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Syria's Cease Fire Continues; 10-Year-Old Girl Rescued in Aleppo; Edward Snowden to Ask For Pardon from President Obama. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired September 15, 2016 - 10:30   ET

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


[10:30:00] CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining me. We begin with two incredible stories out of Syria: CNN following the heart wrenching tale of a 10-year-old girl who nearly died in a bomb attack. Arwa Damon walks us through her amazing rescue and shows us how she's doing now. She's live in Turkey in just a minute, but first the U.S. and Russia have extended a cease fire in Syria for 48 hours, but much- needed aid is still not reaching the people of Aleppo. Frederik Pleitgen has managed to get inside that war-torn city. He joins me now on the phone. Hi Fred.

FREDERIK PLEITGAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi Carol. Yes, and there's really massive destruction here inside Aleppo. I was just in one of the hardest hit neighborhoods, which is right on the fringe between rebel-controlled area and government-controlled area. It was actually in rebel hands until just a couple of weeks ago and then retaken by dominant forces. And I can tell you one thing, Carol, the aid is really desperately needed in all parts of the city. And through that area that I was in, that's actually supposed to be one of the main corridors to try and get aid to those rebel-controlled areas.

We were just on that main road, and over there you can't find a single building that has not been damaged or completely destroyed. We actually talked to a couple of children who were walking around there collecting tree branches to try and make a fire so their parents could cook them something or even make some tea. There's many people there who are living in houses that have been almost completely destroyed. We were in one family's home that what was actually the front of the house had been hit by a bomb and they're still inside that ruin because they say they have nowhere else to go. So being inside the city, being in Aleppo, you can really see the toll that these six years of civil war has taken on this country and of course specifically on its citizens(ph).

You know, Carol, people are even (ph) so happy that the cease fire is in place now, but of course with this war having gone on for six years. They say they're not going to get overly optimistic that it might hold, but they certainly hope that the U.S. and Russia can come to some agreement and continue to extend the cease fires and maybe make them more permanent. Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Frederik Pleitgan reporting live from inside Aleppo, Syria, this morning. In the meantime, out of the rubble in Syria, incredible stories of survival are emerging. Arwa Damon is in Turkey. She has that part of the story. Hi Arwa.

ARWA DAMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi Carol. And we do know that Syria is a country filled with tragedy, but it also has its fair share of heroes. Now this footage was shot by the activist group, The Aleppo Media Centre and we do have to warn our viewers that they may find some of the images a little disturbing.

[10:34:36] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAMON: Before the bombs, the siege, and the war, Mohammed Alaa Al- Jaleel was an electrician.

MOHAMMAD ALAA AL-JALEE, ELECTRICIAN: The plane dropped the barrel bombs.

DAMON: Before the death, the violence, and the hunger, 10-year-old Doha Al-Mohammed loved going to school.

DOHA AL-MOHAMMED: This stone that I am standing on used to be the roof of my bedroom.

DAMON: This is their story. Forever bonded together. For the last four years, Mohammed has been part of a volunteer emergency response unit in Aleppo.

AL-JALEEL: We know the area that was targeted was a residential area, where civilians lived.

AL-MOHAMMED: I remember that there was a plane striking when I was peeling oranges for my siblings. After that, all of a sudden the house was blown up.

AL-JALEEL: We were running, looking around, when we found the children who were thrown off the balcony onto the street. I looked back and saw Doha on the ground.

DAMON: She had gone unnoticed in the chaos until Mohammed happened to glance back.

AL-MOHAMMED: I was really afraid, my body was really hurting me from all the debris that fell on me.

AL-JALEEL: I carried her, running to the ambulance as fast as I could trying to save her life, as I felt she was still alive.

DAMON: Barely alive, drifting in and out of consciousness. Doctors were able to stabilize her, but her younger sister, Yasmin, ended up in Turkey for treatment. The siblings communicate by Facebook messenger.

DOHA: What are you doing?

YASMIN: I don't want to come back.

ABDULLAH, BROTHER: Why don't you want to come back?

YASMIN: Because there are air strikes. You come here, join me.

DAMON: But that is not an option for Doha and the rest of her family. Turkey only opens the border for medical emergencies. Doha says she feels lost, her life in pieces. And that is where Mohammed, her savior, comes in again. He has built a playground for children and created a sanctuary for stray cats.

