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Saddam Trial Begins; Miami SWAT Team Moves in on Site of Gunfire; Officials Discuss Hurricane Preparedness on Capitol Hill; Scientists Test Avian Flu Vaccine

Aired October 19, 2005 - 13:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, HOST: We're talking about Hurricane Wilma. Take a look at this amazing view from space. The huge and powerful storm is on track to hit Florida. We expect a briefing from Florida emergency management officials in just a few minutes.
It's only the first day of the trial and Saddam Hussein wastes no time. The former dictated declares, "I'm innocent." This hour, the judges, the strategy and how the Arab world is reacting.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Kyra Phillips. CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

Thirty-seven years after grabbing power in Iraq, 26 years after formerly assuming the presidency, two years after losing everything, including his country in a U.S.-led invasion, Saddam Hussein is on trial for crimes against humanity. The opening session was taken up with charges, pleas, arguments, not the legal kind, and a six-week process.

We get all the facts and fireworks now from CNN's Christiane Amanpour in Baghdad. She was in that courtroom.

Christiane, what was it like?

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, it was the first day, and unfortunately, the end of that, we're going to have to wait for a long time to see a continuance, because they got a 40-day postponement. So it starts again on November 28. Because the defense said they needed more time to prepare and more time to really deliver a good defense in such a complicated trial.

But during the day's proceeding, Saddam Hussein was brought into court, escorted. He looked rather more tired, slower, a little older, more demoralized than he had when I saw him come into court for his first hearing about 15 months ago. He was nonetheless still defiant.

He addressed the judge correctly and fairly properly. He wasn't rude. But he said he didn't recognize the jurisdiction of this trial and this court. And, therefore, he wasn't going to be answering the questions that the judge asked.

At one point, the judge did ask him to enter a plea. And he said, "I've said what I've had to say. I am not guilty."

But he was also told that there was going to be some evidence, a recording that was alleged to implicate him in the central charges here. He faces the charge of crimes against humanity for the execution of 143 Shiite men in the village of Dujail, 23 years ago, after a botched attempt on his life. When they said they were going to bring up some video evidence, this was his response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SADDAM HUSSEIN (through translator): I talk to you as an Iraqi, to help you get the truth to uncover those that are fake. They -- it is known that -- that sounds can be voice-overed, and the court should not take them. It can listen to it, to follow up and investigate further. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: So he sat down, and the proceedings continued. Altogether, they were about three hours in court with a couple of short recesses. Some of those recesses for technical problems.

They never did introduce that video evidence. That may have to wait for when the trial resumes. But Saddam has said that, because he considers the U.S. invasion of Iraq illegal, everything that follows, he said, is illegal, including this tribunal. Therefore, he does not recognize it, he said.

Defense attorneys told us that that also would be part of their defense strategy, trying to prove that everything that had come since the U.S. invasion was not legal.

However, the government, as you can imagine, the current government in Iraq, was more than pleased to see this trial start. In fact, many members of the government had expressed quite a lot of frustration that the trial had not started even earlier. This is what the spokesman had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAITH KUBBA, PRIME MINISTER'S SPOKESMAN (through translator): We are proud that this trial is controlled by the Iraqis on the Iraqi land, by Iraqi judges. And this is something very important, because Saddam is now facing many accusations because of violating many international laws and other rights, related to the many international conventions and thank God the trial is taking place on Iraqi land.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: Obviously, for so many people here and probably around the world, as well, a deep sense of satisfaction that Saddam Hussein and, in this case, seven of his henchmen, co-defendants, are sitting trial, finally facing justice for some of the crimes they're alleged to have perpetrated through that long, long brutal reign of his.

There are others, though, who are concerned, because there seemed to be few ground rules in that courtroom today. The prosecutor was getting up, defense attorney, defendant, all wanting to speak, have their day in court, so to speak. So there does seem to be a need to smooth out the proceedings, get more control of the courtroom, set down the ground rules, and of course, also smooth out a lot of the technical difficulties so the broadcast of the sound and vision is possible, as well -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Christiane Amanpour, thanks so much. We'll continue to check in with you, of course, throughout the day.

