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CNN NEWSROOM
Staying in Afghanistan Past 2014; Chinese Protest Censorship; Christian Students Push to End Modern Day Slavery
Aired January 8, 2013 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks to Ashleigh Banfield. And welcome to NEWSROOM INTERNATIONAL. I'm Michael Holmes, in for Suzanne Malveaux. We're going to take you around the world in 60 minutes. And let's get right to it.
The future of the U.S. troop residency in Afghanistan is front and center this week. President Obama expected to meet Afghanistan's president, Hamid Karzai, at the White House on Friday. Their focus? To make sure there's a smooth security handover to the Afghan government when NATO forces leave Afghanistan next year. Now, it's still unclear how many U.S. troops will remain to train Afghan security forces and focus on counterterrorism.
Our Chris Lawrence outlines the proposals for the transition.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The options are on the table. At the low end, a little more than 6,000 troops, mostly special operations forces hunting terrorists, with a small amount of training for Afghan forces. The 10,000 option would still focus on al Qaeda, but would add conventional troops to expand Afghan training. A 15,000 option would include even more conventional troops to go on limited patrols and give the Afghans even more support. Some experts say, forget that last option. 15,000.
STEPHANIE SANOK, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: It's not politically tenable in Congress. It's not doable of a budget execution perspective.
LAWRENCE: Analyst Stephanie Sanok worked in Baghdad and developed options for the Iraq drawdown. She says, between war fatigue and spending cuts, even the middle option may be a reach.
SANOK: My guess is you will end up closer to the 6,000 person option than the 10,000 person option.
LAWRENCE: Analyst Jeff Dressler argues the U.S. will still have to keep helicopter crews, medical teams and other backup for whatever troops are left.
JEFFREY DRESSLER, INST. FOR THE STUDY OF WAR: Just keeping 6,000 probably isn't that much cheaper than just keeping 15,000 because there's basic things that you need to have there just for the six.
LAWRENCE: Dressler says low ball options are minimizing the danger any remaining troops could face.
DRESSLER: I would argue that even with 20,000 troops, you're still assuming quite a bit of risk. It's by no means a low-risk option.
LAWRENCE: General John Allen presented these options in one of his last acts as commander. But General Joseph Dunford, the man taking Allen's place next month, admits he wasn't included in the talks over options. That could signal some tense fights with members of Congress who are skeptical of the drawdown plan.
GEN. JOSEPH DUNFORD, INCOMING ISAF COMMANDER: Senator, I have not been included in those conversations.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Boy, I -- that's -- that's interesting to me. The guy that's going to take over the command has not even been included in those conversations?
LAWRENCE: So what's the big picture goal? In an interview with CNN's Erin Burnett in Afghanistan, the defense secretary said terrorists just have to be defeated, not decimated.
LEON PANETTA, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I think that you can reach a point where you so significantly weaken al Qaeda that, you know, although there may still be a few people around, they won't be able to conduct the operations that they've conducted in the past.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: And Chris Lawrence joins us now from the Pentagon. Good to see you, Chris.
Now, former Senator Chuck Hagel, of course, just nominated for secretary of defense, he would obviously be part of this pull-out. He's a guy that was not in favor of the troop surge, has a controversial side to him in that regard. What do we expect from him?
LAWRENCE: Basically, Michael, wasn't in favor of the surge in Iraq. Not quite so critical of the surge in Afghanistan. It's a big difference. On the surge in Iraq, he called it one of the biggest foreign policy blunders since Vietnam. But Chuck Hagel was actually part of the planning for the Afghanistan surge under President Obama. He consulted with the president's national security adviser. And when he gave a speech shortly after that surge was announced, didn't have much criticism for President Obama. Said that he was approaching the situation very carefully. So that suggests that his position may be a lot more aligned with President Obama on Afghanistan than it was during the later years of President Bush.
