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Marines Drive Back Insurgents in Fallujah with Copters; U.S. Frustrated in Bin Laden Search

Aired April 28, 2004 - 13:58   ET

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

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


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Our military commanders will take whatever action's necessary to secure Fallujah on behalf of the Iraqi people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Standoff in Iraq, coalition troops hold back in Fallujah. Will negotiations solve the stalemate?

Critical connections, Spanish authorities link the Madrid train bombing with the 9/11 attacks in the U.S.

The search for Osama bin Laden, why it's getting even harder to track him down.

And baa-baa big sheep have you any wool? Oh, yes. Shrek says bye-bye to his woolly bouffant.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Miles O'Brien. Kyra Phillips is off today. We're glad you're with us. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM. begins right now.

And up first this hour, cease-fire, political track, defensive posture, all of them redefined in Fallujah.

If you've been watching CNN, and we hope you have, you've seen airstrikes and ground combat that one U.S. Marine describes as "patty-cake" compared to what awaits if negotiations fail. U.S. forces insist they're still firing only in self-defense and they're still holding out hope for a peaceful, disarmed, jointly patrolled Fallujah.

Much of what we know from that Sunni flashpoint, we're hearing from U.S. pool report Karl Penhaul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARL PENHAUL, POOL REPORTER: We're standing on the roof of a small U.S. Marine base on the northwest corner of the city of Fallujah. We're looking east at approximately 800 yards or possibly a little further, possibly a kilometer from where we're standing.

We now see at least three plumes of black smoke rising into the afternoon Fallujah sky. That black smoke is coming from, we're told, by Marine commanders, at least three buildings that we've seen being pounded by U.S. Marine helicopters.

The firefight began now about an hour-and-a-half ago. A Marine commander with a company that we are embedded with here on the ground, Captain Douglas Zembiec (ph), has told me that the firefight began after he sent a U.S. Marine sniper team in to take positions in and around Fallujah Train Station.

Fallujah Train Station is a building on the left of your screen, a building and an area which coalition commanders say in the last few days has regularly been used by insurgents to launch attacks against coalition positions.

Even this morning coalition commanders said that they believed insurgents were digging in mortar positions in and around the train station and were looking to use those on coalition positions later in the day. For that reason, a U.S. Marine sniper team was sent in to the area, but we're told about an hour-and-a-half ago, that sniper team came under fire from insurgent positions on the right-hand side of the main road.

The insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades at the sniper teams and so Marine commanders called in what they call a CAT .team, a combined armored team. We saw three armored humvee vehicles speeding to the train station. We understand that those picked up the snipers, took those to safety.

And once that had happened, Marine commanders called in two helicopters, one of them a Cobra attack helicopter, the other a Huey gunship. They moved into position and began pounding three buildings that were believed to be being used by the insurgents, pounding those buildings with machine gun fire, with rockets and with missiles.

In the early minutes of the gun battle, there was a return, an exchange of ground fire between insurgents and coalition forces, but after about 15 minutes we didn't hear any more ground fire from insurgent positions around the area of where these plumes of black smoke are now rising.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: U.S. pool reporter Karl Penhaul.

Wanted posters, leaflets, even playing cards have been staples of the war in Iraq. And now insurgents are taking a page from the coalition's book. Posters circulating in Fallujah this week offer $15 million to whomever kills U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, senior coalition ground commander Ricardo Sanchez, or coalition spokesman Mark Kimmitt.

President Bush was asked about the fighting in Fallujah today during a joint news conference with the prime minister of Sweden. White house correspondent Suzanne Malveaux fills us in on that.

Hello, Suzanne.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles. President Bush emerged from that meeting really talking about the two tracks the administration's taking here, one the military track, the other the political track. They say they certainly prefer to take the political track. The president talking about the importance of the European Community and their support as well as the United Nations.