Meanwhile, it's safe to say the image of Saddam Hussein in a cage in a courtroom is -- in a borrowed suit, we're told, facing trial and potential execution is not one that many in the Arab world would ever thought they would see. They're seeing it now.

And CNN senior Arab affairs editor Octavia Nasr is watching them, watching this incredible spectacle. Can we call it a spectacle?

OCTAVIA NASR, CNN SENIOR ARAB AFFAIRS EDITOR: Absolutely. And Arab media are calling it historic. They're calling it the trial of the 21st Century. The Iraqi television folks are calling it the trial of the century for the dictator of the century.

This is a spectacle. This is a huge story. And it is a drama unfolding. People are watching on their TV sets, in disbelief, sort of. They never thought that this day would come, that the day would come when the former leader, the former president of Iraq, the strong man, the man that used to -- just the mere mention of his name would conjure up images of fear and massacres and threats, the same man is an ordinary man in the defense seat, saying, "I'm innocent."

PHILLIPS: Octavia, let's talk about just the level of respect, because there's been a lot of talk about will this tribunal be credible? Are these judges biased? But you're already seeing a level of respect, I think, as you watch this go down. Saddam Hussein's lawyers not getting three months, but getting 45 days. There's a little give and take going on.

But at the same time, also, who made the call about the head dresses? And tell us about the controversy about that.

NASR: This is a very interesting point. Because today, although we only saw one day of this trial, but the judge had a huge, tremendous responsibility to prove to the world that he is capable of conducting a fair trial, of presiding over a fair trial.

The head dress is a perfect example, Kyra. These men walked into the courtroom. They were asked by the judge to identify themselves. Instead of identifying themselves and spelling out their names, they said -- they complained to the judge. They said, "This is unacceptable. They took away our head dress." And this is in the Sunni Iraqi culture. This could be something very insulting, not to allow a man to wear his head dress, the kofiyah and the igal.

So basically, this judge called immediately for the -- those responsible to bring in the headdress, which showed a lot of authority. It showed a lot of understanding. It showed this judge willing to listen to the defendants, which is something that a lot of critics before the beginning of this trial said that this trial is not going to be fair.

So this is a judge who showed them today that he's capable of fairness, that he is, indeed, a judge that will listen. He won't just issue orders. He won't just shut people up. But, instead, he will listen to their concerns. And maybe, maybe, he will answer their demands.

And of course, by him accepting to postpone the trial, which was something that the defense requested, that is another proof that this judge is listening. And if he thinks the request is fair, he is -- he's answering it.

PHILLIPS: All right, Octavia, as you continue to monitor the web sites there, the Arab web sites and also the news coverage, we'll check in with you. Thank you so much.

Meanwhile, we've got news developing here back in the United States, in Florida. SWAT officers now responding -- you can see here via our affiliate WPLG -- to a tenth story building in downtown Miami. We're being told as we watch these live pictures, shots being fired.

Also, hopefully, as we take these live pictures, whoever's firing those shots can't see the situation of where that SWAT team is, that we don't want to give away their tactics.

On the phone with us now, Red Berke -- Rad Berke, rather, with WPLG. Rad, what can you tell us about the situation taking place right now?

RAD BERKE, WPLG CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, this started about an hour ago with reports to police of shots being fired by someone in one of the apartments on the tenth floor of the building that you're looking at.

At this point, we have had no reports of anyone on the ground being hit and no one being hurt, including police officers. Initial reports from the police were that first responding officers were also fired upon. But at this point, again, no reports of anyone being hit.

This is a relatively new building, about four years old. It's in an area of redevelopment in Miami, along the Miami River, that separates it from downtown by only a couple of blocks.

I can see the county government building practically right next door, which houses the office of the mayor of Miami-Dade County and all of the administrative offices.

