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Live From...
Justice Dept. Claims Dirty Bomber Has Confessed; Oil Futures Hit Record Highs After Weekend Terror Attacks in Saudi Arabia
Aired June 01, 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: It is a very hopeful day for the Iraqi people and a hopeful day for the American people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Presidential praise for the new interim government in Iraq. Find out who's who and how Iraqis are reacting to the group that some call a peace of art.
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The latest from the courtroom in the Scott Peterson capital murder trial. I'm David Mattingly in Redwood City, California. I'll have that story.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And the so-called dirty bomb suspect admits a link to al Qaeda. New defense documents are released today.
PHILLIPS: Worried that millions will take it as gospel? Well, the best selling "Da Vinci Code" is debunked by a religious scholar.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, hello, I'm Kyra Philips.
NGUYEN: And I'm Betty Nguyen, in for Miles O'Brien. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM... starts right now.
PHILLIPS: We begin with potentially explosive documents released just a short time ago. Data declassified by the government say dirty bomb suspect Jose Padilla admitted to dealing with al Qaeda and planning terror operations, a charge that his lawyer denied. The latest now from justice correspondent Kelli Arena -- Kelli.
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kyra. Well, as you know, this case has been very controversial because Jose Padilla is a U.S. citizen. And he has been held indefinitely without being charged as an enemy combatant for nearly two years.
What the government says today is that in interrogations, Jose Padilla to the following. One, training in al Qaeda camps. Two, getting specialized training in explosives. Three, meeting with some of the highest level al Qaeda operatives, two of them being Abu Zubaida and Kkalid Shaikh Mohammed. That he had participated in the planning of a terrorist plot to blow up apartment buildings here in the United States using natural gas. That he also plotted to set off a radiological dirty bomb here in the United States. The deputy attorney general, Jim Comey, saying that when he set foot on U.S. soil, he was most definitely an al Qaeda soldier. Let's hear what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES COMEY, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: On May 8, 2002, a soldier of our enemy, a trained, funded and equipped terrorist stepped off that plane at Chicago's O'Hare; a highly trained al Qaeda soldier who had accepted an assignment to kill hundreds of innocent men, women and children by destroying apartment buildings; an al Qaeda soldier who still hoped and planned to do even more by detonating a radiological device, a dirty bomb, in this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ARENA: Jose Padilla's lawyer, Donna Newman, says that this is just one more instance of the government getting to have its say without any rebuttal. She said that what Mr. Comey had to say today sounded very much like an opening statement. That this should all be taking place in a court of law. That if the government has the goods on Padilla, they should charge him -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. Justice correspondent Kelli Arena, thank you.
NGUYEN: To Iraq now where Iraqis say they've taken a key step toward taking the reins of their country. They announced the members of the interim government that will run Iraq after the coalition transfers sovereignty in four weeks.
CNN's Harris Whitbeck reports now from Baghdad.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HARRIS WHITBECK, CNN ANCHOR: Iraqis were presented with the interim government that will lead them through elections early next year. After days of sometimes intense negotiations and meetings between Iraqi and American politicians and United Nations diplomats, the Iraqi Governing Council chose one of their own, Sheikh Ghazi al- Yawar, as interim president. The presentation of the government was marked by expressions of hope from both members of the Iraqi government and from U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI, U.N. SPECIAL ENVOY TO IRAQ (through translator): It is the first step of this road which will be no doubt long and difficult. But I believe that those who were chosen to perform this mission will be qualified and effective and capable of it .
SHEIKH GHAZI AL-YAWAR, IRAQI INTERIM PRES.-DESIGNATE (through translator): My pledge to you is to put every effort with my brothers and my colleagues to bring back Iraq and to shun all kinds of forms of discrimination and weakness so that this country would be one nation without murderers, without criminals, without bad ambitions. (END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITBECK: Initial reaction on the streets of Baghdad to the interim government seemed positive.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We are very happy for this day because soon we will have first sovereignty in the country. Ghazi is a true Iraqi and hopefully he will change this into a better and safer place for the Iraqis.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITBECK: But security is still the principal concern of many in Iraq. A car bomb early Tuesday morning outside the Green Zone in Baghdad left two persons dead and more than 20 wounded.
Harris Whitbeck, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Let's take a closer look at the men who will have the top post in Iraq's new government. Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawar is a Sunni Muslim and a tribal leader in northern Iraq. He's an engineer who spent most of the past two decades living in Saudi Arabia. Al-Yawar has been critical of Washington's handling of the Iraq crisis. Just days ago, Iyad Allawi was named interim prime minister. He is a Shiite Muslim and a medical doctor. Allawi is founder of the opposition group Iraqi National Accord.
