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Japanese Prime Minister Travels to Washington; Accusations After Kremlin Critics Falls Gravely Ill; Trump Attacks Nordstrom on Twitter; New Therapy Has Potential to Create Embryos from Skin Cells. 8:00-9:00a ET

Aired February 9, 2017 - 8:00   ET

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


[08:00:15] KRISTIE LU STOUT, HOST: I'm Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong. And welcome to News Stream. What kind of welcome will the Japan's prime

minister receive in Washington? We'll examine the relationship between Shinzo Abe and the new U.S. president.

Plus, Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee criticizes the president's attacks on judges

calling them, quote, demoralizing and disheartening.

And accusations in Russia after a critic of President Putin falls gravely ill. His wife speaks to CNN.

Right. Now the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is flying to the U.S. for White House

talks with President Trump. He'll be seeking assurances on security and trade under the new administration.

And during the visit the two leaders will take time out for a little golf diplomacy and heading to Florida where Mr. Trump has a luxury resort.

Now, President Trump has told aides he hopes to use golf and visits to Mar- a-Lago as ice breakers with foreign leaders. And it's only been a few days since U.S. Defense Secretary James

Mattis visited Japan and reaffirmed U.S. commitments there.

As CNN's Will Ripley reports, both the U.S. president and the Japanese prime minister have something to gain from a successful meeting.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Perhaps no world leader has gone to greater lengths to build ties with President Trump than Japanese Prime

Minister Shinzo Abe. He was the first leader to meet with Trump in New York after the election calling him trustworthy, also give Trump a

high-end golf club in his signature color: gold.

Now the president is returning the favor inviting Abe for a weekend of golf at his lavish Florida getaway and possibly a ride on Air Force One.

JEFF KINGSTON, AUTHOR: Abe is going to pull out the stops.

RIPLEY: Author and Tokyo Professor Jeff Kingston says Japan's leader needs a successful U.S.

summit. President Trump could also use a diplomatic win after recent tussles with top allies.

KINGSTON: Both sides have an interesting in trying to make this look good, a bromance.

RIPLEY: It wouldn't the first so-called bromance between a U.S. president and Japanese prime minister. In the '80s, it was Ron and Yasu (ph), the

fabled friendship between Reagan and Nakasone (ph). 20 years later, President Bush and Prime Minister Koizumi my bonded over American pop

culture.

President Obama and Abe never became close friends, but had a strong working relationship.

KINGSTON: It's all about the image, and I think that Abe has Trump's number. He understands that Trump is very petty and vindictive towards

those who criticize him, and he takes care of his friends. So Abe is going to be his best friend.

RIPLEY: Being friends reportedly includes bring Trump a multi-billion dollar proposal, promising massive Japanese investment in U.S. railroads

and infrastructure and potentially hundreds of thousands of American jobs.

Abe hopes the proposal will deflect criticism from Trump over trade, currency policy and

security.

Japan also wants to show China the U.S. alliance is strong.

In Tokyo, some are skeptical.

"Mr. Trump is such an extreme person," says this student. "I hope they don't end up talking in circles."

"I'm sure Mr. Abe has his strategy ready," says this IT worker. "Whether it will actually work on Trump, I'm not so sure."

The U.S. is Japan's most important economic and military partner. Whatever happens at the White House and on the golf course, friends and foes of both

countries, will be watching.

Will Ripley, CNN, Tokyo.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LU STOUT: And there seems to be a more conciliatory tone between Mr. Trump and Beijing. He sent a letter to Chinese President Xi Jinping on Wednesday

wishing him a prosperous year of the Rooster. He also wrote that he is looking forward to developing a constructive relationship that

benefits both the United States and China.

Now, this is the first official contact between the two leaders since Mr. Xi sent a congratulatory note after Mr. Trump's inauguration.

And China is responding in a similar tone. The foreign ministry praised Mr. Trump for his letter.

LU KANG, CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTRY SPOKESMAN (through translator): We highly commend President Trump for expressing festive greetings to

President Xi Jinping and the Chinese people. Cooperation is the only right option for the two countries. China will work together with

the U.S. under the principles of non-confrontation, non-conflict, mutual respect and a win-win attitude to expand cooperation, also to promote Sino-

U.S. relations to achieve greater development.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:05:13] LU STOUT: And that was the Chinese foreign ministry spokesman responding to Mr. Trump's letter.

