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U.S. And North Korea Race To Revive Trump-Kim Summit; Giuliani: Attacks Are Strategy To Sway Public Opinion; Former IMF Official Appointed As Italy's Interim PM. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired May 29, 2018 - 00:00   ET

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


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JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: You are watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. Ahead this hour, it went from 99.9 percent certain it's dead on arrival, but now it appears the summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un maybe back in business and moving ahead.

Plus, it's a day set aside to honor fallen soldiers. President Trump instead used it as an excuse to brag about the U.S. economy and himself.

A real-life Spiderman scales the side of a building to save a youngster, who walks away with quiet a reward for his efforts.

Hello. Great to have you with us. I'm John Vause. This is now the first of three hours of NEWSROOM LA.

Well, the summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un (inaudible) that is on again. Negotiators from the U.S. and North Korea have been meeting at the Korean demilitarized zone and in Singapore to work out the logistics for the June 12th meeting.

U.S. officials described it as a high-stakes scramble with an uncertain ending. President Trump spoke by phone with the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday. They agreed to meet again before Trump's summit with Kim Jong-un.

CNN's Paula Hancocks is live in Seoul, South Korea at this hour. So, Paula, the on again, off again talks, it might be on again, but negotiations ahead of those those talks are not happening, at least, not happening today, which does not seem to be a good sign.

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, there is a tremendous amount of diplomatic activity at the moment. Planes flying everywhere. We are really just trying to track down who is where. What we know at this point there is a U.S. delegation that has met with a North Korean delegation in the DMZ, as you say.

I asked someone who is familiar with U.S.-North Korean relations whether they were meeting today. There were no plans for today, but potential for tomorrow, which is Wednesday local time. So, certainly, that delegation still here in South Korea and they are going to be meeting potentially with the North Koreans again. They are trying to hammer the agenda of this potential summit with Donald Trump, the U.S. president, and Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, which, of course, we still do not know for sure is going to be June 12th in Singapore.

But then when it comes to Singapore, there is also a U.S. delegation that's there at the moment. They arrived on Monday and they are waiting for a North Korean delegation. They are expecting to meet with the North Korean delegation.

And we did see Japanese public broadcaster, NHK, with footage of a North Korean delegation landing in Singapore. So, potentially all these moving pieces mean that for all intents and purposes this summit is going ahead.

The organization behind the scenes is certainly going ahead. That would be for logistics in Singapore. This site survey is making sure that the security is tight enough. So, as far as we are concerned here watching all these moving pieces, it would appear as though the plans are in place -- John.

VAUSE: Paula, thank you. Paula Hancocks there with the very latest on the logistics which she says moving ahead.

OK, let's go to Jasper Kim now. He is also in Seoul. He is an expert on conflict management. So, Jasper, thank you for with us. From what you've seen over the past week or so for both these leaders, Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un, who wants this summit to happen more, whose actions indicate they are the most to lose?

JASPER KIM, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR CONFLICT MANAGEMENT, EWHA UNIVERSITY: John, it's a great question. I think it really depends on the day. On certain days, it seems like Donald Trump wants it more and other days it seems like Kim Jong-un wants it more.

And obviously, it's back and forth, and I think each side is trying to do the same thing is basically answer this question, how does it maximize its bargaining power, its negotiation power?

And leverage that into the negotiation table as expression goes the battles won before it's ever fought into goes through a complex multistage negotiation as this is.

VAUSE: This reality TV type drama surrounding the summit itself, will it happen on time? Can the U.S. be ready? Should the president attend? Listen to the former director of National Intelligence, James Clapper. This is what he said over the weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: There is value having gone this far. There is value in meeting and greeting, riffing and grinning and just establishing a rapport. I think, yes, it would be important to have a summit.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: But are you concerned that the summit has become an end into itself simply if it happens, there will be a success. There is no longer the focus of what the summit is actually meant to achieve?

KIM: Well, that's the million-dollar question, what is exactly the success metric between these two parties and from the optics of the international community at large. I mean, I think at the minimum we say that it is just a media brief and it basically just deals with optics for the media then why would that not be a success in my estimation?