AL-JALEEL: I felt like she was my own daughter, my own child. That I would all my life care about her. That's why every now and then, I check on her and I bring her here to my garden.

DAMON: It's where we hear her laugh, where in Syria's battlefield, a child's gleeful cries are stolen moments.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DAMON: And Carol, Doha's younger sister, Yasmin, has recovered all things considered fairly well. The family moved out of their neighborhood in Aleppo and are living in another apartment where they basically only have threadbare mattresses. The kids all still have that constant sense of fear that overshadows them and then of course there is the psychological toll of everything that they have been through.

COSTELLO: Arwa Damon, thanks so much.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:40:00] COSTELLO: Here's a look at your Money Market update. As you can see, the Dow is up in early trading after we've seen some wild swings this week. So, so far so good. We'll keep our fingers crossed. In other news this morning: A renewed push to pardon Edward Snowden. A day before the release of a Hollywood film that tells the NSA whistleblower's story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Must be special forces?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why do you want to join the CIA?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'd like to help my country make a difference in the world.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The average test time is five hours ...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: The ACLU with the help of two other human rights groups has launched a campaign asking President Obama to pardon Snowden. As you know, Snowden is accused of violating the Espionage Act, but Snowden argues his release of surveillance documents was not only morally right, but left citizens better off.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARD SNOWDEN, NSA WHISTLEBLOWER: This really isn't about me. It's about us. It's about our right to dissent. It's about the kind of country we want to have, the kind of world that we want to build. It's about the kind of tomorrow that we want to see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Joining me now to talk about this is Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney and the director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy and Technology Project. Welcome, Ben. Oh no. I don't think I have audio. Can you say hello to me, Ben?

BEN WIZNER, ATTORNEY AND DIRECTOR OF ACLU'S SPEECH, PRIVACY, AND TECHNOLOGY PROJECT: Yes, Carol. Can you hear me now? Are you not able to hear me?

COSTELLO: Oh good, now I can hear you. Yay. I can hear you now, terrific. OK. We just played something that Edward Snowden said. He said that he did what he did for the best of the country and that the country ought to understand that. If that's the case, why doesn't he come back and, as President Obama suggests, go through a trial?

WIZNER: You know, there's a problem with that. Edward Snowden has been charged under a 1917 World War I era law called the Espionage Act, and that law would not allow him to make his case to a jury. So he wouldn't be able to tell a jury of his peers that the disclosures and the work of journalists led to historic reforms, led to court decisions that reigned in the NSA, led to the first congressional action in 40 years to put controls on NSA surveillance, that the President himself convened a blue ribbon panel that recommended sweeping changes, that the former attorney general Eric Holder has said that Snowden's actions served the public. All of this would be not just irrelevant, but would be deemed inadmissible in a trial under the Espionage Act. He would effectively be reporting just for sentencing, not for trial.

COSTELLO: But is it realistic to think that President Obama would pardon Edward Snowden, when President Obama has made it very clear he thinks what Edward Snowden did was wrong and that Edward Snowden is a spy?

[10:45:05] WIZNER: Well, I actually don't think that President Obama has ever alleged Edward Snowden as a spy and I don't think anybody ...

(CROSSTALK)

COSTELLO: ... the Espionage Act.

WIZNER: ... believes that - well, let me say this. You have on your network all day long pundits who make predictions about what presidents will or will not do. I'm a human rights lawyer and what I do is instead of making predictions, I work hard to try to change the public conversation around an issue so that what's possible is expanded. Maybe today it seems unlikely that President Obama will act in what we consider to be the public interest and the global interest, but if there is a massive global campaign; if prominents, Americans, and world leaders; if millions of people around the world join this petition, I think that actually can change the possibilities here. President Obama has always said to people in my community, "Don't ask me to do something, make me do something. Organize and mobilize." And if this is the will of the public, the President will hear our voices.

COSTELLO: I think that some people might be a little suspect, or a lot suspect, of Edward Snowden because he's in Russia right now, which is not exactly the United States' best friend.

WIZNER: No, that's right. And I think unfortunately right now there's two places where Edward Snowden can be and the first is where he is today and the second is in a maximum security prison cell serving decades in prison and cut off from the debate that he helped to launch. It serves no one's interests for Edward Snowden to be in Russia. He didn't plan to be there. He was stranded there because our own governments canceled his passport when he was trying to transit through there. His being there is an unnecessary propaganda gift to a regime that has been adversarial to us and I think there are strong reasons, not just of justice but of national security, why the United States should find a way to bring him home with dignity.