Both sides are being cordial here, but Mr. Trump has yet to have an official call with President Xi.

Now President Trump is hitting back at Democrats, accusing them of misrepresenting comments from his Supreme Court nominee.

Now Now for more on the story, let's bring in Joe Johns. He joins us live from the White House. Joe, good morning to you. We've got to talk about Neil

Gorsuch. We have in him a Supreme Court nominee criticizing the president who just nominated him. All this in

relation to the travel ban.

Just how remarkable is this?

JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is a very remarkable, and in memory I cannot think of a situation where a nominee for the Supreme Court has found

himself at odds in one form or another with the president who nominated him for the job.

So this is going to have to play out here in Washington against the backdrop of what could be a

very contentious nomination and confirmation process.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: Judge Neil Gorsuch denouncing President Trump's recent attacks against the federal judging weighing his travel ban.

SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, (D) CONNECTICUT: After some back and forth, he did say that he found them to be disheartening and demoralizing.

JOHNS: In a private meeting with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal, the president's nominee to the Supreme Court slamming Mr. Trump's biting

criticism of the federal judge in Seattle who halted his order. Some Republicans praising Judge Gorsuch's comments.

REP. JASON CHAFFETZ, (R) OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE AND GOVERNMENT REFORM CHAIRMAN: It sounds like Neil Gorsuch might be a darn good judge. He's not

going to be politically swayed on one side or the other.

JOHNS: But Democrats...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a step in the right direction.

JOHNS: ...including Blumenthal himself are still skeptical of the nomination.

BLUMENTHAL: He has to come to the defense of the American judiciary, strongly and explicitly and unequivocally. Maybe he's moving in that

direction, but it has to be much stronger and more direct.

JOHNS: This as the president continues to lash out at the judiciary.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't ever want to call a court biased, so I won't call it biased, and we haven't had a decision

yet. But courts seem to be so political.

JOHNS: Belittling the three-judge panel set to rule any day on his immigration order.

TRUMP: A bad high school student would understand this. Anybody would understand this. Suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as

immigrants --

JOHNS: Mr. Trump also claiming he initially wanted to delay implementing the ban.

TRUMP: I wanted to give like a month. Then I said what about a week? They said, well, then you're going to have a whole pile of people, perhaps,

perhaps, with very evil intentions coming in before the restrictions.

JOHNS: The president is stoking fears about terrorism as he awaits the appellate court ruling.

TRUMP: Believe me, I've learned a lot in the last two weeks, and terrorism is a far greater threat than the people of our country understand.

JOHNS: His startling comment a departure from the messaging of past presidents who urged Americans to be vigilant and not afraid.

Meantime the president making it clear, despite pledges to the contrary, he's still looking out for the family business. Mr. Trump blasting upscale

retailer Nordstrom for dropping his daughter Ivanka's clothing line, tweeting "The company treated her unfairly," and re- tweeting it from his

official government account.

SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: For someone to take out their concern with his policies on a family member of his is not acceptable. And

the president has every right as a father to stand up for them.

JOHNS: But Nordstrom is pushing back, saying their decision was an economic one, solely based on performance, citing declining sales over the past

year.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: More on that controversy now involving the words of Judge Gorsuch. The president this morning questioning the credibility of the Democratic

senator who recounted his conversation with the judge. In a tweet, the president writing Senator Richard Blumenthal,

who never fought in Vietnam when he said he had for years, a smajor lie, now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him.

I did ask the administration's Kellyanne Conway if the judge had told the White House his words had been misrepresented, and she said she would not

comment on private conversations - Kristie.

LU STOUT: Yeah, yet another battle that President Trump is now taking on to Twitter. Joe Johns reporting for us live in the White House. Thank

you, Joe, take care.

As you heard in your reporting just a moment ago, President Trump has been going after the

retail giant Nordstrom for dropping his daughter's clothing line.