[00:05:04] Because what that does is it creates a relationship, a direct dialogue between these two top leaders that we have not seen the likes of before a modern history. Now whether in the future that lead to something that is even greater or not, well, who knows, but I think it's always better to speak with your counterpart, enemies or frenemies, whatever terms you want it termed and not to speak.

VAUSE: Well, if this summit does go ahead as planned much of the credit it seems should go to the South Korean President Moon Jae-in. Here is part of a report in the past few hours from the "Washington Post."

"Last week, however, Moon faced a setback. He was blindsided by Trump's decision to cancel the summit less than a day after the South Korean leader returned from a meeting in the Oval Office. Trump's action was discouraging and hurtful Moon's advisor said.

But recognizing the U.S. president holds the key to resuming negotiations remain committed to salvaging the summit, they said." And now to your point, the involvement here of President Moon hasn't still removed one of the problems that there is still this lack of agreement on what they are actually negotiating over.

You have President Moon sort of overly optimistic view on what they can actually get to, but (inaudible) there is no goal and no sort of roadmap on how to get there.

KIM: Yes. I think that's what this summit is actually going to try to hammer out, John. I think it's not the goal in of itself, but this summit will be the beginning of a future focus framework in terms of going forward in the multistage aspects of this negotiation about disarmament, denuclearization, whatever topics, economic assistance.

That there will be a process in which to go about talking about it, thinking about it, and negotiating about it. In fact, the definition of a negotiation is really based on communication process. The end result is almost sort of a byline.

So, I think that was important here. If we get a tangible, workable process, John, then I think we've got something here.

VAUSE: I just want to have that all fix into what the U.S. president has led everyone to believe as to what this summit could achieve because, you know, one, the issue of logistics, we have Siegfried Hecker (ph) a professor at Stanford University, who has been to North Korea many times and he's toured their nuclear facilities.

He published a report which says nuclear disarmament of North Korea could take up to 15 years and that alone is a timetable, which would seem unacceptable to the current U.S. administration.

KIM: Well, my view is (inaudible) that's the case 15 years, which seems like a long time. I think it's for 15 years and say 30 or 50 years of possible non-denuclearization. There's also a process in which that can be verified and so forth.

That's basically (inaudible) specifications and expectations of all the sides involved. So, 15 years, yes, it is possible, but I still think that's better than nothing.

VAUSE: Jasper, thank you. Jasper Kim there EWHA University in Seoul. Appreciate it. Thank you.

KIM: Thank you.

VAUSE: Joining us now, political analyst, Bill Schneider, a former senior legal analyst for us here at CNN. Also, the author of "Standoff: How America Became Ungovernable," which seems a very timely book right now.

OK, let's talk about it, Bill. A lot of stuff happening over the weekend, to do with North Korea. On Saturday, the president, he was in the Oval Office and if you listen to what he said the North Korean summit, no problem here, everything was on track, all on schedule. Listen to the president.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We are looking at June 12th in Singapore that has not changed.

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VAUSE: It has not changed except on Thursday, the president told all of us it was canceled. Again, in case you didn't see it, here it is.

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PRESIDENT TRUMP: Based on the recent statement of North Korea, I have decided to terminate the planned summit in Singapore on June 12th.

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VAUSE: OK, so he decided to terminate the summit. This seems to be, you know, a move straight out of the scripts of the Season 9 "Cliffhanger of Dallas" back in 1986. Check it out.

(VIDEO CLIP) VAUSE: Yes. Bobby is not dead. It's bad dream and that entire season never happened. You know, it's like Thursday it never happened for the present. I mean, why pretend that it seems that has been erased from time as far as this president is concerned, why do that?

BILL SCHNEIDER, POLITICAL ANALYST: Because he wants to show I am in charge here. I am in charge of this agenda. If the summit happens or does not happen, it is up to me. Not up to that guy, Kim in North Korea. I mean, some guy he called him names --

VAUSE: Rocket man, little Rocket man -- nuclear buttons and --

SCHNEIDER: That's right. He did not want to be seen as upon Little Rocket Man, (inaudible) call for the summit. What Trump is saying is if he does not behave, I'm going to call the whole thing off, and he did.

[00:10:07] And they decided, well, maybe we'll put the whole thing back on the agenda again. Trump wants to make sure he is in charge.