PHILLIPS: Washington's reaction to the new Iraqi government is positive. However, President Bush warns challenges, including possible violence are ahead. CNN's Kathleen Koch is live at the White House with more -- Kathleen.
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, the president today described this as a very hopeful day for Iraq. He praised the new team of leaders as patriots saying that, "looks like a very strong government."
Now the president pointed out that it was indeed U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi who he says was the quarterback in all this, who made the selections, not the U.S. government, and not the Iraqi Governing Council.
As you pointed out, the president made very clear that a lot of challenges lie ahead, including the very real possibility of more violence in Iraq. But the president assured Americans that those 135,000 troops still in Iraq would have a chance to fire back if fired upon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: Listen, the American people need to be assured that if our troops are in harm's way, they will be able to defend themselves without having to check with anybody else other than their commander. At the same time, I can assure the Iraqi citizens as well as our friends in Europe that we have done these kind of security arrangements before.
Witness Afghanistan. There's a sovereign government in Afghanistan, there are U.S. troops and coalition troops there and they're working very well together. The Iraqis will have their own chain of command. And that's going to be very important. In other words, the Iraqi army will report up to a chain of command of Iraqis, not coalition or Americans. And I think that's going to be an important part of the spirit and the capabilities of an Iraqi army. But I'm confident we can bridge any gap, David, because we have done it in country after country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOCH:: Now the president says it is now vital to pass a United Nations Security Council resolution to insure international support for the fledgling Iraqi democracy. And the United States and Great Britain want that new resolution to insure that the U.S. and the coalition forces there can take "all necessary measures to both maintain security and prevent terrorism."
At the same time, however, France, Germany, Russia, other U.S. allies want a broader resolution that will give much more sovereignty to the young government and also give it more power over the U.S. and coalition forces. Indeed it would require consultation with the new government in every type of military operation I should say that was not a defensive operation.
President Bush this morning said he believes that he can get together with the allies and with leaders in Iraq and come up with language that everyone can agree on. Back to you.
PHILLIPS: Kathleen Koch, live from the White House.
Well, can Iraq's new leaders work together? At the half hour, we're going to talk with an associate professor of Middle East studies at Florida Atlantic University and get his written -- he's actually written extensively about political and Islamic issues. We'll get his side.
NGUYEN: Now to the highly anticipated murder trial of Scott Peterson. He's accused of killing his wife Laci and their unborn son. Opening statements are beginning today in Redwood City, California. Our David Mattingly has a front row seat and has the latest.
Hi, David..
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Betty. We have some new information for you from inside the courtroom. Prosecutor Rick Distaso continues with his slow look at the small and seemingly suspicious details in Scott Peterson's story free the night that Laci was first reported missing. The biggest so far is Scott's claim that he left his Modesto home that morning at 9:30. Prosecutor says that cell phone records show he was still at home at that time. We now also find out that Scott told two people that he had been golfing that day, when he told investigators later that he went fishing. And that receipt that he has from the marina where he was putting his boat into the water, that receipt that firmed up his alibi from that day, prosecutors now say it is very unusual for anyone to ever get a receipt from that marina.
We've also been told that -- reminded that Scott Peterson told investigators he was not having an affair. And we're told that we'll hear later from fishing experts who will tell us that Scott Peterson had a zero chance of catching any fish out there that day in San Francisco Bay with the kind of equipment that he had in that boat.
We have known for months now that the case against Scott Peterson is a circumstantial one. No cause of death, no murder weapon, no murder scene. And so far that has not changed. But again we're going through some very small and apparently suspicious details in his story. But prosecutors hope to build that into a bigger case against Scott Peterson.
Back to you.
NGUYEN: Getting very interesting there. David Mattingly in Redwood City, California, thank you.
PHILLIPS: Other news across America now begins in Oklahoma where state prosecutors hope to get an execution sentence for Terry Nichols. The penalty phase of his state trial for the Oklahoma City bombing is now under way. Nichols was found guilty of 161 counts of first degree murder for the 1995 bombing last week.
Cashing in on the drug discounts. Today is the day seniors can begin using their drug discount cards. Those cards are a temporary fix for prescription costs until Medicare's new drug insurance goes into effect in 2006. Card sponsors say that enrollment has been quite disappointing.
Word warriors in Washington. The 77th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee begins today. Two hundred and sixty-five champion spellers ranging in age from 9 to 15 are showcasing their skills in the preliminary round. The national spelling bee champ is expected to emerge in the closing rounds on Thursday.
NGUYEN: Those are always so fun. Well, world markets are on edge today after a violent weekend in Saudi Arabia. Find out what this could mean for you at the pump this summer coming up.