The white house is saying that they do support the plan by U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi when he talks about transferring power to the Iraqi people by that June 30 deadline and even perhaps getting the members of that caretaker government assembled by the end of May so they have a full month to actually work with U.S. security forces in defining their relationship.

But the president also making it very clear as well, Miles, that what happens on the ground in Fallujah, that one of the primary concerns there, the focus, of course, is maintaining stability in that region.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: The closer we come to passing sovereignty, the more likely it is that foreign fighters, disgruntled Baathists, or friends of the Shia cleric will try to stop progress. That's what's happening. They want to kill innocent life to try to get us to quit. And we're not going to. And our military commanders will take whatever action is necessary to secure Fallujah on behalf of the Iraqi people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: The administration is also in step with Brahimi's plan, that is to give limited authority to this caretaker government. They say that it really will not be until January 2005 when Iraq holds its national elections that they'll really will have a representative government, one that will be responsible for a good deal of its affairs -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: Suzanne, the president and vice president jointly meeting with the 9/11 Commission tomorrow morning. Just the fact that they're meeting together has been great fodder for the political cartoonists. I'm curious if there's been much talk about having separate meetings within the White House. Maybe the better question is why they're sticking to their guns and doing it together?

MALVEAUX: Miles, this is a question that repeatedly comes up almost on a daily basis as to why it is that the two are meeting together. He was asked again, Scott McClellan, why this was important. McClellan has said before that this is for the sake of allowing the commission -- for the sake of the commission to get the story, to get it all in one session, to allow them to piece this together as best as possible.

But McClellan going even further when pushed a little bit further today, saying that this is not a game of "I gotcha," he says it is not an adversarial type of process here, that they want to be as cooperative as possible. It is just a question, Miles, that they cannot escape and we don't know if it's going to go away even after tomorrow.

O'BRIEN: Suzanne Malveaux, we'll see you then. Thank you very much, appreciate it.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan calls Ambassador Brahimi's assessment of the situation in Iraq very sober. Lakhdar Brahimi, as you know, is trying to help forge some sort of sovereignty bid for the Iraqi people. At a news conference today, Mr. Annan told reporters military action only makes matters worse.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL: The reason why I ask for caution is the more these attacks -- the more the occupation is seen as taking steps that harm the civilians and the population, the greater the ranks of the resistance grows. And I think everybody has said the struggle really should have been to win the hearts and minds of the people. And so it has to be an effort in that direction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Mr. Annan says it is time for those who prefer restraint and dialogue to make their voices be heard.

News from around the world now, no parties for Saddam Hussein today. The former dictator celebrates, if you will, his 67th birthday. When Saddam was in power, the Iraqi government put on festivals across the country to celebrate. But this year, well, it is a bit quiet.

A fugitive Moroccan wanted in the Madrid train bombings, charged with having links to the 9/11 attacks, a Spanish judge says Amer Azizi formed part of a cell that organized the attacks from Spain.

An Italian court has acquitted nine terror suspects. They were accused of plotting to poison the water supply of the U.S. embassy in Rome. Two years ago police found a mildly poisonous chemical compound in the apartment of four of the suspects, and maps of the embassy which was nearby. The embassy had no comment on that verdict.

And Israeli television reports the country's justice ministry is concluding, not enough evidence to charge prime minister Ariel Sharon in a bribery scandal. Channel 2 cites a report from the panel investigating whether to press charges in the case involving (UNINTELLIGIBLE) real estate deal. Sharon throughout has denied any wrongdoing.

Striking a balance between national security and civil liberty. It is at the heart of two cases before the Supreme Court today. Lawyers for two Americans being held as enemy combatants, Jose Padilla and Yaser Hamdi, are challenging the constitutionality of their open-ended detentions. Our Sean Callebs live now in Washington with more on that.

Hello, Sean.

SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Miles, indeed two separate cases that could have a big impact in the way the administration is fighting the war on terrorism. An attorney for the Bush administration says the president has brought authority to detain terror suspects who are considered enemy combatants and a threat to the nation. The first of the two cases the high court heard today involves Yaser Hamdi, the other, Jose Padilla, who you're looking at right here.