HOLMES: Yes. Now, President Karzai, who he's going to be meeting him, he wants U.S. security personnel, obviously, to stick around after 2014. That's going to happen most likely. But he's also been highly critical of the actions of American troops in his country. How will the American military walk that line between, you know, pulling out entirely and still holding hands with the Afghan government and try to hang on to the fragile gains that they've made? LAWRENCE: It's going to be extremely difficult. President Karzai, just in the last month or so, has been extremely critical of the United States, not only saying that U.S. troops are causing a lot of the instability in the country, but really blaming the United States in its civilian contracts, its redevelopment contracts, for fostering a lot of the corruption in the country. So this is the environment in which President Obama and President Karzai will be meeting, trying to hammer out some agreement.
On the other hand, President Karzai would probably be well served by a larger U.S. presence in Afghanistan because the more U.S. troops you have there, the more Afghan soldiers they're going to train, the better equipped the Afghan force is going to be. So, again, this is going to be a really tough set of negotiations to see where that number falls. And I can tell you, just in the last day or a couple days, I'm hearing more and more that that 6,000 figure is way more likely than that 10,000 figure.
HOLMES: Yes, I suppose either way we -- numbers of troops is one thing, amounts of money is another. I mean the Afghan military that we've helped build up cost way more than the Afghan government is going to be able to afford. Their -- whichever way you look at it, it's billions of dollars still going to have to go in.
LAWRENCE: Oh, yes. Well, they're going to have to downsize the military. They were building up this Afghan military to sort of push back the Taliban. But it was always clear that at some point, you know, whether it's 2014 or '15 or '16, that that military's going to have to get smaller because the Afghan government cannot afford to sustain it and other countries simply will not put enough money into Afghanistan to keep those numbers at that size.
HOLMES: Good to see you, Chris. Chris Lawrence there at the Pentagon. Thanks so much.
LAWRENCE: Yes.
HOLMES: Well, there is a face-off erupting in China over freedom of the press. This is all happening in a place called Guangzhou, which is a little more than about 80 miles actually from Hong Kong. Now, in a rare protest, Chinese rallied outside the offices of the "Southern Weekly" newspaper. They were supporting the journalists there who say that the government rewrote an editorial calling for political reform and gave it a positive spin. A very positive spin, in fact.
Howard Kurtz is host of CNN's "RELIABLE SOURCES" and the Washington bureau chief of "Newsweek" and "The Daily Beast."
You know, Howard, in many ways, a lot of people would be surprised that they wouldn't be censorship of something like this. But this newspaper's had a little bit of rope in the past to play with. You know, why does this particular incident be a flash point now?
HOWARD KURTZ, CNN HOST, "RELIABLE SOURCES": It certainly has seemed to touch a nerve, Michael. I mean the idea of a few hundred people demonstrating outside a newspaper office doesn't sound like much to western ears. But in a country like China, where journalists can be and are thrown in jail for not towing the company line. In fact, Amnesty International says the highest number of imprisoned journalists are in China. It represents, I think, a sea change and a hunger for real news in a country where the censors control everything.
HOLMES: The four characters that actually make up the name of the newspaper, have actually been blocked from social media searches since Friday. It's not stopped it from blowing up, though, on social media. That's how it works, I guess.
We got a (INAUDIBLE) post from the actress Yao Chen. I want to show that to you. She quotes a Nobel Prize winning author by saying, "one word of truth shall outweigh the whole world." You know, we talk about how unusual these protests are. Also highly unusual for Chinese journalists to go on strike.
KURTZ: Absolutely. And at the same time, the rise of social media has enabled Chinese -- I wouldn't call them dissidents, they're people who love their country, but believe in a little bit more freedom -- to speak out, to have a megaphone because no matter how powerful the government is, they can't sensor everything. Although I did read just today that one popular blogger who has 6 million followers on the Chinese equivalent of Twitter had two of his posts taken down. So the government is kind of sticking its finger in the die trying to tamp this down and I think it goes well beyond the original editorial by this "Southern Weekend," which simply said we hope for greater respect for constitutional rights in China.
HOLMES: Yes. And Xi Jinping, the leader in waiting, has -- you know, he's vowed to crack down on corruption, for one thing. Of course, one of the ways to do that is to have an open media. Do you see that happening in the short to medium future, or is that a don't hold your breath thing?