PHILLIPS: And for -- let's see. I have got to revert back to when I was 3. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Julia Roberts with a baby carriage? Built for two, that is, entertainment headlines at a new time. LIVE FROM... sends a gift right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: Voicing support for Saudi security. Secretary of State Colin Powell says that he's confident that Saudi Arabia can protect its oil despite this weekend's terror rampage. Saudi authorities say that they're getting closer to arrested three al Qaeda suspects who targeted Western oil workers in Khobar. A fourth attacker is already in custody. The violence has left 22 people dead. And in the last 48 hours, Saudi security forces say they've been in gun battles with militants and made several arrests. But the three involved in the shooting rampage remain on the run.
NGUYEN: Ramifications of the Saudi rampage have left the world markets jittery. Crude oil futures soared to a new high today, $42 a barrel. Our Chris Huntington is watching the bottom line in New York.
Hi there, Chris.
CHRIS HUNTINGTON, CNN FINANCIAL NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Betty, the bottom line is we can all expect to pay more at the gasoline pumps almost immediately. In fact, wholesale gasoline, which is also traded here at the New York Mercantile Exchange is up sharply, up about another 6 or 7 cents a gallon. Crude oil right now is back above that record level of $42. It's just below the al-time record of $42.10 hit earlier today.
All of the traders that I've spoken to here today say the fear premium, which has really been the frothy part of the market in the last month, is back in force here again. Oil prices dipped a little bit at the end of last week, but they're up more than $2 today following that deadly attack in Khobar.
The market is taking some solace from the fact that so far none of the Saudi oil production has been halted or disrupted. But the traders here are not taking any chances. And they feel that, frankly, almost anything is possible now. There's a great deal of concern about what could go wrong over in Saudi Arabia in the weeks and months ahead. And that is further indicated by the fact that the contracts for crude oil to be delivered in August, September and October are also at record high levels.
In fact, the $41 price extends well out through September. So that's an indication, Betty, that the markets feel that crude prices are not coming down any time soon.
NGUYEN: But Chris, what happened to the plan of increasing the production which would allow those prices to come down?
HUNTINGTON: Well, keep in mind there is a big disconnect between OPEC's stated quota, which they're going to discuss, and you'll hear many formal pronouncements out of the meeting in Beirut later this week, and the actual production levels.
Now the Saudis, to their credit, have been very forthright about how much they're actually pumping. And they say that this month in June they plan to get up to about 9 million barrels a day with the hopes of achieving about 11 million perhaps by the end of the summer.
Right now they say they're on track to hit that and these terrorist attacks are not going to get in the way of that, so say the Saudis. But that extra crude oil, the supply issue is really not the factor in the markets right now. The fear of supply interruptions that could come as yet unattempted terrorist attacks.
So what you have, the issue here is a fear in the market and not so much an actual disruption of supply or, for that matter, a shortage. So dumping more crude on the doorstep, for instance, of U.S. refineries is not going to help prices at the pump. And that's really not the issue in the markets right now.
NGUYEN: The fear is a big issue today. All right, Chris Huntington in New York, thank you.
We are heading for another energy crisis and is any help on the way? CNN's Lou Dobbs looks at the squeeze skyrocketing prices are putting on your wallet, that's tonight at 6 p.m. Eastern.
PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, if you don't know your al-Yawar from Allawi, or guest is here to help, the top two men in the Iraqi interim government and why they were selected and how they'll stay safe at the front lines on the war on terror.
And If you love reading "The Da Vinci Code," well, hold on to your hat, separating fact from fiction in the global best seller..
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: A runaway best seller so hot Hollywood heavyweights are vying to be in the film version of "The Da Vinci Code." The book has spawned almost a dozen other books all trying to discredit it. The story is pure fiction, but religious scholars worry that readers will take the book's claims as fact. The dean of Yale's divinity school tackled some of the book's controversial claims with our Heidi Collins on CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING" earlier today.
Now, this viewer caution, if you want to read this book, this interview will give away part of its mystery.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE FROM "AMERICAN MORNING")
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Let's get to the book's biggest claim, that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and actually had a child. Pure fiction?
HAROLD ATTRIDGE, DEAN, YALE UNIV. DIVINITY SCHOOL: Pure fiction as far as we can tell. No evidence for it whatsoever in the New Testament. It's clear that Mary was an important disciple of Jesus, and probably one of the earliest witnesses to the Resurrection. But there's no indication that they had a sexual or marital relationship.
COLLINS : Well, in fact, there's a little bit more evidence -- actually not evidence, I should say, there are some claims that Jesus actually loved Mary Magdalene much more than anyone else, would often kiss her on the mouth. No evidence of this whatsoever.