VAUSE: But there seems to be this kind of sort of denial of reality that it was at least for a day it wasn't happening. No acknowledgment now that it's back on.

SCHNEIDER: Well, they are pretending that if at all that didn't happen because it's now looks like is likely to happen, but Trump when he does a negotiation, it's his negotiation. He is the man in charge. You got two erratic personalities here, Kim and Trump, and it's very complicated to deal with that kind of personality.

VAUSE: I guess the Canadians and the South Koreans have a lot in common when it comes to their neighbors. There does seemed to be some agreement out there that, you know, all of this has come this far. So, it is better to go ahead with the summit than not. Listen to Senator Flake again from the weekend.

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SEN. JEFF BLAKE (R), ARIZONA: I would say a freeze would be better than we've had before. So, there is nothing wrong with saying, hey, they may not denuclearize then we can have a better situation than we currently have.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: So, Senator Jeff Flake, a Republican like many others are saying, listen, it's better to go ahead with the summit, get something, get some kind of deal than nothing at all. We'll have the current situation continue with threat of war and nuclear confrontation. Is this president capable of holding those kinds of negotiations with Kim Jong-un? Does he have the temperament, you know, to basically settle for less?

SCHNEIDER: Well, look, if the summit takes place at all, it will look like a victory for Mr. Trump because he is the first president to deal directly with North Korea, at the least, I think he will establish some channels of communication, not diplomatic recognition, not denuclearization, which will take a long time.

But he will establish a channel communication and he will get credit for being the first president to do anything like that with North Korea and now, it will be what he is looking for, credit.

VAUSE: Even though every other president, you know, since the '70s, the North Koreans have been throwing themselves at, trying to get this kind of meeting. I mean, it wasn't exactly, you know, a great master play to get this summit in the first place by the U.S. president.

SCHNEIDER: Well, the fact is this never happened and the optics of it will be very good. What Trump really wants is a Nobel Peace Prize, but that is not going to happen unless this summit comes up with something very substantial and I doubt that.

VAUSE: OK, well, Monday was Memorial Day in the U.S. with those who gave their lives to this country are remembered. So, the president sent out a tweet early Monday, "Happy Memorial Day. Those who died for our great country would be very happy and proud of how well our country is doing today, best economy in decades, lowest unemployment numbers for blacks and Hispanics (inaudible) 18 years), rebuilding our military and so much more, nice."

OK, there have been a lot of criticism. David From from "The Atlantic" seemed to sum it all up with this paragraph, "Trump's perfect of emptiness of empathy has revealed itself again and again through his presidency, but never as completely and conspicuously as it is self-flattering 2018 Memorial Day tweets.

They exceed even the heartless comment in a speech to Congress in the presence of a grieving widow that a fallen Navy SEAL would be happy that his ovation from Congress had lasted longer than anybody else's." Explain the outrage here over that initial tweet by Donald Trump.

SCHNEIDER: Well, the Democrats and the people who were outraged not just Democrats are saying is get over yourself. You know, he can't get over himself. He is I think clinically a megalomaniac. He is someone who has a very grandiose vision of himself, his power, it is all about him. That is a very dangerous thing in a president.

VAUSE: He seemed to put the me into Memorial Day.

SCHNEIDER: You could say that. Memorial Day is a solemn occasion which remember those made the ultimate sacrifice, and to use it as an excuse for self-congratulation really is outrageous.

VAUSE: And speaking about rage, maybe the outrage was setting a lot of criticism and controversy after the president's lead Russia attorney, Rudy Giuliani, appeared on CNN with Data Bash again over the weekend and certainly laid out the strategy for the president when it comes to dealing with the Russia investigation and Robert Mueller.

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DANA BASH, CNN HOST Is this an intentional strategy to undermine the investigation knowing that they, the investigators, the special counsel's policy, not to talk, but you are very free to and are very aggressive about doing so.

RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: Well, I mean, they are giving us the material. Eventually, the decision here is going to be impeach, not impeach. Members of Congress, Democrat and Republican, are going to be informed a lot by their constituents. So, our jury is, as it's should be, is the American people.

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VAUSE: Some legal experts like CNN's Paul Callan believes that the strategy laid out here by Rudy Giuliani could actually be illegal, (inaudible) obstruction of justice. This is what Paul said.

