Return to Transcripts main page

CNN 10

CNN STUDENT NEWS For August 9, 2002

Aired August 09, 2002 - 04:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: You're watching CNN STUDENT NEWS seen in schools around the world because learning never stops and neither does the news.
SUSAN FREIDMAN, CO-HOST: Time for a quick check of the rundown. We start in Iraq where Saddam Hussein is speaking out.

SHELLEY WALCOTT, CO-HOST: Next door in Kuwait, we "Focus" on a quiet revolution.

FREIDMAN: Later, one mother's quest to make street racing safe.

WALCOTT: Then Student Bureau tackles a dangerous trend.

FREIDMAN: We've reached the end of the week. Welcome to CNN STUDENT NEWS. I'm Susan Freidman.

WALCOTT: And I'm Shelley Walcott.

New threats out of Baghdad don't appear to be phasing the White House.

FRIEDMAN: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein says anyone who attacks his country will -- in his words -- "die in disgraceful failure." His fiery speech yesterday marked the anniversary of the end of the Iran- Iraq war and it was an obvious response to tough talk in Washington on the possibility of an attack on Iraq.

CNN's Rym Brahimi has more from Baghdad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRAHIMI (voice over): The occasion, the Day of Days, the day Iraq's eight-year war with Iran ended 14 years ago. But as the Iraqi leadership celebrates the end of that conflict with full pomp and ceremony, it's also preparing for the possibility of facing another war, the third in the past 22 years.

In his Day of Days speech, the Iraqi president directly addressed U.S. threats for the first time in prophetic tones but using much of the usual defiance.

HUSSEIN (through translator): One of the lessons of recent and distant history is that all empires and bureaus of the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) of evil, whenever they mobilize they're evil against the Arab nation or against the Muslim world. They were themselves buried in their own coffin. BRAHIMI: That's tough talk, backed by a show of force, the second military parade in Baghdad this week, this one about 10,000 volunteers marching. Many of these volunteers, some of them members of the ruling Ba'ath Party, say they have weapons at home and are learning to use them to defend their ruler and their country to the death, displays of readiness that in recent days have gone hand-in- hand with attempts at promoting dialogue with the U.S. voiced on this occasion by the president himself.

HUSSEIN (through translator): If they wanted peace and security for themselves and their people, then this is not the course to take. The right course is of respect to the security and advice of others through dealing with others in peace and establishing the obligations required by way of credible dialog.

BRAHIMI: On this public holiday, few Iraqis show up at their local cafes to discuss politics. They're being told that even if the U.S. does attack Iraq, it won't have the backing of an international coalition like it did in 1991. Most Iraqis bear few, if any, illusions that an attack is on its way, a political game they know is not in their hands.

(on camera): Instructions from the ruling Ba'ath Party these days all seem to converge toward one goal, gaining the international public opinion. The invitation to members of the U.S. Congress to visit Iraq has been renewed. And at all levels, local associations and unions are being mobilized to send the message to their counterparts abroad that this is not a war Iraq wants.

Rym Brahimi, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: The Bush administration says President Hussein's speech was high on rhetoric but nothing new. Mr. Bush has made it clear he wants a change in the Iraqi regime.

CNN's Patty Davis reports from the Pentagon.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PATTY DAVIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Pentagon dismisses Saddam Hussein's warning that any U.S. attack would fail with heavy U.S. casualties, a view echoed across the Bush administration.

PHILLIP REEKER, STATE DEPT. SPOKESMAN: Saddam's comments are a bluster from an internationally isolated dictator.

DAVIS: Planning for a possible U.S. military invasion continues at the Pentagon. Iraqi opposition leaders in Washington to meet with senior Pentagon and State Department officials on ousting Saddam Hussein say, unlike the Gulf War, the Iraqi leader is preparing to fight U.S. troops not in the desert but on the streets of Baghdad.

SHARIF AL DIN AL-HUSSEIN, IRAQI NATIONAL CONGRESS: He is positioning himself so that there would be no significant battles in the field. He is preparing for street fighting and to take on any allied troops inside Iraq.

DAVIS: Pentagon officials say urban combat carries the highest risk of U.S. troop casualties and could result in significant civilian deaths as well. The military, a senior Pentagon official said, is familiar with the difficulties of urban warfare and there are ways to get around it. Military analysts aren't so sure.