ATTRIDGE: One of the things about the book is that it takes bits and pieces of fact and spins them into fiction. And in the case of that particular claim, we have a story and something called the Gospel of Philip, which is a second century or third century text, that seems to be an anthology of excerpts and various other kinds of text. And that text is very much interested in Christian rituals, and baptism, and Eucharist and anointing. And one of the rituals it's interested in, I believe, is the ritual kiss in the Eucharistic assembly. What we have in that little story about Jesus and Mary kissing is an explanation, a story about why Christians did what they did, which was not an uncontroversial thing.
COLLINS: So this was not deliberately covered up or left out.
ATTRIDGE: Well, this was -- the text, the gospel of Phillip, was part of a collection of materials only recently discovered in 1946 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. So it was a text that was not incorporated into Christian scriptures. But the story about Jesus and Mary is part of a larger story about the relationship between Jesus and Mary, and that is recognized by the fathers of the church, many of whom called her the apostle to the apostles.
COLLINS: Right. OK, there's another claim that the book says, that Leonardo Da Vinci's famous painting, that we all know is the Last Supper, actually depicts Mary Magdalene to the right of Jesus Christ, not the apostle John. It claims Mary is the Holy Grail. Your thoughts on that.
ATTRIDGE: Right, well, there are two claims there. One, the story about the Grail being not a story about a cup, the cup that Jesus used at the Last Supper, but rather about his relationship with Mary and the bloodline that they started. That's a fictitious claim that began, I believe, in 1980 or the early '80s. It has no historical evidence for it whatsoever. The interpretation of the Last Supper is something that art historians would be more competent to talk about than myself, but I think it's fairly clear, to me at least, the person represented by the John figure is a young man, a rather handsome young man, and I think at the conventions that are at work, there are conventions of the renaissance that are interested in male relationships rather than male/female relationships.
COLLINS: OK, but now wait a minute, this is a fictional book.
ATTRIDGE: That's right. Correct.
COLLINS: I mean, that's how it's been sold. That's how it's been marketed. But a lot of people have read it, and you say that people are taking this thing much more seriously than they should.
ATTRIDGE: They are. And I think one of the reason for that is the claim at the beginning of the book that says the description of artwork and institutions in this book are fact. The descriptions are factual, but the interpretations are in many cases quite extraordinary, quite imaginative, and quite wrong. And I think people missed that distinction and take the interpretations as historical fact.
COLLINS: So read between the lines on your fictional books, you say. All right. Harold Attridge, thanks so much for your time this morning.
ATTRIDGE: You're welcome.
COLLINS: We appreciate it a lot.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(MARKET REPORT)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: The U.S. military is increasingly relying on National Guardsmen to make up for a short shortfall of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most of these soldiers are spending a lot more time overseas than anticipated. CNN's Ryan Chilcote spent Memorial Day weekend with infantrymen from the Oklahoma National Guard in Afghanistan. He filed this exclusive report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RYAN CHILCOTE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Oklahomans make their way outside the wire. In the last week one Norwegian soldier was killed, another wounded, when their convoy was attacked just outside this fence. Sergeant Chris Buckley, a convenience store manager back home, is in charge. He's married and has a child. When he gets home, he's getting out. He wants the American dream back.
(on camera): What are you giving up being here?
SGT. CHRIS BUCKLEY, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: Giving up the income, family life, the good, normal, everyday American job that is nice and secure to come over here and help these people out.
CHILCOTE (voice-over): Buckley said he had no idea how much of a commitment he was making when he signed up seven years ago.
BUCKLEY: We're all glad to put our time in for our country, but there's only so much some people can take. Some people are like, hey, we've had enough. We're glad to do this mission but we're ready to go home.
CHILCOTE: Lieutenant Khalid Hussein had just graduated from law school and was looking forward to getting a job when the unit was activated. He misses his wife.
LT. KHALID HUSSEIN, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: I think when you send guys overseas and you don't give them a date that shows them when they're coming back, I think that hurts morale and I think it is hard on the families back at home.
CHILCOTE: Specialist Dave Eaton, a medic, was an environmental safety expert and was on his way to graduate school. He figures this deployment costs him $30,000 a year in salary. He got out of the Guard once, then was called back. Now he's been in so long, he thinks he'll just stay. EPC. DAVID EATON, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: I'm over the halfway point to retirement, so I might as well go ahead and stay in.
CHILCOTE: Later at a home for Afghan orphans, another group of Oklahoma Guardsmen hands out gifts. Part of the military's campaign to win hearts and minds here. The soldiers clearly enjoying the children. Still most would have preferred to spend Memorial Day weekend with family. The military has always turned to the Guard and the Reserves in difficult times. This unit spent more consecutive days in combat than any other infantry unit in Korea and did long tours in Italy, France and Germany during World War II. Most of these soldiers only hope they won't be needed here much longer.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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Aired June 1, 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: It is a very hopeful day for the Iraqi people and a hopeful day for the American people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Presidential praise for the new interim government in Iraq. Find out who's who and how Iraqis are reacting to the group that some call a peace of art.
