cell or cells, people who might be on the loose?

Police still seeking Hayat Boumeddiene. She is the partner of one of the men killed last week, Amedy Coulibaly. She was reportedly last seen near Turkey's border with Syria. Investigators also looking for her companion in the surveillance video that captured her at a Turkish airport, a man now identified as Mahdi Belhoucine.

Another suspect, another man was arrested Tuesday on the border between Bulgaria and Turkey. Officials say Fritz-Joly Joachin will face terror charges -- could face terror charges. Also, he's wanted in connection with kidnapping his son. They believe he was on his way to Syria. Agence France Presse says that this man had been in contact with one of the Kouachi brothers before his arrest in Bulgaria on January 1st.

The money trail, investigators are tracing the weapons and the funds used in the attacks here. Officials say this huge stockpile of weapons and the money used to buy them perhaps came from abroad. CBS News is reporting that Kouachi brothers returned from Yemen in 2011 with $20,000 from the al Qaeda affiliate there. That is the same year intelligence sources tell CNN that Cherif Kouachi used his brother Said's passport to travel to Yemen himself.

A lot of threads in the investigation. I want to bring in CNN's Isa Soares right now. She is in the Paris bureau.

Good morning, Isa.

ISA SOARES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John.

Yes, the pieces of the jigsaw slowly coming together. As they come together, it paints a more -- even more confusing picture. Just shows you how wide this net perhaps is and how many people they should really be looking at.

Let me break it to you. Let tell you what we have learned in the last few hours. About five hours or so ago, we have heard from -- CNN sources have learned that the youngest of the brothers, Cherif Kouachi, the 32-year-old used his brother's passport to travel to Yemen. That was back in 2011. They have always said those two brothers. They have also pledged allegiance to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

So that's what we have learned. Why did he take the passport? Because his passport had been revoked back in 2008, because you remember he had three years in prison and he was basically accused of recruitment, of jihadist recruitment. So, this is what we're hearing on that front. That's not to say that

both of them weren't in Yemen. So, that is the part of the investigation that we are hearing.

Along with that puzzle, also another piece that's come in to the jigsaw is the new face in what is becoming a very complex case. Agence France Press has said that they have arrested a Frenchman with alleged links to one of the Kouachi brothers. Now, this man left Paris. He arrived in Bulgaria on the 30th of December, weeks before the attacks were carried out here. That is not to say, he didn't have some sort of involvement, whether that was planning, whether that was funding, we do not know.

There was an arrest warrant for him first because his wife, there are allegations that he took his son from his wife. The second one now we're hearing that he is charges of terrorism. We have heard recently that he was radicalized and converted to Islam some 15 years or so ago.

But all these pieces are coming together. Also learning more about Hayat Boumeddiene and also the man that was with her as she left Turkey by (INAUDIBLE), left back to Madrid to go to Istanbul, now hearing that she's in Syria.

The gentleman is called Mahdi Belhoucine. He's 23 years old. He is from Paris. We're told that he's -- you know, he grew up just on the outskirts of Paris. "Le Monde", a very well-known French newspaper here saying he grew up in the French streets of Paris, in the suburbs. He went to a famous engineering school and may have been connected -- this is what we're learning, John -- to a separate jihadist cell, a Pakistani Afghan jihadist cell.

His brother reportedly may have met Coulibaly in jail, and his brother was, in fact, sentenced to two years in prison for sending fighters to Pakistan, to really fight jihad. And he too has reportedly posted jihadist propaganda on social media.

So, you're starting to get a picture of the connectivity between all of them. But there's so many questions, despite the fact we're getting more information, the puzzle is getting -- is all piecing together, so many questions remain unanswered as to just how the links to AQAP, the links to Yemen, and obviously all, you know, Coulibaly says he represents ISIS, one represents the other. Is it all -- are they all being represented under one umbrella? Or is it just the fact they -- you know, they have a fascination for these groups?

So many questions including organization and indeed financing, which is crucial -- John.

BERMAN: And you can expect I think to bring in more people for questioning as they trace all the contacts of the Kouachi brothers and Amedy Coulibaly had had over the last weeks and months as well.

Isa Soares, thanks so much for being with us. Really appreciate it.

Now, all morning, we have been walking around Paris visiting newsstands trying to get our hands on a copy of the new "Charlie Hebdo" issue that did hit the newsstands this morning. They were said to have printed some 3 million copies, that's 50 times the normal press run. However, as far as we can tell, they are almost all sold out. None of the newsstands we visited seem to have any copies available.

The surviving staffers, as you can see here, they put out the new issue. It does have a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed on the cover and CNN is not showing it. We have told you that before.

On the cover, Muhammad has a tear in his eye. He's wearing a shirt that says "Je Suis Charlie", means "I am Charlie." And above him, it says, "Tout est pardonne", all is forgiven.