MICHAEL O'HANLON, BOOKINGS INSTITUTION: It's going to involve Iraqis hiding behind civilian populations, ambushing us from the basements and roofs of various buildings, trying to use shoulder- launched weaponry against our helicopters, and making life difficult. We will win but we could lose a thousand or more people if things go badly.

DAVIS (on camera): The U.S. is weighing the risks as it forges ahead with war planning. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice meet next week with President Bush at his Crawford, Texas ranch to discuss how best to deal with Saddam Hussein. Patty Davis, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: Also keeping a close eye on Iraq, the neighboring country of Kuwait. Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990, a move which sparked the Gulf War. Iraqi troops still patrol the Kuwaiti border, and the Kuwaitis have countered with a buildup of their own.

With more, here's Brent Sadler.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRENT SADLER, CNN BEIRUT BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): An impressive display of Kuwaiti tanks from the 15th Armor Brigade, training in the desert, a resurgent Kuwaiti army, with American-made Howitzers and Russian-built tanks, to counter Iraq's persistent high- troop concentrations across the border, a short tank drive away.

GEN. ALI MUMEN, CHIEF OF STAFF, KUWAITI ARMED FORCES: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) of a threat, but I wouldn't say there is a movement or any indicators of change of the situation.

SADLER: If there was a sudden change, United Nations observers would be the first to know. They have overseen this vast, highly- sensitive demilitarized zone, 200 kilometers, or 125 miles long, since the end of the Gulf War, including movements in and out of Iraq's Port of Umm Qasr.

MAJ. GEN. MIGUEL MORENO, UNIKOM FORCE COMMANDER: We are here to accomplish our mandate. The U.N. presence here is very important. So we'll stay here until the U.N. headquarters will tell us what to do.

SADLER: In the event, that is, of a return to a U.S.-led conflict with Iraq. It's reportedly calm here, no violations, but Kuwaitis say they have already paid a high price for Saddam Hussein's unpredictability and territorial ambitions. So tank and infantry brigades exercise in the same blistering hot month that Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990.

(on camera): Kuwait's military collapsed in the first few hours of Iraq's invasion 12 years ago, but a repeat of that battlefield disaster is impossible today, claims Kuwait's military top brass, confident an Iraqi threat to border security is neutralized.

(voice-over): For all this display of Kuwaiti fire power on the ground and in the air, it's unseen American forces that act as the real deterrent. But these Kuwaiti units could still be dangerously close to military action if their U.S. ally tries to drive Saddam Hussein from power, a possible fight Kuwait's rulers are not yet ready to join, but would want Washington to win.

Brent Sadler, CNN in Kuwait's northern desert.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: The world has become much more familiar with Kuwaiti society since the Gulf War; but this small, oil-rich nation has raised some eyebrows of Westerners who question its conservative policy on women.

Here again is Brent Sadler.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SADLER (voice-over): In Kuwait, a dramatic contest of ideas between the past and the present over the rights of women inside a Muslim society with some startling contradictions between what women want and how they behave.

(on camera): It's a case of religious conservatism versus a more liberal interpretation of Islam as you can clearly see inside this popular shopping mall where women browse through Western-style boutiques and purchase designer labels.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To me, the way I dress here is the same -- the way I dressed in Europe and the States, wherever I am.

SADLER (voice-over): But while women in Kuwait can drive, work and hold senior government positions, society remains strictly conservative. Wedding parties separate men from women and public schools are segregated after kindergarten. Westerners are often criticized here for interpreting the rules in a bad light.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But it's not. Actually, it's like more open than most countries around us.

SADLER: More open, that is, then say Saudi Arabia, but still behind the times says this Kuwaiti lawyer because women can't vote or run for office in Kuwait. She's spent nearly 30 years campaigning for those rights, a struggle fought out in parliament last year when Islamic fundamentalists defeated moves to change the electoral law by just two votes. But a debate is still raging. BADRIA AL-AWADHI, LEGAL CONSULTANT: Especially of the fundamentalists. They say we give you only right to vote, not to be elected. But we are against that one completely because they say oh this right I'd (ph) be divided, either full or nothing.

SADLER: Aroob Al-Rifaee may dress differently from the lawyer, but she is no less committed to political reform for women. But all in good time she says, arguing that pressure from the West to move faster is a mistake.

AROOB AL-RIFAEE, SOCIAL AFFAIRS RESEARCHER: This kind of pressure is too much. We don't want to get our political rights because America wants it. We think that we need it because it's time for it.