Padilla's accused of trying to set off a dirty bomb. Hamdi is a U.S. citizen as well, born in Louisiana, but chiefly raised in the Middle East. He was seized in Afghanistan shortly after 9/11. The U.S. says he was fighting with the Taliban. Hamdi has yet to be charged with a crime and until recently was denied access to a lawyer. His attorney today told the high court President Bush is overstepping his authority by jailing terror suspects and denying them access to the courts, and the designation "enemy combatant" sparked a lively give and take.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

FRANK DUNHAM, ATTORNEY FOR DETAINEE: The allegation here is that, as I understand it, is that Mr. Hamdi is an enemy combatant, whatever that means. We don't find it defined in any case. We don't find it defined in any statute. And it hasn't been defined by regulation or by anything that's been filed in this case.

ANTONIN SCALIA, SUPREME COURT JUSTICE: Well, it's an English word. It means somebody who is combating.

DUNHAM: That's correct.

SCALIA: I assume it means someone who has taken up arms against the armed forces of the United States. Really, do we have to quibble about that word?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CALLEBS: The deputy solicitor general arguing for the Bush administration, says the president has the authority to detain suspected terrorists as enemy combatants if they pose a national security risk.

Now the second case involving Jose Padilla, he, too, a U.S. citizen who was a gang member in Chicago before converting toys Islam and traveling to the Middle East. Padilla was nabbed a couple of years ago by authorities in Chicago, he's accused of planning to detonate a dirty bomb. Like Hamdi, Padilla has not been charged and was denied access to a lawyer.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

DONNA NEWMAN, ATTORNEY FOR DETAINEE: However grave the circumstances of the war on terror may be, this nation has faced other grave threats. We've had war on our soil before. And never before in the nation's history has this court granted the president a blank check to do whatever he wants to American citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CALLEBS: Padilla only recently received access to an attorney. Both Hamdi and Padilla are being held in isolation at a Navy brig near Charleston, South Carolina. An attorney for one of the suspects says Congress did not intend to grant the president widespread indefinite detentions, saying if that was the case, Americans would be locked up all over the country -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: CNN's Sean Callebs in Washington, thank you very much.

Does this case have implications for future terror suspects? We'll talk about it after a break.

And amazing pictures from a violent episode in Thailand. Teenaged militants take on police.

And later, what's in a name? In this case, it would be lunch. When food and names are the same the order's up later on LIVE FROM., stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: We've been telling you a lot about Iraq, specifically Fallujah, all day today. But on another war front, there is news to bring to you. U.S. troops are under fire in Afghanistan in what has become a frustrating hunt for Osama bin Laden. CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson is with the troops along the Afghan-Pakistani border.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S. troops under fire, now increasingly common on the Afghan-Pakistan border. This ambush earlier in the month resulting in the attackers fleeing into Pakistan.

CAPT. JON CHUNG, U.S. ARMY: It's difficult. It makes the fight and the challenge of defeating the enemy a little more difficult.

ROBERSTON: Insurgents' hit-and-hide-in-Pakistan tactics worry commanders.

LT. COL. HARRY GLENN, U.S. ARMY: It is certainly frustrating for our soldiers, and we constantly work to defeat that and we work hard with the Pakistanis to do that.

ROBERTSON: But that cooperation, the so-called "hammer and anvil," where Pakistani troops force al Qaeda out of hiding towards U.S. troops waiting on the border, is now slipping beyond U.S. control.

LT. COL. MATTHEW BEEVERS, COALITION SPOKESMAN: They're moving along in a political process and some dialogue now. I think clearly they have left the door open there to continue operations in the south, Wazeristan (ph). So we'll wait and see how that goes and what the Pak timetable is.

ROBERTSON: In the meantime, U.S. troop strength here is at an all-time high, with 13,500 U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.