KURTZ: It seems that sometimes the Chinese authorities loosen the reins just a little bit. Particularly if they're on an anti-corruption drive, they might allow stories about local corruption. But if you do other kinds of things, then that's not allowed. Newspapers have been shut down. People, as I mentioned, have been sent to jail. There are still negotiations going on with that newspaper that started this over what they can say in the future in the editorial.
So, you know, it seems to me to ultimately be a losing battle against technology on the part of the Chinese authorities, but the culture of censorship and government control is so engrained in Beijing that it's a very difficult tightrope for journalists who want to be able to report freely.
HOLMES: Yes, it's going to be a slow-moving beast, that's for sure. Howard, good to see you. Howard Kurtz there.
KURTZ: Thanks, Michael.
HOLMES: All right, here's more of what we're working on this hour for NEWSROOM INTERNATIONAL. Hundreds of Australians forced from their home by raging fires, fueled by a vicious heat wave. The worst the country has ever seen.
And a little later, you think slavery is history? Well, think again. More than 27 million people around the world are being bought, sold and exploited. And that group of young Christians is part of a larger group coming together to try to stop it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Welcome back, everyone.
Hundreds of people in south eastern Australia are being force out of their homes by bushfires. Those fires burning in the most highly populated Australian state, New South Wales. You see it there in the southeast. It includes the city of Sidney, of course. And the Australian Capital Territory, the ACT, in within New South Wales as well. That's where the capital of the country, Canberra, is.
One hundred homes have been destroyed so far. The officials say that the fires were fueled by record-breaking heat wave. Also some very dry conditions in December. This is the worst heat wave, actually, in New South Wales in living memory. Yesterday the hottest average temperature across the country ever.
Australia is, of course, the world's driest inhabited continent, vulnerable to bushfires. Every year you see them. But scientists are blaming creeping climate shift for even hotter temperatures globally. And, of course, that includes Australia. I spoke earlier with Matt Inwood, who is the superintendent of Rural Fire Services in New South Wales. Here's part of what he told me about the sheer size of these blazes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MATT INWOOD, NSW RURAL FIRE SERVICES (via telephone): Apparently we have just over 130 fires burning across New South Wales. Thirty of those fires at this stage remain uncontained. So fire crews are continuing to work throughout the night over here tonight making sure that we're certainly rendering properties safe and property protection mode on some fire grounds and establishing containment lines, which crews can back burn off as we start to see a cooler southerly change passing through particularly the south of the state at present.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: A desperate situation there. Winter weather is tightening its grip, meanwhile, on the refugee camps along Syria's borders. Those camps already struggling to keep up with the desperate need for supplies and shelter. People living in flimsy tents that were only meant to hold them through the summer, certainly not the downpours they've been seeing lately. People are even resorting to burning plastic for warmth in some cases. They can't find any firewood. It is wet throughout the camps. The temperatures are dropping.
Well, imagine enduring all of that as a child without your parents. Photojournalist Joe Duren (ph) captured a heartbreaking snapshot of life in these refugee camps in the words of an orphan boy. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): My name is Mar'ee (ph), the son of Ali Rajoub (ph). I'm 12. I'm from Azaz (ph). I have five sisters and five brothers. We have no electricity, no water, a shortage of everything. My mom and dad are dead. The fighter jet bombed him in Aleppo. My dad died there, then I brought my mother to Azaz where another jet killed her.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Heartbreaking stuff, isn't it? Joe Duran, one of our cameramen based out of Istanbul with that.
Meanwhile, an earthquake has hit just off Turkey's northwest coast. It was felt in Istanbul, also in other parts of the country, even in Athens, Greece. Right now, no reports of injuries or damage. U.S. Geological Survey says it was a magnitude 5.7 earthquake.
Well, he rules Venezuela with an iron fist, or he did. We're looking at what happens if Hugo Chavez can no longer lead.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Welcome back, everyone. Believe it or not, slavery still exists, very much so. It's here in the United States and very much in existence around the world. Well, Christian students met in Atlanta to push a global movement to end it.