SADLER: An evolution not revolution say women here that could one day give them the same political rights as men.

Brent Sadler, CNN, Kuwait.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: The essentials of college life usually include a computer, a microwave and a comfy couch. But in one Colorado town you're going to have to be a little more careful where you sit.

Kimberly Osias reports now from Boulder, Colorado.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KIMBERLY OSIAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They come in all different shapes and styles, mostly used and cheap.

KRISTEN BARRY, UNIVERSITY STUDENT: I don't know it -- even in the winter when it's raining out it's just nice to sit out here.

OSIAS: You don't want to throw them out so you place them, out front that is.

BARRY: It's a big part of our daily life.

OSIAS (on camera): But now that right to lounge on your own property, a sofa just like these, is against a new city-wide ordinance.

DAN CORSON, BOULDER CITY COUNCIL: Upholstered furniture is easy to carry and it burns easily.

OSIAS (voice-over): And that's the problem. In Boulder at the University of Colorado, football spirit has gotten out of control.

STEVE STOLZ, BOULDER FIRE CHIEF: Since 1996, we're at about 136 fires and probably about 125 are on the University Hill area.

OSIAS: After big wins, some students take to the streets giving residents the hangover. RON STUMP, UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO: It's unfortunate that we have to do this, but I think it's understandable given the situation.

OSIAS: For students it's a choice between comfort and cash. Your front yard sofa could get you a $1,000 fine or worse, jail time.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It just seems ridiculous to me. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) to stop.

OSIAS: It's so bad that even the Colorado legislature has gotten involved. New on the books, a mandatory one-year suspension for students convicted of disturbing the peace.

CORSON: I hope that we are able to build a different atmosphere on University Hill where the students and the permanent residents work together.

OSIAS: But not sit together, at least on a sofa outside.

In Boulder, Colorado, Kimberly Osias reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: The sofa ban is not forever. It expires in 2005. Other cities across the U.S. have adopted similar policies.

ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."

WALCOTT: All week in "Perspectives" we've been checking out different modes of transportation. Today, a look at the way cars are sold in Europe.

For nearly 20 years, European car dealers have conducted business pretty much on their own terms; but that's about to change dramatically.

We have this report from London.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SONIA SEQUARUS (ph), CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The consumer is king. EU Commissioner Mario Monti has not wavered from that position on the European car industry. Manufacturers in Europe should get ready for some big changes.

MARIO MONTI, COMMISSIONER, EU COMPETITION: This is a bold reform. It's important to grant an adequate period for adaptation. But if there has to be adaptation, people must know to what they have to adapt. They must know with certainty as of today, and as of today they will know, what the future regime will be.

SEQUARUS: For the last 17 years, automakers have held a tight grip over the way their cars are sold in Europe. A so-called block exemption allows them to dictate to dealers where showrooms will be set up and stop dealers from selling rival brands. They've also controlled the lucrative repair business, limiting after sale service to their dealerships and supplying the bulk of the spare parts. But that cozy relationship is coming to an end.

ALAN ASHAR, U.K. CONSUMERS ASSOCIATION: Once the competition jeannie (ph) is out of the bottle, you can't put it back. And I think that consumers will get a taste for a better, a freer market and they'll insist on complete reform.

SEQUARUS: Pricing is at the heart of the issue. Prices can vary by up to 50 percent across Europe, and British buyers often pay the most. Under the proposed rules, dealers will be able to set up anywhere and sell any car. That will expose those price differences, but some Europeans might end up paying more.

GREG MELICH, MORGAN STANLEY DEAN WITTER: I think for consumers the benefit will be eventually a more common European pricing system and that could mean lower prices in some European markets such as Germany, but it will also mean convergence suffer (ph) in some other markets such as Denmark. So the consumers that win and lose are really depends on where you live.

SEQUARUS: Monti's vision of unrestricted competition could eventually see consumers buying their cars from auto supermarkets where there will be more choice and comparing prices will be easier. In theory, increasing competition, bringing prices down and forcing dealers to provide a better service.

Sonia Sequarus, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: Our "Perspective" on transportation wraps up this week in Portland, Oregon. Often when a bunch of kids with cars get together it means street racing and the police usually aren't far behind. But that's not the case when it involves a fund raiser to remember a young girl.

Here's Chris Murphy with the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is time to get racing.

CHRIS MURPHY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Revved up and ready to race. Portland International Raceway the place where street racing is legal, safe and...