So at this point, police have cordoned off a wide area around this building, so it is affecting downtown traffic in particular today, on a day when most people up until now had been more concerned about the hurricane lurking out there. Now all eyes focused on this ten-story building and whoever is inside of it -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Now, Rad, obviously -- well, maybe it's not obvious, but do SWAT officers know where -- which apartment the shots are being fired from? And if they do know which apartment, which window, do they know who lives in that apartment? Is it possible that the person that actually lives in that building is the one firing those shots?

BERKE: As so often happens in a case like this, what the police know and what they tell us are always two different things. But presumably, they do know which apartment it is, because they say two of the windows face the river and one other window in that building faces First Street. So they know what unit it is. If they know exactly who's inside and what started all of this, at this point, they're not telling us. They're trying to cope with the situation.

And as we follow what's happened in situations like this in the past, they'll try to set up some kind of an avenue of communication with the person inside, before doing anything else, to see if they can resolve this by phone or however they are able to communicate with him.

PHILLIPS: Brad Berke, with our affiliate WPLG. Rad, keep us up to date on that situation there. Once again, shots being fired from the tenth floor of an apartment complex there. You'll see it in downtown Miami. We'll follow it as the SWAT team moves in there and tries to strategize and, of course, make contact with whoever is firing those shots.

Hurricane Wilma. We are following its every move -- her every move, I guess. Jacqui Jeras just upstairs in the weather center.

What do we know at this point, Jacqui?

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hey, Kyra. "It," technically.

PHILLIPS: OK. Good, it is technically. All right, good. We don't want to, I guess, go there. All right. Politically correct, yes.

JERAS: All right, anyway, Wilma just continues to hold at its record status right now. Incredible Category 5 hurricane, winds right now at 175 miles per hour. It's about 325 miles to the south and the east of Cozumel.

We do expect some weakening. And there are going to be some changes in the intensity of this storm, we think, over the next couple of days. It's been wobbling.

Take a look. This is just a real curvy, wobbly pattern that it's been tacking. But overall, we are expecting it to be moving to the north and west and eventually pull a little bit farther on up to the north.

But we're getting increasingly concerned that there could be a landfall along Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula before it heads into the Gulf of Mexico and then takes that sharp right-hand turn.

We need to prepare at this time for a major hurricane making landfall this weekend, probably late sometime on Saturday. It's still really too early to tell exactly where in Florida landfall could be. But central and southern Florida looking most vulnerable at this time. The other thing to keep in mind is, this is a huge storm. We're talking about 300 miles-plus across already. The hurricane force winds were very tiny earlier today. And now they've expanded out, about 100 miles across.

We talk about our computer models all the time. This is our in- house computer model forecast. And I think it has a real good handle on where Wilma's going to be going over the next 24 to 48 hours. And the color scheme, you can see here, these dark oranges, that's Category 3 winds or better.

There you can see it, very near Cancun, with the eye wall on shore on Friday morning. There's the time stamp. So certainly going to be battering much of Mexico. There are hurricane watches and tropical storm warnings, which have already been posted across the area, with eight to 10 inches of rain expected -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right, Jacqui, thank you so much.

Saving the worst for the last. The last storm on the official list of names attached to the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season is the strongest, in terms of barometric pressure, ever recorded in the Atlantic Basin and the quickest to strengthen so much.

This time yesterday, Wilma was a minimal Category 1. Today, it's a monster Category 5. And we're going to have a lot more to say about it later this hour.

In the meantime, Katrina, in hindsight. The secretary of homeland security is telling Congress how to make FEMA, still playing catch up eight weeks later, quicker on its feet. Michael Chertoff is also taking flack, which is an understated way of describing one lawmaker's question about those nursing home deaths in a New Orleans' suburb.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. CYNTHIA MCKINNEY (D), GEORGIA: Mr. Secretary, if the nursing home owners are arrested for negligent homicide, why shouldn't you also be arrested for negligent homicide?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Well, objections from other members followed. Chertoff changed the subject quickly. We get more on all that from CNN's Kimberly Osias. She's in our Washington bureau -- Kimberly.