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The latest from the courtroom in the Scott Peterson capital murder trial. I'm David Mattingly in Redwood City, California. I'll have that story.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And the so-called dirty bomb suspect admits a link to al Qaeda. New defense documents are released today.
PHILLIPS: Worried that millions will take it as gospel? Well, the best selling "Da Vinci Code" is debunked by a religious scholar.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, hello, I'm Kyra Philips.
NGUYEN: And I'm Betty Nguyen, in for Miles O'Brien. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM... starts right now.
PHILLIPS: We begin with potentially explosive documents released just a short time ago. Data declassified by the government say dirty bomb suspect Jose Padilla admitted to dealing with al Qaeda and planning terror operations, a charge that his lawyer denied. The latest now from justice correspondent Kelli Arena -- Kelli.
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kyra. Well, as you know, this case has been very controversial because Jose Padilla is a U.S. citizen. And he has been held indefinitely without being charged as an enemy combatant for nearly two years.
What the government says today is that in interrogations, Jose Padilla to the following. One, training in al Qaeda camps. Two, getting specialized training in explosives. Three, meeting with some of the highest level al Qaeda operatives, two of them being Abu Zubaida and Kkalid Shaikh Mohammed. That he had participated in the planning of a terrorist plot to blow up apartment buildings here in the United States using natural gas. That he also plotted to set off a radiological dirty bomb here in the United States. The deputy attorney general, Jim Comey, saying that when he set foot on U.S. soil, he was most definitely an al Qaeda soldier. Let's hear what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES COMEY, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: On May 8, 2002, a soldier of our enemy, a trained, funded and equipped terrorist stepped off that plane at Chicago's O'Hare; a highly trained al Qaeda soldier who had accepted an assignment to kill hundreds of innocent men, women and children by destroying apartment buildings; an al Qaeda soldier who still hoped and planned to do even more by detonating a radiological device, a dirty bomb, in this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ARENA: Jose Padilla's lawyer, Donna Newman, says that this is just one more instance of the government getting to have its say without any rebuttal. She said that what Mr. Comey had to say today sounded very much like an opening statement. That this should all be taking place in a court of law. That if the government has the goods on Padilla, they should charge him -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. Justice correspondent Kelli Arena, thank you.
NGUYEN: To Iraq now where Iraqis say they've taken a key step toward taking the reins of their country. They announced the members of the interim government that will run Iraq after the coalition transfers sovereignty in four weeks.
CNN's Harris Whitbeck reports now from Baghdad.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HARRIS WHITBECK, CNN ANCHOR: Iraqis were presented with the interim government that will lead them through elections early next year. After days of sometimes intense negotiations and meetings between Iraqi and American politicians and United Nations diplomats, the Iraqi Governing Council chose one of their own, Sheikh Ghazi al- Yawar, as interim president. The presentation of the government was marked by expressions of hope from both members of the Iraqi government and from U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI, U.N. SPECIAL ENVOY TO IRAQ (through translator): It is the first step of this road which will be no doubt long and difficult. But I believe that those who were chosen to perform this mission will be qualified and effective and capable of it .
SHEIKH GHAZI AL-YAWAR, IRAQI INTERIM PRES.-DESIGNATE (through translator): My pledge to you is to put every effort with my brothers and my colleagues to bring back Iraq and to shun all kinds of forms of discrimination and weakness so that this country would be one nation without murderers, without criminals, without bad ambitions. (END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITBECK: Initial reaction on the streets of Baghdad to the interim government seemed positive.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We are very happy for this day because soon we will have first sovereignty in the country. Ghazi is a true Iraqi and hopefully he will change this into a better and safer place for the Iraqis.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITBECK: But security is still the principal concern of many in Iraq. A car bomb early Tuesday morning outside the Green Zone in Baghdad left two persons dead and more than 20 wounded.
Harris Whitbeck, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Let's take a closer look at the men who will have the top post in Iraq's new government. Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawar is a Sunni Muslim and a tribal leader in northern Iraq. He's an engineer who spent most of the past two decades living in Saudi Arabia. Al-Yawar has been critical of Washington's handling of the Iraq crisis. Just days ago, Iyad Allawi was named interim prime minister. He is a Shiite Muslim and a medical doctor. Allawi is founder of the opposition group Iraqi National Accord.
PHILLIPS: Washington's reaction to the new Iraqi government is positive. However, President Bush warns challenges, including possible violence are ahead. CNN's Kathleen Koch is live at the White House with more -- Kathleen.