MICHAEL DE WIN VU (ph), RACER: It's fun.

MURPHY: Michael de Win Vu, one of the 300 racers pumped for this event. Even though it's organized by Gresham Police, it's far from a drag.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Love the smoke. The more smoke the better.

DE WIN VU: You know I don't find running from cops fun, so you know I'd rather do legal instead of illegal.

MURPHY: These amateur races are now held every Friday and Saturday night at PIR during summer, but this night is special.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tonight is a benefit race for Krystal Pomante.

MURPHY: Eleven-year-old Krystal Pomante was killed in an illegal street race last year. A passenger in a mustang, crushed after it crashed into a tree in Gresham. Her death is driving many of these racers off the streets.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's sad. I mean you shouldn't be doing it. I think it was raining too, so it's probably a pretty stupid choice.

MURPHY: A portion of admission and donations will go to the Krystal Pomante Scholarship Fund.

(on camera): Each of these drivers pays a $20 entry fee. But when it comes to safety, the message these races send is invaluable.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It made everybody take a step back and think about what we were doing, you know, and seek out other options of racing and different things to do. You know what I mean? A lot more of us come here every weekend now, yes.

MURPHY: Because of her death?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because of her death, yes.

DE WIN VU: I feel bad for the girl because she had no choice, you know. She was in the car and stuff. And you know, like I said, illegal street racing, gosh (ph), it's just dumb.

MURPHY (voice-over): This event smart since seven people were killed in illegal street races in just three months in Gresham last year alone.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: We look back on the week in science now and what an incredible week it was. Two little girls joined at the head were separated in a daylong operation and the outcome looks promising.

Our Joel Hochmuth reports on that medical feat, and then Anne McDermott looks back at two women who spent their lives together.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOEL HOCHMUTH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What is a medical marvel so far, doctors in California this week separated twin girls from Guatemala who had spent the first year of their lives joined at the head. The preliminary prognosis at least looks good.

DR. MICHAEL KARPF, DIRECTOR, UCLA MEDICAL CENTER: I think it went even better than I'd hoped for. Well we had serious concerns about what they would find when they actually saw the venous system. The veins that they had to separate, apparently it was as they thought it was going to be. The separations went very smoothly, so I couldn't have asked for better.

HOCHMUTH: The two girls named Maria Teresa and Maria de Jesus remain in critical condition, and they're not out of the woods just yet. Maria Teresa was rushed back into surgery only hours after the initial separation to relieve a buildup of blood on her brain. And it still remains to be seen whether the girl suffered any brain damage. Still, doctors don't expect any damage to be permanent.

DR. JORGE LAZAREFF, UCLA MEDICAL CENTER: It is possible that they will not reach the milestones of the -- of the -- of their second year of life as rapidly as any other child would, but I -- that's why I, like I said yesterday, five years. I mean I am absolutely sure that by the time that they're 5 years of the constert (ph) I mean four more years they would have already reached those as a milestone.

HOCHMUTH: Although the delicate surgery the girls endured is not unprecedented, it is rare and not always successful. Worldwide, surgeons have performed cranial separations at least five times in the past decade, but in two of those cases, one of the twins did not survive.

CNN's medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta explains the procedure involved in this case.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Follow this black line now...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.

GUPTA: ... along the middle of the brain, and you'll see that there's actually a separation between the two brains.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.

GUPTA: So while they are truly conjoined, no doubt about it looking at the picture, the brains are separate. These two twins had independent thoughts.

HOCHMUTH: Prior to the surgery, doctors actually inserted balloons under the girls' scalp.

GUPTA: But the purpose of that, and you can see there's actually hair growing over -- the hair's been shaved, that's important because that skin is actually stretched over the -- over the new defect or wound from the operation. The operation actually took place in this area over here.

What they actually had to do is really remarkable. They operated really on the whole skull and took bone from other places around the skull and actually covered up the important areas that they wanted to cover up now, including the middle part of the brain and some of the side parts of the brain. HOCHMUTH: Further surgeries will be required to take more bone from the babies' skulls as they grow to fill in remaining soft spots. Of course that's still down the road. For now, the girls' parents are simply enjoying the fact that their daughters have a chance at a more normal life.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's just happy that they made it through the surgery and that everything is going well so far.