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PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Normally what a lawyer will say is we are being fully cooperative with the investigation. We think they are wrong. We think they reach the wrong conclusion, but we will cooperate as the law requires.

[00:15:05] That said instead Giuliani says, yes, we are trying to undermine the investigation and they have given us the material to undermine the investigation. Now when a lawyer says that, it sounds to me like he's recommending an obstruction of justice. And I think Giuliani is getting perilously close to stating things that were unethical for an attorney to state.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: OK. So, we have the ethics here, but legal ethics on Rudy Giuliani, but talk the strategy here which the president is using essentially admitting that now into a PR strategy as opposed to some kind of legal defense strategy.

SCHNEIDER: This isn't about legal process. This is about politics. The president is rallying his base. He is mobilizing his supporters. He fully expects that if the Democrats take over the House of Representatives, he'll move very quickly to impeach him.

And it probably will do that because the situation wants them to do that. It will be very difficult to get a conviction in the Senate, but he's preparing the way, and if there is an impeachment by the end -- by the beginning of next year, it will completely take over the agenda for the next year. That is all we'll be talking about.

VAUSE: Yes. To get a conviction in the Senate, you need two thirds.

SCHNEIDER: Two-thirds and that's very unlikely.

VAUSE: OK. Let's face up on, you know, another odd treat from the president, which is sort of this, I guess, part of his overall strategy. This is the strategy of deflection, if you like, this is over his U.S. -- his policy of separating children and their parents, who arrived at the border and try to cross into the country illegally, maybe even seek asylum. Here's the tweet, "Put pressure on the Democrats and the horrible wall that separates children from their parents once they cross the border into the U.S. catch and release, lottery and chain must also go with it and we must continue building the wall. Democrats are protecting MS-13 thugs."

And there's a whole lot there, but essentially put pressure on the Democrats on this policy, which seems odd just as a reminder, this is what happened Thursday night November 2nd, 2016.

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Right now, a historic moment, we can now project the winner of the presidential race, CNN projects Donald Trump wins the presidency.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald J. Trump is the president of the United States elect.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have now confirmed that Secretary Clinton has conceded to Donald Trump.

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VAUSE: OK. He is the president. Republicans control both houses of Congress. What do the Democrats have to do with his policy that he's talking about?

SCHNEIDER: Nothing. And I don't know what law he's talking about. A law that the Democrats apparently sponsored to separate parents from their children. The closest you could come to that is an anti-child sex trafficking law in 2008 when the Democrats did have control one house of Congress.

The child sex trafficking law that will enable the government to take into custody unaccompanied children who cross the border, but that's nothing like the situation now. It's not clear that he's talking about any actual law. But once again this is a political strategy to mobilize his base and to blame the other side.

VAUSE: Very quickly, you wrote a book about how America is now ungovernable, how much do the tactics of this president feed into that?

SCHNEIDER: Well, he has a base that tends to be conspiracy minded. They think the rest of the country is out to get them. They feel disrespected which is why he won in the first place. They were angry because they are disrespected. And he's pursuing conspiracy theories to encourage that kind of belief.

VAUSE: In which no president has ever done before.

SCHNEIDER: I'd never seen a president do that, no.

VAUSE: Thank you, Bill. Thank you. Great to have you with us. Appreciate it. SCHNEIDER: Thanks.

VAUSE: Well, populists will not govern Italy after all at least not for now. When we come back, an interim prime minister is leading the country to new elections as the political uncertainty grows even bigger.

Also, ahead, the French president has a life changing offer for the migrant who scaled an apartment in Paris and saved (inaudible).

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VAUSE: Well, Italy appears to be heading for new elections after the populist failed to form a government. The Italian president has appointed Carlo Cottarelli, a former official with the International Monetary Fund as interim prime minister. For the next few month, he'll lead a country more than $2 trillion in debt and counting.

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CARLO COTTARELLI, ITALIAN INTERIM PRIME MINISTER (through translator): (Inaudible) to form a government as the president of the republic asked me to do. Naturally, I will do my best. I will go to parliament with a program that if it wins the competence vote will include the budget law for 2019.