CAPT. ANTHONY GIBBS, U.S. ARMY: Osama bin Laden and his top dogs, I think those guys have -- I think they're far enough removed from the guys who are actually down on the ground, the ground soldiers, that information is going to be hard to come by.

ROBERTSON (on camera): U.S. forces are so short of good intelligence on Osama bin Laden that on occasion troops are used as bait. As one officer put it to me, we're playing our D-game here, using our poorest battlefield techniques and tactics.

(voice-over): It seems the much vaunted spring offensive could be slipping into a protracted summer campaign.

Nic Robertson, CNN, close to the Afghan-Pakistan border.

(END VIDEOTAPE) O'BRIEN: Well, it has been a successful run on Mars for both rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. They both pass beyond their 90-day warranty, if you will. And they're still going. We'll bring you an update on how things are going on Mars and what may lie ahead for both of those rovers.

Also former Vice President Al Gore is the $6 million man. Find out who he's writing out a big fat check to. Sadly it is not moi.

And the fleecing of Shrek. Why this sheep is no longer getting the wool pulled over his eyes, we'll talk to the man with the scissors in his hand. That's ahead on LIVE FROM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MARKET REPORT)

O'BRIEN: Police are holding a 12-year-old boy today, accused in a crime that has shocked the metro Atlanta area. The story from CNN's Eric Philips.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Yellow police tape surrounds the area where the body of eight-year- old Amy Michelle Yates was found. A small shrine growing nearby in her memory.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A piece of me is gone. And it can't be returned.

PHILIPS: What's worse for family and friends, news of who authorities believe killed Amy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are at this time charging a local 12-year-old male with her murder.

PHILIPS: The two youngsters lived only doors apart at the Twin Oaks mobile home park here in Carrollton, Georgia. Investigators allege the 12-year-old strangled Amy with his bare hands.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We believe he is responsible for murdering her, and we believe he acted alone at this point.

PHILIPS: Police say Amy left home on her bike around 5:00 on Monday afternoon. She was going to a friend's house in the same trailer park, but never showed up. Soon her bike was spotted, but it would be hours before authorities would find her body in nearby woods. Jean Gossage (ph) says the eight-year-old was heading to her house.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's not right, it just hurts. This shouldn't have happened. PHILIPS: The 12-year-old is being held in a local youth detention center.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To me, in my eyes, he was still a child. I never would have thought that anything like this could have happened.

PHILIPS: Counselors were on hand at Amy's elementary school to try and make sense out of all of this for her classmates. But even adults are having difficulty coming to terms with what happened.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is -- this is the most tragic loss I've ever had to endure. It just doesn't make any sense.

PHILIPS: Eric Philips, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM., glad to have you back with us.

Here is what's all new this half hour. The bad hair days are over for this really woolly sheep. In just moments, we're going to talk with the champion shearer who gave Shrek the shearing of his life, live on New Zealand television.

But first, the top stories we're looking at this hour.

When you're talking meatloaf, leftovers aren't necessarily a good thing. But the Kerry campaign can't complain be the $6 million left in Al Gore's campaign pot. The former V.P. is donating about $6 million in leftover funds from his 2000 campaign to aid Democrats this year. Much of that money going to boost Senator Kerry's White House bid.

In Spain, a fugitive sought in connection with last month's Madrid train bombings indicted today on charges he helped plan the 9/11 attacks. A Spanish judge says Amer Azizi from Morocco helped organize a meeting in Spain in July of 2001. The judge says key plotters, including Mohamed Atta, used the meeting to finalize details for the attacks only weeks later.

In Thailand, more than 100 are dead after a series of attacks on security outposts in the country's south. Government officials say most of the people killed were teenage insurgents. Officials think they were trying to seize weapons and ammunition.

Taking whatever action is necessary, President Bush says that's how American commanders will secure Fallujah. His statement came as riveting real-time images of thick black smoke and sniper fire were seen and heard all around the world as Marines battled Sunni insurgents to try to get the upper hand for the third day straight.