HOCHMUTH: What would life have been like for the twins if they had not gone through the surgery? Anne McDermott looks back at the lives of two conjoined girls in California.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNE MCDERMOTT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Go ahead, stare. God knows Yvonne and Yvette McCarther were used to that. But they never felt they were freaks.

Nope, they were two individuals who said every day they were glad to be alive. Sure they spent a lifetime head to head sharing a circulatory system, sharing their space, but they were happy as long as nobody made the mistake of thinking of them as a single being.

(on camera): You agree on everything?

MCCARTHER: No.

MCDERMOTT: How do you resolve your differences then?

MCCARTHER: Carefully.

MCDERMOTT (voice-over): What made them happy? Simple things like getting a place of their own, like paying the...

MCCARTHER: Bills. I love the bills.

MCCARTHER: I like being able to say that I pay my own bills.

MCCARTHER: Pay my own bills and stuff like that.

MCCARTHER: Stuff like that, you know.

MCCARTHER: Buy our own groceries.

MCCARTHER: Groceries.

MCDERMOTT: Buying groceries, easy, they just take the bus. But it wasn't always easy.

Back when they were born in 1941, there were no modern medical miracles to separate them. And then there were a couple of tough years when they toured as a sideshow attraction, but they never talked about that because they preferred to be happy and busy, which is why they went to college to study nursing. And boy they loved that, but they didn't live to graduate.

Yvonne and Yvette died almost 10 years ago. They were only 43. Heart problems were suspected, but there was no autopsy. Of course it doesn't matter how they died, it's how they lived and they lived so gallantly, smiling, always smiling in the face of all those stares.

Anne McDermott, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: A drug commonly prescribed to children is making its way into the college scene. Students aren't taking the drug for kicks, they're using it to improve concentration and study harder. Unfortunately, these youngsters may be doing themselves more harm than good.

Our Student Bureau has more on this dangerous drug trend.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARAH FAUST, CNN STUDENT BUREAU: Our generation thinks a pill can fix anything.

ALLY ALTMAN, CNN STUDENT BUREAU (voice-over): For Sarah Faust the pill was Ritalin or methalfenadine (ph), usually prescribed for youngsters who have trouble paying attention in class.

FAUST: Whenever I would take it, I would become so focused. It's like I could actually, it sounds crazy, but studying would almost be fun.

ALTMAN: This 21-year-old sophomore at Florida Atlanta University is not alone.

DR. MARK AGRESTI, PSYCHIATRIST: Ritalin helps you focus, helps you stay on task, helps you stay awake. So Ritalin could be very helpful. I think it may actually enhance learning.

ALTMAN: Studies show at least one in five college students has tried Ritalin or amphetamines like Aderol without a prescription of their own.

JON WEISS, STUDENT: Everybody definitely has at least one friend who's prescribed drugs for A.D.D. or any learning disability. And I guess it's really easy to access these drugs for kids our age.

ALTMAN: Duke University sophomore John Weiss, who's from South Florida, says the pills are passed around among students who want to get up for the big test or the big game.

AGRESTI: It enhances sports performance, there's no question about it.

WEISS: It's definitely -- it definitely has to do with being competitive.

ALTMAN: From the locker room to the library, the competition is intense.

FAUST: I would have like little panic attacks about oh my gosh, how am I going to get all the studying done?

AGRESTI: Ritalin is addicting. It will destroy that individual. Paranoia, psychosis, disorganization, impair decision making, impair concentration, inability to sleep, inability to eat. They will become grossly impaired at high doses.

ALTMAN (on camera): Abusive prescription drugs like Ritalin and Aderol is illegal, but students rarely get busted. In Sarah's case, she realized on her own that she had a problem and got help.

FAUST: Once I realized that I could go and take a test and study without the pill and that I would do fine, even better than before sometimes, it was like oh I can do this on my own now.

ALTMAN: Ally Altman, CNN Student Bureau, Boca Raton, Florida.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

"Where in the World" government type (ph) constitutional monarchy, slightly smaller than New Jersey, world's second largest oil exporter? Can you name this country? Kuwait.

WALCOTT: OK, well get your beach gear ready because we're heading to the water.

FREIDMAN: That's right, next week we're going exploring. We'll get the lowdown on all the best beaches then go offshore to visit a research vessel.

WALCOTT: That's right, and we'll also meet an activist whose life mission begins and ends in the ocean.

Our work for the week is over.

FREIDMAN: Have a great weekend. Bye-bye.

WALCOTT: See you next week.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com