After that, the parliament will be dissolved, and new elections will be called for the beginning of 2019. As a founding country of the European Union, our role in the union is essential, and our participation in the Euro is also essential.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: The populist coalition collapsed when the president rejected their Euroskeptic nominee for economy minister and now there are predictions the two leading populist parties could lead an even bigger victory in the next elections.

CNN European affairs commentator, Dominic Thomas, is with us now. Dominic, good to see you. We just heard from Cottarelli there. He is saying that he has a very modest agenda. He wants to pass a budget. He wants to keep the ship afloat until those elections which was scheduled for next year. Right now, that seems like he is the eternal optimist and there is always no chance.

DOMINIC THOMAS, CNN EUROPEAN AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Right. There is a lot of strategizing going on and I think that the choice of Cottarelli by Mattarella is about as far as he can go in playing this particular game. What fuels the populist parties and the far-right agenda is precisely this kind of administrative mechanism falling apart.

Of course, right now, the screaming and shouting and kicking, which is of course concealing their shortcomings and potential disagreements, but by picking somebody who was so unambiguously pro-European Union, pro-single currency and in favor of the austerity fiscal measures of the European Union is not only completely taken somebody that was diametrically opposed to their choice for a finance minister.

That forcing an election that will have to weigh in not only on the question of the euro currency but of European Union in a broader context and this is going to make the Five Star Movement and therefore, of course, the Northern League be a bit more articulate unless ambiguity on what they really want and expect out of the European Union.

VAUSE: This seems to be a pretty big gamble from a president, who I think who's been described as gray, a ghost, Berlusconi once called him a monk. I mean, this is a big gamble and you know, a big intervention by him.

THOMAS: Well, what we could argue is this is one potential example of the European Union fighting back here, simply allowing this far-right, you know, entity to enter into power with a group and movement that has no experience in political office was also profoundly irresponsible.

And their choice of economics minister was so far out of the real, his age, his experience, his position especially given, you know, you mentioned in the lead up, the financial situation of this country whose debt is on the level just below Greece is and a really important European economy with huge social problems and to have allowed that to go ahead is irresponsible.

[00:25:09] JONES: But what about the counterargument which we are hearing from the (inaudible) movement and you know, the others that essentially that this is what people wanted. I think the coalition makes about 40 percent of the vote if not more, you know, together you put the votes together that's democracy.

THOMAS: Right. But what Mattarella would argue is that that's not what people voted for in the case of this finance minister, which was essentially this kind of Plan B he invoked, which is to start strategizing about withdrawing from the European Union and the euro.

That's the argument that is being used. That's not what people asked for, yes, overwhelmingly more than two-thirds voted for anti- immigration positions, anti-euro currency attacking Brussels and so on. But there's a big difference between that and the Italian exit when the overwhelming percentage of Italians are still in favor of the European Union.

VAUSE: And he also wants -- Mattarella made this call, you know, there was some praise coming from essentially the defacto leader of the E.U., France's Emmanuel Macron. This is what he said.

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EMMANUEL MACRON, FRENCH PRESIDENT (through translator): I simply want to express my regards and support to President Mattarella, who has an essential task to carryout out of this country's institutional and democratic stability, which he is doing with much courage and a great sense of responsibility.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: How will that go down with those people who (inaudible)?

THOMAS: Well, Macron is an ambiguous figure so in terms of some of the major issues that impacted, you could argue that there all -- that this vote in Italy reflects the broader side of the European Union that there were two Europes.

There was the Europe of Macron and the Europe of Merkel which wants to move ahead with greater integration, standardization of policy across these countries although on the question of immigration, Emmanuel Macron has been very tough and problematic.

And that is course a major issue in Italy with so many people voted for anti-immigrant positions. I think what we are going to see here from the Northern League and from the Five Star Movement is they are going to do everything they can to build on this division to mobilize the electric around what they will call European Union reform.

So, not so much complete withdrawal from the European Union that we need to look at questions of austerity. We need to make sure European Union is helping us more with the migrants issue and so on.

And it's possible around that, they would be able to galvanize votes. However, many of the supporters of the Five Star Movement were disappointed at the idea of going into a coalition with the Northern League.

I mean, let's not forget that the Northern League represents essentially the north, which is wealthier, and the Five Star Movement represents the south where unemployment is above 20 percent and so on.