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, the president today described this as a very hopeful day for Iraq. He praised the new team of leaders as patriots saying that, "looks like a very strong government."
Now the president pointed out that it was indeed U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi who he says was the quarterback in all this, who made the selections, not the U.S. government, and not the Iraqi Governing Council.
As you pointed out, the president made very clear that a lot of challenges lie ahead, including the very real possibility of more violence in Iraq. But the president assured Americans that those 135,000 troops still in Iraq would have a chance to fire back if fired upon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: Listen, the American people need to be assured that if our troops are in harm's way, they will be able to defend themselves without having to check with anybody else other than their commander. At the same time, I can assure the Iraqi citizens as well as our friends in Europe that we have done these kind of security arrangements before.
Witness Afghanistan. There's a sovereign government in Afghanistan, there are U.S. troops and coalition troops there and they're working very well together. The Iraqis will have their own chain of command. And that's going to be very important. In other words, the Iraqi army will report up to a chain of command of Iraqis, not coalition or Americans. And I think that's going to be an important part of the spirit and the capabilities of an Iraqi army. But I'm confident we can bridge any gap, David, because we have done it in country after country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOCH:: Now the president says it is now vital to pass a United Nations Security Council resolution to insure international support for the fledgling Iraqi democracy. And the United States and Great Britain want that new resolution to insure that the U.S. and the coalition forces there can take "all necessary measures to both maintain security and prevent terrorism."
At the same time, however, France, Germany, Russia, other U.S. allies want a broader resolution that will give much more sovereignty to the young government and also give it more power over the U.S. and coalition forces. Indeed it would require consultation with the new government in every type of military operation I should say that was not a defensive operation.
President Bush this morning said he believes that he can get together with the allies and with leaders in Iraq and come up with language that everyone can agree on. Back to you.
PHILLIPS: Kathleen Koch, live from the White House.
Well, can Iraq's new leaders work together? At the half hour, we're going to talk with an associate professor of Middle East studies at Florida Atlantic University and get his written -- he's actually written extensively about political and Islamic issues. We'll get his side.
NGUYEN: Now to the highly anticipated murder trial of Scott Peterson. He's accused of killing his wife Laci and their unborn son. Opening statements are beginning today in Redwood City, California. Our David Mattingly has a front row seat and has the latest.
Hi, David..
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Betty. We have some new information for you from inside the courtroom. Prosecutor Rick Distaso continues with his slow look at the small and seemingly suspicious details in Scott Peterson's story free the night that Laci was first reported missing. The biggest so far is Scott's claim that he left his Modesto home that morning at 9:30. Prosecutor says that cell phone records show he was still at home at that time. We now also find out that Scott told two people that he had been golfing that day, when he told investigators later that he went fishing. And that receipt that he has from the marina where he was putting his boat into the water, that receipt that firmed up his alibi from that day, prosecutors now say it is very unusual for anyone to ever get a receipt from that marina.
We've also been told that -- reminded that Scott Peterson told investigators he was not having an affair. And we're told that we'll hear later from fishing experts who will tell us that Scott Peterson had a zero chance of catching any fish out there that day in San Francisco Bay with the kind of equipment that he had in that boat.
We have known for months now that the case against Scott Peterson is a circumstantial one. No cause of death, no murder weapon, no murder scene. And so far that has not changed. But again we're going through some very small and apparently suspicious details in his story. But prosecutors hope to build that into a bigger case against Scott Peterson.
Back to you.
NGUYEN: Getting very interesting there. David Mattingly in Redwood City, California, thank you.
PHILLIPS: Other news across America now begins in Oklahoma where state prosecutors hope to get an execution sentence for Terry Nichols. The penalty phase of his state trial for the Oklahoma City bombing is now under way. Nichols was found guilty of 161 counts of first degree murder for the 1995 bombing last week.
Cashing in on the drug discounts. Today is the day seniors can begin using their drug discount cards. Those cards are a temporary fix for prescription costs until Medicare's new drug insurance goes into effect in 2006. Card sponsors say that enrollment has been quite disappointing.
Word warriors in Washington. The 77th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee begins today. Two hundred and sixty-five champion spellers ranging in age from 9 to 15 are showcasing their skills in the preliminary round. The national spelling bee champ is expected to emerge in the closing rounds on Thursday.
NGUYEN: Those are always so fun. Well, world markets are on edge today after a violent weekend in Saudi Arabia. Find out what this could mean for you at the pump this summer coming up.
PHILLIPS: And for -- let's see. I have got to revert back to when I was 3. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Julia Roberts with a baby carriage? Built for two, that is, entertainment headlines at a new time. LIVE FROM... sends a gift right after this.
