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Former Ukraine leader calls for 'strongest means' against Russia if diplomacy fails
By Mick Krever, CNN
(CNN) - If diplomacy fails to persuade Russia to withdraw its forces from the Ukrainian region of Crimea, the world should apply the "strongest means" on Russia, former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko told CNN's Christiane Amanpour in an exclusive interview Monday.
Amanpour asked Tymoshenko if she was calling for the West to use military force against Russia.
She would not directly answer the question, saying that she "cannot solve this issue," but she issued an appeal to help Ukraine.
"I am asking all the world, personally every world leader, to use all the possibilities in order to avoid Ukraine losing Crimea."
Ex-prime minister calls on world to act
Yulia Tymoshenko, former Ukrainian prime minister, says "the world has to apply strongest means" if diplomacy fails.
Russia has complete "operational control" over Crimea, a senior U.S. official has told CNN.
This was Tymoshenko's first international interview since her release from prison just over a week ago, following a truce between then-President Viktor Yanukovych and the opposition. She spent
the last years behind bars on what the West called politically motivated charges.
Ukraine is just "one step" away from war, Tymoshenko said.
The Russian Duma, or parliament, has started debate on "the draft of the law of annexation of Crimea from Ukraine," she told Amanpour.
The Duma website confirms that a draft law has been put forward on defining the process whereby a country or territory can seek to be annexed by Russia.
FULL TRANSCRIPT: Yulia Tymoshenko
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: Yulia Tymoshenko, welcome to the program, thanks for joining me today in the midst of this very, very severe crisis.
YULIA TYMOSHENKO (through translator): Yes, I'm happy to hear you and very happy to participate in your program.
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Science and math are the ‘engines of tomorrow's economy,’ says astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson
By Mick Krever, CNN
Science, technology, engineering, and math will be the “engines of tomorrow's economy,” astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Thursday.
“I want to explore because I think it's fun and I like learning something different and new tomorrow that I didn't know today. But I can't require that of everybody.”
“So if you needed a pragmatic reason to explore, the best one out there is innovations in science and technology are the engines of tomorrow's economy,” Tyson, who is director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York, said.
“We've known this certainly since the Industrial Revolution. But even before then, those nations that invested in exploration and discovery would lead the world in almost every metric that mattered in anything that we call civilization today.”
NASA this week announced the discovery of 715 new planets, the largest single batch ever announced, by far. By way of comparison, about 1,000 planets total had been identified in our galaxy before Wednesday.
Neil deGrasse Tyson on new planets
Astrophysist Neil deGrasse Tyson speaks with CNN's about hte discovery of 715 new planets.
“It's not like they discovered them all last night and then it got reported this morning,” Tyson said. “They've been lined up for a while until the confidence in the detection was high enough to then present it all as one release.”
Four of the planets announced are in the so-called “habitable zone,” meaning they could theoretically support life.
“You could ask, are we alone? Is the solar - our solar system unusual? Is it - is it common? And that's one of the great questions we always ask about ourselves, and we've been asking it since we came out of the caves.”
Afghanistan should sign U.S. security deal, presidential candidate and former foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul tells Amanpour
By Mick Krever, CNN
Afghanistan should sign an agreement that would keep some U.S. troops in the country after 2014, Afghan presidential candidate Zalmai Rassoul told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Thursday.
“I hope and I'm confident that the zero option will not be an option,” Rassoul said. Leaving no U.S troops after 2014 is “not a good option for Afghanistan and therefore for the United States,” he said.
Rassoul, an establishment figure and former foreign minister, did not directly criticize President Hamid Karzai, who has refused to sign such a deal.
Afghanistan’s Loya Jirga, or grand assembly, has endorsed the security deal.
The Obama administration announced earlier this week that it had warned Afghanistan that it has started planning for a possible withdrawal of all U.S. troops by the end of the year if no security agreement is signed.
Rassoul said that he did not believe Afghanistan was at risk of breaking out into civil war, and that the Afghan national security forces are “well trained” and “ready to defend Afghanistan.”
Nonetheless, he admitted that they are “not yet well equipped.”