A cease-fire seems to exist in name only, still the coalition.

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Aired April 28, 2004 - 13:58   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Our military commanders will take whatever action's necessary to secure Fallujah on behalf of the Iraqi people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Standoff in Iraq, coalition troops hold back in Fallujah. Will negotiations solve the stalemate?

Critical connections, Spanish authorities link the Madrid train bombing with the 9/11 attacks in the U.S.

The search for Osama bin Laden, why it's getting even harder to track him down.

And baa-baa big sheep have you any wool? Oh, yes. Shrek says bye-bye to his woolly bouffant.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Miles O'Brien. Kyra Phillips is off today. We're glad you're with us. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM. begins right now.

And up first this hour, cease-fire, political track, defensive posture, all of them redefined in Fallujah.

If you've been watching CNN, and we hope you have, you've seen airstrikes and ground combat that one U.S. Marine describes as "patty-cake" compared to what awaits if negotiations fail. U.S. forces insist they're still firing only in self-defense and they're still holding out hope for a peaceful, disarmed, jointly patrolled Fallujah.

Much of what we know from that Sunni flashpoint, we're hearing from U.S. pool report Karl Penhaul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARL PENHAUL, POOL REPORTER: We're standing on the roof of a small U.S. Marine base on the northwest corner of the city of Fallujah. We're looking east at approximately 800 yards or possibly a little further, possibly a kilometer from where we're standing.

We now see at least three plumes of black smoke rising into the afternoon Fallujah sky. That black smoke is coming from, we're told, by Marine commanders, at least three buildings that we've seen being pounded by U.S. Marine helicopters.

The firefight began now about an hour-and-a-half ago. A Marine commander with a company that we are embedded with here on the ground, Captain Douglas Zembiec (ph), has told me that the firefight began after he sent a U.S. Marine sniper team in to take positions in and around Fallujah Train Station.

Fallujah Train Station is a building on the left of your screen, a building and an area which coalition commanders say in the last few days has regularly been used by insurgents to launch attacks against coalition positions.

Even this morning coalition commanders said that they believed insurgents were digging in mortar positions in and around the train station and were looking to use those on coalition positions later in the day. For that reason, a U.S. Marine sniper team was sent in to the area, but we're told about an hour-and-a-half ago, that sniper team came under fire from insurgent positions on the right-hand side of the main road.

The insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades at the sniper teams and so Marine commanders called in what they call a CAT .team, a combined armored team. We saw three armored humvee vehicles speeding to the train station. We understand that those picked up the snipers, took those to safety.

And once that had happened, Marine commanders called in two helicopters, one of them a Cobra attack helicopter, the other a Huey gunship. They moved into position and began pounding three buildings that were believed to be being used by the insurgents, pounding those buildings with machine gun fire, with rockets and with missiles.

In the early minutes of the gun battle, there was a return, an exchange of ground fire between insurgents and coalition forces, but after about 15 minutes we didn't hear any more ground fire from insurgent positions around the area of where these plumes of black smoke are now rising.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: U.S. pool reporter Karl Penhaul.

Wanted posters, leaflets, even playing cards have been staples of the war in Iraq. And now insurgents are taking a page from the coalition's book. Posters circulating in Fallujah this week offer $15 million to whomever kills U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, senior coalition ground commander Ricardo Sanchez, or coalition spokesman Mark Kimmitt.

President Bush was asked about the fighting in Fallujah today during a joint news conference with the prime minister of Sweden. White house correspondent Suzanne Malveaux fills us in on that.

Hello, Suzanne.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles. President Bush emerged from that meeting really talking about the two tracks the administration's taking here, one the military track, the other the political track. They say they certainly prefer to take the political track. The president talking about the importance of the European Community and their support as well as the United Nations.

The white house is saying that they do support the plan by U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi when he talks about transferring power to the Iraqi people by that June 30 deadline and even perhaps getting the members of that caretaker government assembled by the end of May so they have a full month to actually work with U.S. security forces in defining their relationship.