There was a news conference I attended yesterday at the office where the "Charlie Hebdo" surviving workers are. And the cartoonists who drew the cover, Renald Luzier, Luz as he's known, he defended the cover. He said it just felt right.

CNN's Phil Black is at a newsstand here in Paris.

And, Phil, we were at some newsstands ourselves. They were packed and as far as we can tell, there weren't many available copies of that magazine around anywhere.

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, that's right. We saw crowds around the newsstands here before they opened. And once they did open, most of those people were disappointed. The newsstand operators said they received pretty limited deliveries of this edition, less than 100. And most of those have gone to people who were forward thinking enough to actually reserve them in advance.

The rest of the crowds, the people have been coming up here in constant waves asking for a copy had been disappointed. But they say are determined, they say they will keep coming back over the coming days until they do get a copy. It's likely they will.

As you say, millions of copies are being printed this week. The newsstand operator says they are expecting further deliveries every day. And the people that are coming here saying it's important and they believe it's important to get their hands on a copy of this week's "Charlie Hebdo" because they believe it is a symbol. And we're hearing from people who say they don't normally read the publication, don't even necessarily like or approve of its cartoons and comments and so forth.

But for the staff who put this together, they say it is really a miracle. And you can understand why limited time, extraordinary circumstances, emotionally, logistically, but they say they were driven and determined to put together an issue of the publication just like any other. Not a special edition, but one that features the work of all the staff, including those who were killed, who were gunned gown last week.

And there is, of course, the cover, which you have mentioned. The staff described it as an image of a good man crying, but, of course, that good man as they described, it is the Prophet Muhammad. It is a controversial choice, one that does risk offending many Muslims, who believe that any depiction of the prophet is against -- is offensive to them.

But for the staff, they believe it was the right choice, but very much an emotional journey coming up with that image. Listen to them now describing the process by which they came up with this image and decided that it was the right choice.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RENALD "LUZ" LUZIER, CHARLIE HEBDO CARTOONIST (through translator): Then there was nothing else but that, this idea of drawing Muhammad, I am Charlie. And I looked at him, he was crying. And over it I wrote, "All is forgiven." And I cried. And it was the front page.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACK: (AUDIO GAP) just what they think about that cover and unanimously they believe that the staff at "Charlie Hebdo" have got the tone exactly right. They believe it's both defiant and touching. If anything, one point of objection, you mentioned the headline on the page that says, all is forgiven -- some people said that's the part they don't necessarily agree with because they say it will take time to achieve that degree of forgiveness, John.

BERMAN: Phil, I was at that news conference yesterday. It was very emotional. The cartoonist Luz, as he said, he focused on the tear in Mohammed's eye more than anything else on that cover. It was very interesting.

And also, it should be noted, Luz, that cartoonist is only alive because he showed up late to work here one week ago and was not in the room when the attack happened.

Our Phil Black at the newsstand here in Paris -- our thanks to you, Phil.

Let's go back to Christine in New York.

ROMANS: All right. Thank you, John, for that in Paris this morning.

Here in the U.S., the Department of Homeland Security announcing it has stepped up security at some U.S. airports. Now, this announcement came this week, but the measures we're told are not related to the Paris attacks. Instead they were rolled out three weeks ago in response to a disturbing new article in the al Qaeda magazine "Inspire."

Our justice correspondent Pamela Brown is in Washington with details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christine, amid renewed concerns over Westerners making hard-to-detect bombs, the Department of Homeland Security recently announced it is ramping up security measures at some U.S. airports. And according to a government official, these enhanced measures include random passenger pat-downs, as well as luggage searches and hand swabs where they look for any type of explosive device at the gate once the passenger is already through security.

Now, this move in part is in reaction to a recent article published by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which describes a new recipe in how to make homemade bombs with simply household products. It has long been a concern among U.S. officials that AQAP is targeting aviation and concocting non-metallic IEDs, that are only detectable by full body scanners. It's a technology that is not always available, though, at smaller airports and that is, we're being told by a government official, the reason for the stepped up measures -- Christine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Pamela Brown in Washington.

We'll be following the latest on the Paris terror attack all morning long.

But, first, new developments in the search for AirAsia Flight 8501. Investigators have downloaded audio from the plane's voice recorder. They are now listening to it.

We're live after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: Eighteen minutes past the hour.

Now to breaking news in the investigation into doomed AirAsia Flight 8501. Indonesian transportation safety officials -- they have downloaded the cockpit voice recorder. The flight data recorder was successfully downloaded Tuesday. Both are key to solving the mystery of what brought this plane down. All this as families of more than 100 passengers wait for word on the recovery of their loved ones.

David Molko joins us live from Jakarta with a very little on this.