“They are suffering from that. They need better equipment, training and advice.”
Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson on climate change
In this web extra, Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson speaks with CNN's Christiane Amanpour about climate change.
Amanpour's full interview with deGrasse Tyson will be online Friday.
Two years after Trayvon Martin killing, human rights lawyer says America ‘burdened with a legacy of slavery’
By Mick Krever, CNN
Two years ago Wednesday, a black teenager named Trayvon Martin became the latest face of what many called racial injustice in America.
Martin was unarmed, except with a hoodie, when he was shot and killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer in Florida.
The assailant, George Zimmerman, a white Hispanic, claimed self-defense. A jury agreed, pronouncing him not guilty.
Of course Trayvon's case was hardly the first or the last such tragedy.
Just two weeks ago, again in Florida, a similar situation: a white man escaped the most serious charge of first degree murder after he shot and killed a black teenager in a dispute over loud music, of all things. Michael Dunn was convicted on three charges of attempted second-degree murder for shooting into the SUV holding the victim and other black teenagers.
The cases “reflect a continuing disregard for valuing people of color in the way that we have to if we’re going to recover from our history inequality and racial injustice,” Bryan Stevenson, a human rights lawyer and founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Wednesday.
“This country is burdened with a legacy of slavery. We enslaved Africans for over two centuries. From the end of reconstruction until World War II we terrorized and traumatized black people in America with lynchings and violence and racial hatred.”
“And because we never told the truth about all of those problems and all the difficulties that created, we never had the moment of truth and reconciliation that every country requires if it’s going to deal with decades of human rights abuse. We didn’t have what South Africa went through.”
Venezuela opposition lawmaker: ‘government has to choose’
Venezuela is in the throes of the biggest protests since the death of President Hugo Chavez a year ago.
People are outraged in the oil-rich country at record inflation, shortages of basic goods, and high crime rates.
Thirteen people have been killed since the demonstrations began.
CNN’S Christiane Amanpour spoke on Wednesday with Maria Corina Machado, an opposition member of parliament.
“The government has to choose: They make changes, profound changes, or they decided to repress,” Machado said from Caracas. “And what they have decided is the second part. They decided to a brutal repression in order to stop this civic movement.”
Click above to see Amanpour’s full conversation with Machado.
Putin phone call convinced Yanukovych to change attitude, says Polish foreign minister
By Mick Krever, CNN
A phone call between former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and Russian President Vladimir Putin may have been the deciding factor in the Ukrainian leader changing his "attitude" towards the protests in Kiev, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Wednesday.
Sikorski was intimately involved in the negotiations that brought a truce between Yanukovych and the Ukrainian opposition, and gave Amanpour an insider’s view of the talks.
“President Yanukovych left us several times to talk to [U.S.] Vice President Biden, [German] Chancellor Merkel, and indeed President Putin,” Sikorski said. “One of the breakthroughs was when we said, ‘Well look, Mr. President, you have to declare to the opposition by when you agree for new presidential elections to be held, by when do you intend to shorten your term of office.’”
“He was very reluctant, as you might imagine,” Sikorski said. “His attitude changed after one of the conversations, we think, with President Putin.”
Polish FM on Ukraine future
CNN's Christiane Amanpour speaks with Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski about Ukraine's future.
The end of innocence: Photojournalist documents child sexual abuse
By Mick Krever, CNN
It is hard to imagine – a three-year-old girl being raped. It is even harder to fathom the rapists being children themselves.
But in South Africa, not only is this crime shockingly common, it may be on the rise.
45% of rapes reported to the police in South Africa are child rapes, and 50% of South Africa’s children will be abused before the age of 18, according to South Africa’s Tears Foundation and the Medical Research Council.
For over a decade, photographer Mariella Furrer has worked to document these crimes with powerful photos and accompanying narratives.
She has compiled her work into a nearly 700-page book, “My Piece of Sky.”
Click here to see Furrer’s photos in large format
“Most child sexual abuse is unreported,” she told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday. “The most important thing about this body of work really is to try to get people to speak out about their abuse – to have the courage to speak out about it, because there’s a lot of shame and guilt attached to it.”
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