COSTELLO: Ben Wizner, thanks for being with me this morning. I appreciate it. One NFL linebacker is taking hits in the wallet for taking a knee during the National Anthem. Up next: Brandon Marshall's plan to hit bac for charity.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:50:10] COSTELLO: Bronco's linebacker Brandon Marshall lost two endorsement deals after kneeling during the National Anthem, but that's not stopping him from trying to make a difference. Andy Scholes has that and more in this morning's BLEACHER REPORT. Hi Andy.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. You know, Brandon Marshall says he's going to donate $300.00 for every tackle he makes this season to an organization in the Denver community. Now this comes after he lost those two endorsements for joining his college teammate Colin Kaepernick in his protest of kneeling during the National Anthem over social injustice. Marshall said his intent was not to offend anyone but rather to simply raise awareness and create some dialogue for affecting positive change in our communities. And earlier this week he actually met with Denver's police chief to discuss his protest.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRANDON MARSHALL, DENVER BRONCOS LINEBACKER: I grasp more understanding of, you know, what they go through and, you know, the different trials and tests that it is to be a police officer and he kinda got my side of the spiel as well. And, you know, how some people are feeling as well. So I think it was a good meeting.

(END VIDEO CLIP) SCHOLES: Jets and Bills are going to hit the field tonight and it will be the first ever Thursday night game streamed live on Twitter. And, hey, you don't even have to have a Twitter account to watch the game on the site or app; just download the app and you're all set. You can also watch the game by going to TNF.Twitter.com on your desktop computer.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame announcing the nominees for the 2017 class yesterday and CNNs own Hines Ward among the finalists. Also making the cut was Donovan McNabb, LaDamian Tomlinson, and Chad Ochocinco. The class of 2017 will formally be enshrined next August(ph). Carol, you know what? If Hines makes it, I think he needs to invite me and you to go along with him to Canton for all the festivities.

COSTELLO: That is a great idea. And my parents live there. We can all go have dinner.

SCHOLES: Oh, it would be great. Let's just hope he gets in this year. There you go.

COSTELLO: Exactly, fingers crossed. Does it seem to you that the nominees are getting younger and younger?

SCHOLES: Well, either that or we're getting older and older, right Carol?

COSTELLO: I prefer to think the other way.

SCHOLES: Yes, yes, that's a better way to do it.

COSTELLO: Andy Scholes, many thanks. Still to come in THE NEWSROOM: Russian hackers strike again; the new athletes whose confidential medical records are now in jeopardy. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:55:10] COSTELLO: Checking for our top stories at 58 minutes past. Overnight in Columbus, Ohio, an officer responding to the report of an armed robber shot and killed a 13-year-old boy. Police say the teenager matched the description of one of the robbery suspects, and when he drew a weapon from his waistband, the officer fired and killed him. The teenager's weapon turned out to be a BB gun with an attached laser site. The family of Sandra Blanton confirming this morning they will receive nearly $2 million in a settlement of her wrongful death lawsuit. Sandra Blanton was found dead in her Texas jail cell three days after she was arrested for failure to use her turn signal in July 2015. The settlement also adds changes to procedures at that jail including having a nurse or EMT on all shifts.

The women pictured passed out in a car with her 4-year-old grandson in the back seat is heading to jail. Police say her and her male friend had overdosed on heroin. In court this morning, Rhonda Pesek was sentenced to 180 days in jail. She was also fined $280.00 on a child endangerment charge. Pesek was granted custody of her grandson just six weeks before police found her slumped inside of that car by the side of the road. Now the little boy will move to South Carolina to live with family members there. More Olympic athletes now revealed to be the victims of Russian Hackers. The World Anti-Doping Agency says ten additional American athletes were targeted by the cyber group Fancy Bears. Earlier this week, the hackers published information about four other U.S. athletes, including gold medal gymnast Simone Biles and tennis player Venus Williams. The agency has not named the ten additional U.S. athletes.

Thank you so much for joining me today. I'm Carol Costello. "AT THIS HOUR with BERMAN AND BALDUAN" starts now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: Hi everybody, I'm Kate Bolduan. A huge hour of breaking news ahead, so stay here. In a big day in the race for the White House we're watching two live events.