KIMBERLY OSIAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Kyra.

Well, there were definitely some tense times in that meeting. Michael Chertoff really, really under the microscope. Some folks really wanting to focus on problems of Katrina, he clearly wanting to focus on the solution, really refocusing.

So much to talk about today, Kyra. Weatherwise, hurricanes past and present. But forefront in everyone's mind is this Hurricane Wilma, threatening to be a whopper of one.

Man of the hour is Florida governor Jeb Bush on Capitol Hill today as well, saying his state, Florida, is ready.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: We have prestaged ice and water and trucks that we control that we contract with, in our own warehouses, so that we can -- and we've created actually, because of lessons learned, we now have points of distribution that we have designed to -- for maximum through-put. We brought in logistics experts from the private sector to -- to teach us how to do this. If Wal-Mart can do it, why can't the government do it, is kind of the question that I've been asking for last six months. And in fact, we can.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OSIAS: Mandatory evacuations have already been called for in the Florida Keys just about an hour ago where Katrina may make landfall as a powerful Category 5, as soon as Saturday.

As far as emergency shelters, Bush says those will be activated starting tomorrow.

While FEMA is not a first responder, Department of Homeland Security director Michael Chertoff, also on Capitol Hill, as we mentioned, admitted the agency's relief supply delivery is antiquated and inefficient. But clearly, Chertoff didn't want to dwell on mast mistakes. Instead, he focused on those specific solutions, solutions like establishing special reconnaissance teams.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL CHERTOFF, HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: We're integrating the department's existing preparedness efforts all across the board, from prevention through protection to response and recovery, including planning, training, and exercising, and a single director for preparedness, which we will equip with people who have real experience and planning in the kind of disciplined way you see in the private sector and you see in the military.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OSIAS: Chertoff talked about using members the U.S. Coast Guard, the Secret Service and the private sector in initial disaster response -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Kimberly Osias, thank you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS (voice-over): Next on LIVE FROM...

DANIEL HOROWITZ, ATTORNEY: You scream, you cry, but I know I just basically sat with her and I just told her "I love you." PHILLIPS: Attorney's wife murdered. A CNN/Nancy Grace exclusive. TV legal analyst Daniel Horowitz talks for the first time about the horrific death of his wife Pamela.

Later on LIVE FROM, disturbing discovery: a python in a koi pond. Wait until you see what happens when home owners take matters, and the snake, into their own hands.

Also ahead on LIVE FROM, inside the Saddam Hussein trial. Who are the judges? Who are his defenders? And what will their next move be?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOROWITZ: My brain is telling myself, it's just one of the crime scene photos you've been looking at all day

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: And that's Daniel Horowitz, an exclusive interview with CNN's Nancy Grace. The high-profile California attorney is describing reaction to coming home Saturday to find his wife Pamela had been brutally beaten to death. Investigators are saying very little about possible clues or suspects in that case, but medical examiners have disclosed that his wife died from blunt trauma to the head.

Horowitz says as soon as he saw Pamela's body lying on the floor in their home, he knew she was dead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOROWITZ: I dialed the regular police number. And then I just was with her. And I just -- I don't know exactly what I said. Between -- you scream, you cry. But I know I just basically sat with her and I just told her, "I love you and you're beautiful." And, and, you know, just whatever things you say to somebody you love. Because, to me, at that point, all that was there was the person I loved.

NANCY GRACE, HOST, "NANCY GRACE": How long did you sit there until police arrived?

HOROWITZ: It had to be a long time, Nancy, because I kept saying ten minutes, but then I analyzed it. It had to be more than that. Because I kept hearing the sirens and they got lost and it takes 10 minutes just to get from there to there.

And then it was bad. It was like -- I mean, I'm not stupid. I know as soon as the police come, they're going to take me away from my wife. And -- I just wanted as much time with her as I could have.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: You can tune in tonight to see more of Nancy Grace's interview with Daniel Horowitz on CNN's Headline News. That's tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern.