And so even within these two sorts of to move forward and to assume that the Northern League and the Five Star Movement are going to remain as potential coalition partners is problematic.

And we are always seeing some cracks thereto and let's not forget Berlusconi and Force of Italia, which is, of course, also making comments that sort of lean them towards the Northern League and to support there.

Ultimately, the leaders of the Northern League and the Five Star Movement both want to be prime minister -- that's what counts to them.

VAUSE: We're out of time. It's sort of makes you wish for the relative stability of Berlusconi and (inaudible).

THOMAS: Well, I think there's going to be some disruption in the next few months and the Italians -- there will be some heated conversations about how all this means and how it's recuperated by each political agency.

VAUSE: It's part of the upheaval we are seeing in so many places. Dominic, thank you. THOMAS: Thank you.

VAUSE: A short break. When we come back here on NEWSROOM L.A., the mystery endures, but the search for Flight MH-370 will not. More on that in just a moment.

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[00:30:00] JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: If you're just joining us, you're watching CNN Newsroom live from Los Angeles. I have - (inaudible) for staying with us. I'm John Vause headlines from this hour.

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Malaysia airlines flight MH370 disappeared more then four years ago and now the search for the missing plane is officially over. Anna Coren is live for us in our Hong Kong news room. So Anna for all intensive purposes it seems this search ended a very long time ago.

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes that's right. The official search January of 2017 but this latest search by a U.S. private firm, it ends today. With no result and for the families of the 239 people on board, as you say it has been an extremely long and painful roller coaster over the last four years. They still have no answers what so ever as to what happened to their loved ones. And they fear that with end of this latest search that this tragedy will just become another footnote in history.

COREN (voice over): A routine Malaysian airlines flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing would rock the aviation industry. And shatter the lives of the families of the 239 people on board. Flight MH370 vanished on the 8th of March 2014 less then an hour after takeoff. These were the last communications with air traffic control.

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TOWER: Malaysia 370 contact Ho Chi Minh 120 decimal 9, good ...

PLANE: Good night Malaysia 370.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COREN: Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah was flying the Boeing Triple Seven when it vanished from radar. Mounting speculation the disappearance of this ill fated flight was in fact a deliberate act. A massive search immediately focused on the South China Sea. But a week later tracking data released by Malaysian authorities reviled the plane had flown up to eight hours in the opposite direction before crashing in the Southern Indian Ocean off the coast of Western Australia.

One of the most challenging and exhaustive searches in history began. With the initial search zone roughly half the size of the United States.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not searching for a needle in a haystack, we're still trying to define where the haystack is.

GEOFFREY THOMAS: The loss of MH370 is the most bizarre mystery ever in aviation and arguably probably on of the most bizarre mysteries in any field at all.

COREN: In an Australian led search experts honed in on 60,000 square kilometers of sea bed. 2,000 kilometers off the coast of Perth.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If there is a plane down there you know we will see it.

COREN: Using sonar equipment and or autonomous under water vehicles they navigated trenches, volcanoes and under water mountains searching for a debris field up to six kilometers below the surface.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When looking for small features similar to something like this pixel.

[00:35:00]

COREN: Of more then a year into the search thousands of kilometers away debris from MH370 began washing up on the coast of Africa on an island in the Indian Ocean. As the underwater search dragged on the Australian Malaysian and Chinese government funding the $150 million dollar operation decided it had gone on long enough. Officially ending the search in January 2017. Devastating families all over again. Earlier this year a private U.S. company took up the search on a no find no fee basis. But after five months it too has failed to produce any results and is ending its operation.

JHANG HUI (ph), SON OF LOST PASSENGER (through translator): If the Malaysian government decides to end this search and there's no further search then I will be very angry says Jhang Hui(ph), who lost his mother. We can not accept this kind of outcome.

COREN: Sakayas Nurindren(ph) whose beloved wife was aboard MH370, he is also pleading for the Malaysians to keep searching.