But the president also making it very clear as well, Miles, that what happens on the ground in Fallujah, that one of the primary concerns there, the focus, of course, is maintaining stability in that region.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: The closer we come to passing sovereignty, the more likely it is that foreign fighters, disgruntled Baathists, or friends of the Shia cleric will try to stop progress. That's what's happening. They want to kill innocent life to try to get us to quit. And we're not going to. And our military commanders will take whatever action is necessary to secure Fallujah on behalf of the Iraqi people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: The administration is also in step with Brahimi's plan, that is to give limited authority to this caretaker government. They say that it really will not be until January 2005 when Iraq holds its national elections that they'll really will have a representative government, one that will be responsible for a good deal of its affairs -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: Suzanne, the president and vice president jointly meeting with the 9/11 Commission tomorrow morning. Just the fact that they're meeting together has been great fodder for the political cartoonists. I'm curious if there's been much talk about having separate meetings within the White House. Maybe the better question is why they're sticking to their guns and doing it together?

MALVEAUX: Miles, this is a question that repeatedly comes up almost on a daily basis as to why it is that the two are meeting together. He was asked again, Scott McClellan, why this was important. McClellan has said before that this is for the sake of allowing the commission -- for the sake of the commission to get the story, to get it all in one session, to allow them to piece this together as best as possible.

But McClellan going even further when pushed a little bit further today, saying that this is not a game of "I gotcha," he says it is not an adversarial type of process here, that they want to be as cooperative as possible. It is just a question, Miles, that they cannot escape and we don't know if it's going to go away even after tomorrow.

O'BRIEN: Suzanne Malveaux, we'll see you then. Thank you very much, appreciate it.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan calls Ambassador Brahimi's assessment of the situation in Iraq very sober. Lakhdar Brahimi, as you know, is trying to help forge some sort of sovereignty bid for the Iraqi people. At a news conference today, Mr. Annan told reporters military action only makes matters worse.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL: The reason why I ask for caution is the more these attacks -- the more the occupation is seen as taking steps that harm the civilians and the population, the greater the ranks of the resistance grows. And I think everybody has said the struggle really should have been to win the hearts and minds of the people. And so it has to be an effort in that direction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Mr. Annan says it is time for those who prefer restraint and dialogue to make their voices be heard.

News from around the world now, no parties for Saddam Hussein today. The former dictator celebrates, if you will, his 67th birthday. When Saddam was in power, the Iraqi government put on festivals across the country to celebrate. But this year, well, it is a bit quiet.

A fugitive Moroccan wanted in the Madrid train bombings, charged with having links to the 9/11 attacks, a Spanish judge says Amer Azizi formed part of a cell that organized the attacks from Spain.

An Italian court has acquitted nine terror suspects. They were accused of plotting to poison the water supply of the U.S. embassy in Rome. Two years ago police found a mildly poisonous chemical compound in the apartment of four of the suspects, and maps of the embassy which was nearby. The embassy had no comment on that verdict.

And Israeli television reports the country's justice ministry is concluding, not enough evidence to charge prime minister Ariel Sharon in a bribery scandal. Channel 2 cites a report from the panel investigating whether to press charges in the case involving (UNINTELLIGIBLE) real estate deal. Sharon throughout has denied any wrongdoing.

Striking a balance between national security and civil liberty. It is at the heart of two cases before the Supreme Court today. Lawyers for two Americans being held as enemy combatants, Jose Padilla and Yaser Hamdi, are challenging the constitutionality of their open-ended detentions. Our Sean Callebs live now in Washington with more on that.

Hello, Sean.

SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Miles, indeed two separate cases that could have a big impact in the way the administration is fighting the war on terrorism. An attorney for the Bush administration says the president has brought authority to detain terror suspects who are considered enemy combatants and a threat to the nation. The first of the two cases the high court heard today involves Yaser Hamdi, the other, Jose Padilla, who you're looking at right here.