And for more on Trump and Twitter, let's go straight to Brian Stelter who joins us now live

from New York. And Brian, we have the U.S. president again using Twitter to lash out at Nordstrom for dropping Ivanka's fashion line. This has

raised a lot of eyebrows for a variety of reasons, but how are you observing this?

[08:10:14] BRIAN STELTER, CNN MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, Joe describing it really well there in his piece. And we have new developments in the past

few minutes, one of Trump's advisers, Kellyanne Conway, someone Joe just mentioned, she was on Fox News

saying I'm going do a free ad right how for Ivanka's clothing line. Go out, buy Ivanka brands. That - we're overusing the word unusual nowadays, Kristie, but

that is so unusual for a White House aide.

I think we all understand from the perspective of a father wanting to defend a daughter. Of course, from the respective of a dad, this makes

sense. However, your job as the president of the United States would supersede any role you have as a father and I think that's why a lot of

people are raising their eyebrows about this.

LU STOUT: That's right. It's not just a father on Twitter, this is POTUS on Twitter. In fact, even Senator Bob Casey, says that the tweet raises

ethical concerns and that the president should be referred to the ethics office for attacking Nordstrom.

Could the U.S. president be punished for a tweet for -- as a sort of misuse of presidential

power?

STELTER: This is the debate right now that ethics experts are having. I was talking with Norm Eisen about this.

He's a Democratic ethics expert who says this is something that violates the constitution, that

there are clauses against this. That's being debated I think vigorously. And it would be hard to imagine and Republican-controlled congress taking

action against Trump for a tweet like this.

Let's remember, Kristie, about three months ago when President Trump was elected, he said I'm going to be very restrained with Twitter once I'm in

the Oval Office. If I use it at all, I'm going to be very restrained.

That's one fact check we can very easily do and say turned out to do and that has turned out not to be the case.

LU STOUT: Yeah, that hasn't happened at all. And President Trump in the last month or so he singled out a number of companies on Twitter - Lockheed

Martin, Boeing, often causing stock prices to fall. But this is interesting, Brian, after the Nordstrom tweet went out, shares in the

retail giant actually rose. So what does that reveal? Are we at sort of a turning

point in Trump's Twitter strategy?

STELTER: Well, I'm not going to go that far. I think what we saw yesterday was a number of different factors. We saw a quick decline in the

stock price at the moment Trump tweeted. That was probably algorithmic saying, seeing trump tweet and trading as a result.

Then, you're right, the stock did go up all afternoon and closed up and had one of its best days in months.

Could that all be attributed to Trump, was it a kind of a blowback to Trump. Hard to say in that particular case.

We saw Intel also in the news yesterday thanks to Trump. The Intel CEO announcing a new job effort and Trump taking some credit for it. Every day

we're seeing companies makes these choices about whether to lean into the president or not. I saw one analyst quoted saying you're damned if you do,

you're damned if you don't when it comes to the president in his Twitter strategy.

LU STOUT: Yeah, he has moved markets and will likely continue to do so.

And Brian, a final question for you, why does Donald Trump continue to tweet about perceived slights to him and his family, whether it's Nordstrom

or Saturday Night Live or an interview on CNN? What is it about him and criticism?

STELTER: He is the ultimate counter puncher. That's the word he uses to describe himself. He said this during the campaign. He wouldn't be the

first to punch, but he will always counter punch and wants to come at you 100 times harder.

We are seeing that same view now as the president of the United States. And it's trickled down to his aides. Sean Spicer, usually a jovial

spokesman, known by every reporter in Washington and New York, now coming out there very hostile. They are being very aggressive

and defending what Trump said about Nordstrom.

There's an allergy to criticism from this White House. But the problem is, Kristie, as you know is, when you're the president of the United States,

you're one of the most criticized people in the world.

LU STOUT: An allergy to criticism. Well put. Brian Stelter reporting. Thank you, Brian.

Now, Twitter might be Donald Trump's favorite way to communicate, but not even the president can fix the company's financial problems. Twitter

posted fourth-quarter sales of $717 million, lower than forecast. Advertisers are spending less money on the social media platform. And

Twitter is also struggling to find new users adding just 2 million since last quarter.