SAKAYAS NURINDREN (ph), HUSBAND OF LOST PASSENGER: Do not give up the search. Stay focused on finding what really happened, finding the claim and finding the truth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COREN: Yes desperate pleas from family members searching for answers John. Now there have mixed messages from the new Malaysian government but the transport minister has come out saying that this needs to end. Enough is enough and there needs to be closure. Well the families members that we've spoken to as well as the aviation experts we have spoken to say that there is a moral obligation, a global responsibility to solve this mystery and find out what happened to MH370, John. VAUSE: Yes, I - with all those mysteries which we'll never know the answer too, at least not for now. Anna thanks you. Coming up here on Wednesday CNN's Nick Paton Walsh has exclusive access to an elite gang fighting police squad in El Salvador which includes former members of a controversial unit alleged to have acted as a death squad, take a look.

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NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's an undeclared war here in El Salvador. Elite police against MS13 have gang menace that beheads, rapes and terrorizes. And it's America's war too because president Trump has declared MS13 animals that must be eliminated. And these men are fighting with U.S. money and help. We're headed now to one of the scenes of the more prominent killings here deep inside gang territory. Carried out by what locals here say was effectively a police death squad.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: And you can watch the rest of Nick's reporting here on Wednesday starting at 5 A.M. in London, at noon in Hong Kong. Stay with us I'll be back in a moment.

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VAUSE: Every Starbucks in the U.S. will be closed for a few hours on Tuesday as staff receive anti-bias training. The giant coffee chain faced protest and accusations of racial profiling back in April after the arrest of two African American men at a Philadelphia store. The manager called police because they were waiting for a friend and refused to order. Starbucks' CEO promised it would never happen again. About 175,000 employees are required to attend Tuesdays training which will the focus on the history of racial discrimination as well as share some personal experiences. The rapper, actor and activist Common is one the e-virtual guides.

Well Europe is considering a ban on single use plastic such as straw, cups and plates. The European commission wants to ban 10 items that make up 70 percent of the litter in European waters and beaches. The proposal would make plastic producers pay the cost of waste management and clean up. A plastics group has said it supports the overall objective but they say more resources are needed to improved the collection of used plastic.

Well he rescued a child and changed his life forever. A migrant from Mali was in Paris when he saved the young boy. Take a look at this, a four year boy was seen dangling from a balcony while his father was out shopping. After the child's rescuing, Mamoudou Gassama who some are now calling a real live Spiderman. He scaled four floors from balcony to balcony, pulled the child to safety.

He says he didn't even think about it, that God helped him. Gassama is undocumented, but not for long Jim Bittermann has more from Paris. JIM BITTERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Looked like something out of an

action film. A young man scaling the outside of a building to rescue a child dangling in mid air. In fact Mamoudou Gassama, 22 years old, an immigrant from Mali who here kind of waiting to see whether he was going to get permanent asylum, just suddenly sprang into action. He said he saw the child and he just had to do something. Here's the way he put it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAMOUDOU GASSAMA, RESCUED CHILD DANGLING FROM BALCONY (through translator): We came here to watch the football match at a restaurant. I saw a lot of people yelling, cars were honking. I got out and I saw the child who was about to fall from the balcony. I like children so I will hate to see him get hurt in front of me. I ran and I thought of ways to save him, and thank God I scaled the front of the building to that balcony.

UNDIENTIFED FEMALE (through translator): How did you climb it seemed easy?

GASSAMA: I got onto of a door and I managed to pull my self up from balcony to balcony and thank God I saved him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BITTERMANN: Gassama a very humbly, kind of a divine intervention for his heroics. But it took a great deal of bravery to do that and president Macron said that this morning when he met him in the Elysee Palace He said bravo at the end of their discussion. And said that in fact Gassama will be given French nationality. The kind of brain that perhaps he had, it said that life expands and contracts with courage and certainly Gassama's life has expanded today. Jim Bittermann CNN, Paris.

VAUSE: Thank you for watching CNN Newsroom live from Los Angles. I'm John Vause. World Sports is up next, that's right after the break.

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VAUSE: You're watching CNN Newsroom live from Los Angeles. Ahead this hour, a high stakes scramble to keep a Summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and the North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, alive. U.S. delegates are in North Korea right now working to make it happen.

Plus the European Union's fourth largest economy faces a major political setback. We'll look at how a former IMF official could shake things up in Italy. And later, Disney opens up it's first Skywalker free "Star Wars" film, but "Solo," a "Star Wars" story comes in at the box office below what many had expected.

Hello and thank you for joining us. I'm John Vause