Padilla's accused of trying to set off a dirty bomb. Hamdi is a U.S. citizen as well, born in Louisiana, but chiefly raised in the Middle East. He was seized in Afghanistan shortly after 9/11. The U.S. says he was fighting with the Taliban. Hamdi has yet to be charged with a crime and until recently was denied access to a lawyer. His attorney today told the high court President Bush is overstepping his authority by jailing terror suspects and denying them access to the courts, and the designation "enemy combatant" sparked a lively give and take.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

FRANK DUNHAM, ATTORNEY FOR DETAINEE: The allegation here is that, as I understand it, is that Mr. Hamdi is an enemy combatant, whatever that means. We don't find it defined in any case. We don't find it defined in any statute. And it hasn't been defined by regulation or by anything that's been filed in this case.

ANTONIN SCALIA, SUPREME COURT JUSTICE: Well, it's an English word. It means somebody who is combating.

DUNHAM: That's correct.

SCALIA: I assume it means someone who has taken up arms against the armed forces of the United States. Really, do we have to quibble about that word?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CALLEBS: The deputy solicitor general arguing for the Bush administration, says the president has the authority to detain suspected terrorists as enemy combatants if they pose a national security risk.

Now the second case involving Jose Padilla, he, too, a U.S. citizen who was a gang member in Chicago before converting toys Islam and traveling to the Middle East. Padilla was nabbed a couple of years ago by authorities in Chicago, he's accused of planning to detonate a dirty bomb. Like Hamdi, Padilla has not been charged and was denied access to a lawyer.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

DONNA NEWMAN, ATTORNEY FOR DETAINEE: However grave the circumstances of the war on terror may be, this nation has faced other grave threats. We've had war on our soil before. And never before in the nation's history has this court granted the president a blank check to do whatever he wants to American citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CALLEBS: Padilla only recently received access to an attorney. Both Hamdi and Padilla are being held in isolation at a Navy brig near Charleston, South Carolina. An attorney for one of the suspects says Congress did not intend to grant the president widespread indefinite detentions, saying if that was the case, Americans would be locked up all over the country -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: CNN's Sean Callebs in Washington, thank you very much.

Does this case have implications for future terror suspects? We'll talk about it after a break.

And amazing pictures from a violent episode in Thailand. Teenaged militants take on police.

And later, what's in a name? In this case, it would be lunch. When food and names are the same the order's up later on LIVE FROM., stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: We've been telling you a lot about Iraq, specifically Fallujah, all day today. But on another war front, there is news to bring to you. U.S. troops are under fire in Afghanistan in what has become a frustrating hunt for Osama bin Laden. CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson is with the troops along the Afghan-Pakistani border.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S. troops under fire, now increasingly common on the Afghan-Pakistan border. This ambush earlier in the month resulting in the attackers fleeing into Pakistan.

CAPT. JON CHUNG, U.S. ARMY: It's difficult. It makes the fight and the challenge of defeating the enemy a little more difficult.

ROBERSTON: Insurgents' hit-and-hide-in-Pakistan tactics worry commanders.

LT. COL. HARRY GLENN, U.S. ARMY: It is certainly frustrating for our soldiers, and we constantly work to defeat that and we work hard with the Pakistanis to do that.

ROBERTSON: But that cooperation, the so-called "hammer and anvil," where Pakistani troops force al Qaeda out of hiding towards U.S. troops waiting on the border, is now slipping beyond U.S. control.

LT. COL. MATTHEW BEEVERS, COALITION SPOKESMAN: They're moving along in a political process and some dialogue now. I think clearly they have left the door open there to continue operations in the south, Wazeristan (ph). So we'll wait and see how that goes and what the Pak timetable is.

ROBERTSON: In the meantime, U.S. troop strength here is at an all-time high, with 13,500 U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.