Talk about medical news now. As the flap over bird flu increases, profits are soaring for a Swiss drug conglomerate. Roche says that its Tamiflu sales shot up more than 250 percent in the first nine months of this year as nations around the world stockpiled the antiviral drug in the event of a human bird flu pandemic. Although Tamiflu doesn't cure bird flu, it can lessen the severity and duration of that virus.

Now today, new confirmation of the further spread of bird flu. Russian officials say the virus has been found in chickens in a village south of Moscow. It's the first confirmation of the N5-N1 virus in European Russia. And it was already found in Siberia over the summer. Since then, the strain has spread to Romania, Turkey and Greece.

CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On the surface, it sounds like a positive development.

MIKE LEAVITT, HHS SECRETARY: We do have a vaccine that produces an immune response against this type of flu.

GUPTA: That's right: there is a vaccine against the strain of avian flu that is killing birds and people in Asia. In fact about 20 million doses are being produced for the U.S. government.

But you can't get it from your doctor. It's not approved by the FDA. In fact, at this point, it's only experimental and it's being made for clinical trials.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH: The good news is that thus far it appears to be safe. The good news is that we have a good dose response curve, which means that it is classically acting like a vaccine that will induce, and it has induced a rather robust immune response that you would predict would be protective.

GUPTA: But there's more bad news. The flu virus is constantly changing. That's why we need a different flu vaccine every year. And experts think the avian flu spreading through Southeast Asia will change more before it starts spreading easily from person to person, which begs this question: if the virus continues to change, will the vaccine the government is working so hard to make even work?

The man who made it, Dr. Robert Webster at St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital, thinks it probably will.

DR. ROBERT WEBSTER, ST. JUDE'S CHILDREN'S RESEARCH HOSPITAL: I would argue that, since we have no immunity at all in the world to H5- N1, the vaccine, even though it's not a perfect match, would probably protect you from death. If you were vaccinated, you would still get infected. You'd probably get very sick but not die. GUPTA: And that's the best we can do until we know which version of the virus will spread from person to person. Once that starts happening, it will take about four to six months to build the perfect vaccine.

There's no shorter way, because like all flu vaccines this one is grown in fertilized chicken eggs in a process that takes millions of eggs. But, remember this avian flu kills chickens. So there are questions about building vaccines in the very same animals the flu is killing.

TOMMY THOMPSON, FORMER HHS SECRETARY: That's what's killing chickens right now is the H5-N1 and that's what we're basing our future on to create a vaccine. I mean, it's just -- it's just nuts.

GUPTA: Former secretary of health and human services, Tommy Thompson, as well as some flu experts, favor another way to build vaccines that could shave weeks off the production time. Instead of growing the vaccine in an egg, you could do it scientifically in a lab using cell cultures. Many vaccines are already built with cell cultures, but not the flu vaccine. Thompson says he tried to change that.

THOMPSON: I asked Congress to appropriate money three years ago to set aside a way to stimulate the vaccine companies that were still in the market to do something about that, to start modernizing their vaccine methods to a cell culture.

GUPTA: He says Congress never supported him.

THOMPSON: If they would have done it three years ago, we would be well on our way to a new way to manufacture vaccine and producing vaccine.

GUPTA: Senator Tom Harkin says...

SEN. TOM HARKIN (D), IOWA: I'm on the appropriates committee, and I don't recall the Bush administration asking for an appropriations of money to build vaccine manufacturing plants. Whether Secretary Thompson just sort of talked about it, that may be one thing. But I don't remember any request coming from the administration to do this.

GUPTA: Even though trial results aren't completed on the new avian flu vaccine, the U.S. government is spending $100 million to buy enough for 20 million people, just in case.

If avian flu does hit this country, the first people to get the vaccine would undoubtedly be the health care workers who would be treating the sick. But what about others? There might be harmful side effects for some people. That's one of the many things they're hoping to learn in these clinical trials before the vaccine is made available.

So while there's a lot of hope, for now, there's also a lot of uncertainty. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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