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PHILLIPS: Voicing support for Saudi security. Secretary of State Colin Powell says that he's confident that Saudi Arabia can protect its oil despite this weekend's terror rampage. Saudi authorities say that they're getting closer to arrested three al Qaeda suspects who targeted Western oil workers in Khobar. A fourth attacker is already in custody. The violence has left 22 people dead. And in the last 48 hours, Saudi security forces say they've been in gun battles with militants and made several arrests. But the three involved in the shooting rampage remain on the run.
NGUYEN: Ramifications of the Saudi rampage have left the world markets jittery. Crude oil futures soared to a new high today, $42 a barrel. Our Chris Huntington is watching the bottom line in New York.
Hi there, Chris.
CHRIS HUNTINGTON, CNN FINANCIAL NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Betty, the bottom line is we can all expect to pay more at the gasoline pumps almost immediately. In fact, wholesale gasoline, which is also traded here at the New York Mercantile Exchange is up sharply, up about another 6 or 7 cents a gallon. Crude oil right now is back above that record level of $42. It's just below the al-time record of $42.10 hit earlier today.
All of the traders that I've spoken to here today say the fear premium, which has really been the frothy part of the market in the last month, is back in force here again. Oil prices dipped a little bit at the end of last week, but they're up more than $2 today following that deadly attack in Khobar.
The market is taking some solace from the fact that so far none of the Saudi oil production has been halted or disrupted. But the traders here are not taking any chances. And they feel that, frankly, almost anything is possible now. There's a great deal of concern about what could go wrong over in Saudi Arabia in the weeks and months ahead. And that is further indicated by the fact that the contracts for crude oil to be delivered in August, September and October are also at record high levels.
In fact, the $41 price extends well out through September. So that's an indication, Betty, that the markets feel that crude prices are not coming down any time soon.
NGUYEN: But Chris, what happened to the plan of increasing the production which would allow those prices to come down?
HUNTINGTON: Well, keep in mind there is a big disconnect between OPEC's stated quota, which they're going to discuss, and you'll hear many formal pronouncements out of the meeting in Beirut later this week, and the actual production levels.
Now the Saudis, to their credit, have been very forthright about how much they're actually pumping. And they say that this month in June they plan to get up to about 9 million barrels a day with the hopes of achieving about 11 million perhaps by the end of the summer.
Right now they say they're on track to hit that and these terrorist attacks are not going to get in the way of that, so say the Saudis. But that extra crude oil, the supply issue is really not the factor in the markets right now. The fear of supply interruptions that could come as yet unattempted terrorist attacks.
So what you have, the issue here is a fear in the market and not so much an actual disruption of supply or, for that matter, a shortage. So dumping more crude on the doorstep, for instance, of U.S. refineries is not going to help prices at the pump. And that's really not the issue in the markets right now.
NGUYEN: The fear is a big issue today. All right, Chris Huntington in New York, thank you.
We are heading for another energy crisis and is any help on the way? CNN's Lou Dobbs looks at the squeeze skyrocketing prices are putting on your wallet, that's tonight at 6 p.m. Eastern.
PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, if you don't know your al-Yawar from Allawi, or guest is here to help, the top two men in the Iraqi interim government and why they were selected and how they'll stay safe at the front lines on the war on terror.
And If you love reading "The Da Vinci Code," well, hold on to your hat, separating fact from fiction in the global best seller..
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PHILLIPS: A runaway best seller so hot Hollywood heavyweights are vying to be in the film version of "The Da Vinci Code." The book has spawned almost a dozen other books all trying to discredit it. The story is pure fiction, but religious scholars worry that readers will take the book's claims as fact. The dean of Yale's divinity school tackled some of the book's controversial claims with our Heidi Collins on CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING" earlier today.
Now, this viewer caution, if you want to read this book, this interview will give away part of its mystery.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE FROM "AMERICAN MORNING")
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Let's get to the book's biggest claim, that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and actually had a child. Pure fiction?
HAROLD ATTRIDGE, DEAN, YALE UNIV. DIVINITY SCHOOL: Pure fiction as far as we can tell. No evidence for it whatsoever in the New Testament. It's clear that Mary was an important disciple of Jesus, and probably one of the earliest witnesses to the Resurrection. But there's no indication that they had a sexual or marital relationship.
COLLINS : Well, in fact, there's a little bit more evidence -- actually not evidence, I should say, there are some claims that Jesus actually loved Mary Magdalene much more than anyone else, would often kiss her on the mouth. No evidence of this whatsoever.