Jim Clancy tells us about their cause.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JIM CLANCY, ANCHOR, CNN INTERNATIONAL: More than 60,000 young Christians from around the country and around the world held candles aloft in the frosty air, their own faces shined back at them from a massive cube set up outside the Georgia Dome, faces of those who have pledged to light up the world and put an end to human trafficking in their lifetimes.
BRYSON VOGELTANZ, PASSION 2013: Slavery is trapped in dark places all over the world. It's trapped here in Atlanta in the shadows. It's in the shadows in Mumbai, India. It's in the shadows in Cambodia.
It's in the shadows around the world in brothels and factories. These 60,000 students are going to shine a light on slavery.
CLANCY: For many, this is a journey of the Christian faith, one that brings them here to the Passion Conference to worship, pray, and learn.
For the past two years, they've been focusing on the unholy scourge of sexual slavery and forced labor, the 27 million victims, the billions of dollars churned out by robbing men, women, and children of their freedom.
These young men and women are determined to change that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Truth is spoken here and, where truth is spoken, things change.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're going to raise the awareness. We're going to fight for those that don't have a voice. And we're just going to tell people about it. We're going to let this world know that there's an issue and we're not OK with it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To just know that this is out there and, like, it just opened my eyes to all of this. Like, I had no idea this was really going on. And then, like, I just want to be able to help as much as I can.
GARY HAUGEN, PRESIDENT, INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE MISSION: The reason I'm so excited about this generation is that they have an understanding that they don't want to tolerate slavery. They don't want to tolerate mass atrocity in the world and do nothing about it.
CLANCY: Gary Haugen's International Justice Mission is just one of more than a dozen groups singled out by Passion organizers for support.
VOGELTANZ: This is about students starting a journey of justice, that their entire lives would count for justice. Their entire lives would count for freedom. And that's happening here.
CLANCY: Last year, the event raised $3.5 million. With 20,000 more participants this year, tablet computers were used to speed the donation process. Some of the money comes from the students themselves. More was raised in their communities. It will be used to help raise awareness, rescue victims and help them restore their lives.
These Christian students have all donated their money and now they're posing for pictures that will make a personal statement -- "We're in it to end it." Each and every one of them knows that human trafficking hangs like a darkness over the world, but they're making a personal commitment to being the ones to hold the candles to shine the light of freedom.
Jim Clancy, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: Impressive sight, isn't it? Want to continue the conversation now.
Twenty-seven million men, women and children are enslaved around the world. Yes, that's an accurate number. They're trapped in forced labor or they're being sold, exploited in some way or other.
Joining me now is Louie Giglio, the founder of the Passion Movement that is vowing to end modern-day slavery and what a noble cause it is. Now, we had here in Atlanta because this place was full of them, 60,000 young adults who poured in. They donated, I think it was $3 million for various causes for the freedom projects around the world. It's one thing to donate money. It's another thing to have a conference and talk about it. What's next for the campaign?
LOUIE GIGLIO, PASTOR, PASSION CITY CHURCH: Well, you know, Passion 2013 was a gathering of young people. That's the hope of the world, really. Eighteen-to-25-year-olds from 50 states and 50-something nations around the world came together to celebrate Jesus, the ultimate abolitionist, the original abolitionist.
And, in that cause, they wanted to lift their voices for those that have no voice and, so, not only did they raise money, that money is going to fund 23 projects with 19 partners here in Atlanta and around the world.
But they want to bring awareness to the nation for people who have no clue that this is go on and, so, End It Movement has launched and that's just simply a way to try to bring this conversation to the forefront so that everybody in America can know that there are still more slaves today in the world than at any other time in human history.
HOLMES: You talk to most Americans, you sit around the dinner table or down at the pub or whatever, people are going to say, what? Really?
GIGLIO: My wife and I got on the elevator because we live out in the suburbs of Atlanta, but we've been downtown for the conference, got on the elevator. I was wearing this hat from the End It Movement.
Gentleman on the elevator, as we're leaving the hotel, looks up at my hat. It says, "End It Movement" on the side. He said, what's End It Movement? And I went, oh, wow, I've got 14 floors to tell this guy what's going on.