CAPT. ANTHONY GIBBS, U.S. ARMY: Osama bin Laden and his top dogs, I think those guys have -- I think they're far enough removed from the guys who are actually down on the ground, the ground soldiers, that information is going to be hard to come by.

ROBERTSON (on camera): U.S. forces are so short of good intelligence on Osama bin Laden that on occasion troops are used as bait. As one officer put it to me, we're playing our D-game here, using our poorest battlefield techniques and tactics.

(voice-over): It seems the much vaunted spring offensive could be slipping into a protracted summer campaign.

Nic Robertson, CNN, close to the Afghan-Pakistan border.

(END VIDEOTAPE) O'BRIEN: Well, it has been a successful run on Mars for both rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. They both pass beyond their 90-day warranty, if you will. And they're still going. We'll bring you an update on how things are going on Mars and what may lie ahead for both of those rovers.

Also former Vice President Al Gore is the $6 million man. Find out who he's writing out a big fat check to. Sadly it is not moi.

And the fleecing of Shrek. Why this sheep is no longer getting the wool pulled over his eyes, we'll talk to the man with the scissors in his hand. That's ahead on LIVE FROM.

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O'BRIEN: Police are holding a 12-year-old boy today, accused in a crime that has shocked the metro Atlanta area. The story from CNN's Eric Philips.

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ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Yellow police tape surrounds the area where the body of eight-year- old Amy Michelle Yates was found. A small shrine growing nearby in her memory.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A piece of me is gone. And it can't be returned.

PHILIPS: What's worse for family and friends, news of who authorities believe killed Amy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are at this time charging a local 12-year-old male with her murder.

PHILIPS: The two youngsters lived only doors apart at the Twin Oaks mobile home park here in Carrollton, Georgia. Investigators allege the 12-year-old strangled Amy with his bare hands.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We believe he is responsible for murdering her, and we believe he acted alone at this point.

PHILIPS: Police say Amy left home on her bike around 5:00 on Monday afternoon. She was going to a friend's house in the same trailer park, but never showed up. Soon her bike was spotted, but it would be hours before authorities would find her body in nearby woods. Jean Gossage (ph) says the eight-year-old was heading to her house.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's not right, it just hurts. This shouldn't have happened. PHILIPS: The 12-year-old is being held in a local youth detention center.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To me, in my eyes, he was still a child. I never would have thought that anything like this could have happened.

PHILIPS: Counselors were on hand at Amy's elementary school to try and make sense out of all of this for her classmates. But even adults are having difficulty coming to terms with what happened.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is -- this is the most tragic loss I've ever had to endure. It just doesn't make any sense.

PHILIPS: Eric Philips, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM., glad to have you back with us.

Here is what's all new this half hour. The bad hair days are over for this really woolly sheep. In just moments, we're going to talk with the champion shearer who gave Shrek the shearing of his life, live on New Zealand television.

But first, the top stories we're looking at this hour.

When you're talking meatloaf, leftovers aren't necessarily a good thing. But the Kerry campaign can't complain be the $6 million left in Al Gore's campaign pot. The former V.P. is donating about $6 million in leftover funds from his 2000 campaign to aid Democrats this year. Much of that money going to boost Senator Kerry's White House bid.

In Spain, a fugitive sought in connection with last month's Madrid train bombings indicted today on charges he helped plan the 9/11 attacks. A Spanish judge says Amer Azizi from Morocco helped organize a meeting in Spain in July of 2001. The judge says key plotters, including Mohamed Atta, used the meeting to finalize details for the attacks only weeks later.

In Thailand, more than 100 are dead after a series of attacks on security outposts in the country's south. Government officials say most of the people killed were teenage insurgents. Officials think they were trying to seize weapons and ammunition.

Taking whatever action is necessary, President Bush says that's how American commanders will secure Fallujah. His statement came as riveting real-time images of thick black smoke and sniper fire were seen and heard all around the world as Marines battled Sunni insurgents to try to get the upper hand for the third day straight.

A cease-fire seems to exist in name only, still the coalition.

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