Good morning.

DAVID MOLKO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Christine. Good morning from here in Jakarta.

The cockpit voice recorder, that download complete as you mentioned and they are listening, investigators listening to that tape. The flight was less than an hour in length. We know that the recording will cover more than that, including the time on the ground.

What they will pick up is not only conversations between the pilot and air traffic controllers but what happened before and after those conversations in the cockpit. For example, we talk a lot about the change in altitude, that request to turn because of the weather, the voice recorder may tell us why, if it was because of the weather or perhaps something else.

Christine, the grim reality here with these investigators listening to this is part of the reality of a plane crash. We talk about pulling bodies out of the water. This is another part. These investigators know that this recording will end. They know -- they have a good idea of what happens at the end. The question is what happens in the final moments leading up to that, of course.

Out in the Java Sea, the search efforts continue for the fuselage. We had a lot of conflicting reports. Officials not necessarily on the same page, the bottom line, there are a lot of objects being spotted with sonar. They are getting divers into the water to take a look at them at this point.

Christine, families continuing to wait. The CEO of AirAsia making a point, saying, "Let's all pray, pray, pray hard", he just tweeted out on his Twitter account.

To put it bluntly, Christine, at this point, search and rescue officials do not have a choice. Families are waiting for answers and they are the only ones who can bring them.

ROMANS: Such a poignant assess assessment to searchers.

All right. Thank you so much for that, David Molko, in Jakarta.

In the U.S., an Illinois teenager pleading not guilty to charges he tried to support ISIS terrorists. Officials say 19-year-old Mohammed Hamzah Khan invited his family to join him in his plans to travel to the Middle East to join ISIS. He was arrested at Chicago O'Hare Airport in October. Khan's mother condemned ISIS, saying it brainwashes Muslim youth.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ZARINE KHAN, MOTHER OF DEFENDANT: He condemned the brainwashing and ruining of children through the use of social media and the Internet, and we have a message to Mr. Baghdadi and his fellow social media recruiters -- leave our children alone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Khan faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted.

Attorneys for accused for Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev are asking the judge to suspend jury selection in his trial for at least month, in light of the terrorist attacks in Paris. Defense lawyers argued that right now, it would be all but impossible to see an impartial jury. The judge has twice rejected defense efforts to move the trial out of Boston or delay its start. Tsarnaev is charged in the 2013 marathon bombing attack that killed three and injured more than 260 others.

North Korea is again denying it had anything to do with the devastating hack of Sony Pictures and is challenging the U.S. to provide evidence of North Korean involvement. The FBI has blamed Pyongyang for the cyber attack, which led Sony to cancel the wide release of "The Interview" before releasing it online and in select theaters. North Korea's deputy U.N. ambassador insists his country was not behind it and again called for a joint investigation with the U.S. to get to the bottom of it.

We're learning new details this morning in Boko Haram's horrific attack on a village in Africa. We're live with what we're learning new this morning, right after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: The Islamic militant group Boko Haram gaining even more ground in Nigeria than previously thought. A five-hour gun battle Monday sent thousands of people fleeing for their lives. This as the group's leader issues threatening messages.

What's behind this recent wave of violence?

We want to get right to Diana Magnay in Johannesburg with the latest. And I have to tell you, it's shocking the scope -- the scope of violence that this group has brought. What do they want?

DIANA MAGNAY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: They want to establish Sharia law across northern Nigeria, and I suppose as much territory as they can. They are also conducting raids into Cameroon. They are pretty much camped out along the borders between Niger, Chad, Cameroon and Nigeria. That's their sort of home base.

And essentially, what they want is to establish an Islamic caliphate in that region. And what we have seen as the attacks have picked up, I mean, this insurgency has been raging for five years, but it would appear as though, especially the attacks over the last week, the level of killing, the numbers have just increased dramatically is that Boko Haram feels emboldened by their success and they don't really face much resistance. They are very well-equipped.

The Nigerian army has managed to retain control of basically the provincial capitals. This town of Maiduguri, for example, the town of Damaturu where they had raging gun battle against Boko Haram, about a week ago and they managed to push them back. But they are losing the territory around it, a territory which some people estimate to be the size of a country like Rwanda or Belgium.

It's so hard for us to know because security-wise it's very, very dangerous, very difficult for journalists to get to that region. Even for the Nigerian military who are under-equipped, who have very low morale, and who don't feel that they can take on Boko Haram with the sort of equipment that they have now -- Christine.

ROMANS: All right. Thank you for that, Diana Magnay, in Johannesburg this morning, on that very troubling, troubling story about Boko Haram in Nigeria.

Twenty-seven minutes past the hour.

New this morning, a controversial new issue of Charlie Hebdo hitting the newsstands, millions of copies in print. We're live in Paris, next.

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