ATTRIDGE: One of the things about the book is that it takes bits and pieces of fact and spins them into fiction. And in the case of that particular claim, we have a story and something called the Gospel of Philip, which is a second century or third century text, that seems to be an anthology of excerpts and various other kinds of text. And that text is very much interested in Christian rituals, and baptism, and Eucharist and anointing. And one of the rituals it's interested in, I believe, is the ritual kiss in the Eucharistic assembly. What we have in that little story about Jesus and Mary kissing is an explanation, a story about why Christians did what they did, which was not an uncontroversial thing.
COLLINS: So this was not deliberately covered up or left out.
ATTRIDGE: Well, this was -- the text, the gospel of Phillip, was part of a collection of materials only recently discovered in 1946 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. So it was a text that was not incorporated into Christian scriptures. But the story about Jesus and Mary is part of a larger story about the relationship between Jesus and Mary, and that is recognized by the fathers of the church, many of whom called her the apostle to the apostles.
COLLINS: Right. OK, there's another claim that the book says, that Leonardo Da Vinci's famous painting, that we all know is the Last Supper, actually depicts Mary Magdalene to the right of Jesus Christ, not the apostle John. It claims Mary is the Holy Grail. Your thoughts on that.
ATTRIDGE: Right, well, there are two claims there. One, the story about the Grail being not a story about a cup, the cup that Jesus used at the Last Supper, but rather about his relationship with Mary and the bloodline that they started. That's a fictitious claim that began, I believe, in 1980 or the early '80s. It has no historical evidence for it whatsoever. The interpretation of the Last Supper is something that art historians would be more competent to talk about than myself, but I think it's fairly clear, to me at least, the person represented by the John figure is a young man, a rather handsome young man, and I think at the conventions that are at work, there are conventions of the renaissance that are interested in male relationships rather than male/female relationships.
COLLINS: OK, but now wait a minute, this is a fictional book.
ATTRIDGE: That's right. Correct.
COLLINS: I mean, that's how it's been sold. That's how it's been marketed. But a lot of people have read it, and you say that people are taking this thing much more seriously than they should.
ATTRIDGE: They are. And I think one of the reason for that is the claim at the beginning of the book that says the description of artwork and institutions in this book are fact. The descriptions are factual, but the interpretations are in many cases quite extraordinary, quite imaginative, and quite wrong. And I think people missed that distinction and take the interpretations as historical fact.
COLLINS: So read between the lines on your fictional books, you say. All right. Harold Attridge, thanks so much for your time this morning.
ATTRIDGE: You're welcome.
COLLINS: We appreciate it a lot.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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NGUYEN: The U.S. military is increasingly relying on National Guardsmen to make up for a short shortfall of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most of these soldiers are spending a lot more time overseas than anticipated. CNN's Ryan Chilcote spent Memorial Day weekend with infantrymen from the Oklahoma National Guard in Afghanistan. He filed this exclusive report.
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RYAN CHILCOTE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Oklahomans make their way outside the wire. In the last week one Norwegian soldier was killed, another wounded, when their convoy was attacked just outside this fence. Sergeant Chris Buckley, a convenience store manager back home, is in charge. He's married and has a child. When he gets home, he's getting out. He wants the American dream back.
(on camera): What are you giving up being here?
SGT. CHRIS BUCKLEY, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: Giving up the income, family life, the good, normal, everyday American job that is nice and secure to come over here and help these people out.
CHILCOTE (voice-over): Buckley said he had no idea how much of a commitment he was making when he signed up seven years ago.
BUCKLEY: We're all glad to put our time in for our country, but there's only so much some people can take. Some people are like, hey, we've had enough. We're glad to do this mission but we're ready to go home.
CHILCOTE: Lieutenant Khalid Hussein had just graduated from law school and was looking forward to getting a job when the unit was activated. He misses his wife.
LT. KHALID HUSSEIN, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: I think when you send guys overseas and you don't give them a date that shows them when they're coming back, I think that hurts morale and I think it is hard on the families back at home.
CHILCOTE: Specialist Dave Eaton, a medic, was an environmental safety expert and was on his way to graduate school. He figures this deployment costs him $30,000 a year in salary. He got out of the Guard once, then was called back. Now he's been in so long, he thinks he'll just stay. EPC. DAVID EATON, OKLAHOMA NATIONAL GUARD: I'm over the halfway point to retirement, so I might as well go ahead and stay in.
CHILCOTE: Later at a home for Afghan orphans, another group of Oklahoma Guardsmen hands out gifts. Part of the military's campaign to win hearts and minds here. The soldiers clearly enjoying the children. Still most would have preferred to spend Memorial Day weekend with family. The military has always turned to the Guard and the Reserves in difficult times. This unit spent more consecutive days in combat than any other infantry unit in Korea and did long tours in Italy, France and Germany during World War II. Most of these soldiers only hope they won't be needed here much longer.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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