And when I told him that there are more slaves today than any other time in history, he looked at me and said, you've got to be kidding me. And that's the response of the average person in this country.
And, so, EndItMovement.com is simply a way of partnering with men and women who are already in the fight, great organizations already in this fight, to say, we've got to open our eyes and we've got to begin to engage so that we can bring freedom to people around the world.
HOLMES: Awareness is obviously such a major thing, but also so is actual concrete action, of course.
One of the things that was involved, one of the organizations that you're partnered with, SlaveryFootprint.org, and what's interesting about that is it provides a way for people to see what their slavery footprint is, for want of a better word, because you can have one and not even know it.
GIGLIO: You can go to SlaveryFootprint.org. You can take your personal slavery footprint, depending where you live, what your income is, what you buy ...
HOLMES: What you buy, yeah.
GIGLIO: ... and you can see how many slaves work for you and that's part of the process of awakening people.
One of our partners is International Justice Mission. Gary Haugen leads this cause and he's such a great freedom fighter in the world. He said to the 60,000 of us at Passion 2013, awareness is doing the work.
So it's not an either/or. I should do something or I should become aware. Awareness is the first step to getting engaged in the process and anyone can go to SlaveryFootprint.org, one of our partners with End It, and they can see, wow, I'm contributing to this problem just by the places that I shop, the things that I wear.
I want to get involved. I've got to become aware.
HOLMES: Yeah, that's true. You know, it was announced, I think it was today, that you're going to be at the inauguration. Is that right, yeah?
GIGLIO: It was announced today.
HOLMES: And you obviously have a lot of influence with youth and Christian circles.
What about the White House? Because, again, passion, awareness, that's great. Action is everything. What about the White House? Engaged?
GIGLIO: Well, you know, last year at his National Prayer Breakfast speech in February, a year ago, the president mentioned what had happened at Passion 2012 because the voices of this generation, these -- what are called poor college students, giving $3.2 million or $3.3 million or $3.5 million in four days, that's a big message.
And their voice has reached the White House. It's reached a lot of streams of culture. And we pray the White House is listening, engaging and doing what they can.
It's not any one person or organization that's going to solve this. It's every one of us doing what we can at the level of influence we have to not only shine a light on slavery, but to end it.
HOLMES: Shine a light. You just led me into the next question.
There was that symbolic beam of light that took place at the conference. It could be seen miles away. We've got some video there. Look at that.
What was that moment like when that happened? I mean, it just -- the energy around this place -- and we were lucky enough to sort of feel it because this took place over the road from us -- was extraordinary.
What was it like being there?
GIGLIO: Well, I think there were three powerful pictures there. One, first, we stood in silence and prayed. That's solidarity and unity.
Second, the 60,000 on the International Plaza lifted a shout. You might have heard that in the building.
HOLMES: Heard it where I live.
GIGLIO: We prayed. It shook heaven and earth.
And then, third, this great beam of light representing our hope to shine a light on slavery shot three miles into the sky. I knew it was coming. Most of the people in the plaza didn't. It still took my breath away.
And it is that visual symbol, that Instagram-able moment, because you can't tell someone in four seconds what's going on with slavery in the world and human trafficking in the world, but you can show them that image of 60,000 little lights and one giant light, and that can begin the conversation of saying, we're waking up and we want to do something about it.
HOLMES: Yeah. I admire you and the energy and the work that you guys are doing and keep it up. Good to see you.
GIGLIO: Thank you.
HOLMES: Louie Giglio there, the founder of the Passion Movement. Quite an extraordinary gathering, too. If you're ever in Atlanta around that time of year, you've got to check that out.
Thanks for coming in. Appreciate it.
GIGLIO: Thanks for having me today.
HOLMES: And do check out CNN.com, by the way. Learn what you can do to help end modern day slavery. Just go to our website, CNN.com/freedomproject and you've got a lot of links to check out. Do drop in on that.
Now, let's talk about the love affair with guns. Often talked about as a uniquely American kind of romance.
We're going to take you, though, to Egypt where gun sales have been soaring since the Arab Spring revolution. Stay with us.
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