As a result, Twitter shares have plunged 10 percent in pre-market trade. We've got more on this story in the next hour in CNN Money with Maggie

Lake.

Now, after the break, we will go to France where a brutal rape allegedly at the lands of police

has gripped the country. We'll be live in Paris after another night of violent protests.

And this well-known critic of the Kremlin was struck down by a mysterious illness. He is now out of a medically induced coma, but up next we'll hear

from his wife who says he was poisoned.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:16:58] LU STOUT: Coming to you live from Hong Kong. Welcome back, you're watching News Stream. Now kin Paris, a brutal sexual assault

allegedly at the hands of police sparked a fifth night of violence.

Now the victim himself is calling for calm after police arrested 26 people.

Riot squads filled the street while demonstrators set cars ablaze in a Paris suburb. They are outraged by allegations that four officers forced a

22-year-old man to the ground, beat him and raped him with a baton.

Melissa Bell joins me now live from Paris with the latest on this. Melissa, another night of violent protests in and around Paris. Tell us

what has been going on there?

MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, five nights now, Kristie, of this violence, not just in Aulnay-sous-Bois, which is the town in which this

happened last Thursday. The young Theo (ph), a 22-year-old aide worker, was asked for his identity papers. It's something that can happen to

anyone any time here in France. You're meant to carry your identity papers with you. That identity check, a stop and search essentially then turned

extremely violent.

Four of the policemen involved have now been charged with violence, one of them with rape. And that's led to this violence, Kristie, over the course

of the last few nights, not just in Aulnay-sous-Bois, but in a number of other towns in this department of Seine-Saint-Denis, which is just outside

of Paris.

Now, what's interesting today is that even as these four policemen are charged with these offenses, the French press is reporting that the police

report, because these men would also be the subject of disciplinary procedures by the police, as you would suspect, the police report, the

preliminary report into what went on, provides a very different picture than the one that the judge conclude on in charging the men.

The police in their investigation. They have looked at length at the footage are suggesting that this was not in fact rape, Kristie, but rather

an attempt to get this man who was resisting arrest to comply and that it was accidental.

LU STOUT: Melissa, tell us more about the victim. Who is he? And what is he saying about the incident?

BELL: Now he's been speaking out from his hospital bed, and shockingly he remains in hospital. His injuries really are very severe, particularly

those inflicted by the baton. He, though, speaking from his hospital bed has really shown a great deal of courage, calling for calm saying that he

loves his town and that he wishes to find it as he left it when he eventually gets back.

He's been visited advised by the prime minister, Francois Hollande, all of the main presidential

candidates because we're, of course, less than three months from the first round of the presidential election and most have condemned what happened.

Only the far right's Marine Le Pen, interestingly, has held off any condemnation saying we need to wait to get to the end of the judiciary's

investigation into precisely what went on. But there is a great deal of outrage here in France. And I suspect outrage that will only grow as this

discrepancy between what the police say happened and what the judiciary has so far found happened becomes more and more public. And this is something

that the newspapers are focusing on an awful lot today here in France - Kristie.

[08:20:16] LU STOUT: The victim calling for calm after five consecutive nights of violent protests and as you point out, outrage may be growing.

Melissa Bell reporting live for us from Paris, thank you.

Now, turning to Russia now, and a case that has doctors there baffled. A well-known critic of President Vladimir Putin became gravely ill while

visiting Moscow. It is not the first time it's happened to him either.

Ivan Watson reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

IVAN WATSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: In a hospital in Moscow, an outspoken critic of the Kremlin fights for his life. Vladimir Kara-Murza's

wife, Evgenia, says her husband fell sick with sudden and mysterious organ failure last week.

What is your husband's official diagnosis right now?

EVGENIA KARA-MURZA, WIFE OF PUTIN CRITIC AND ACTIVIST: An acute intoxication by unidentified substance.

WATSON: What do you think that means?

EVGENIA KARA-MURZA: It's poisoning.

WATSON: CNN cannot independently confirm this claim, but powerful supporters in Washington are speaking out because this is the second time

in just two years he has suddenly gotten sick.

MCCAIN: Many suspected he was poisoned to intimidate him or worse. This is why last week's news signaled another shadowy strike against a brilliant

voice who has defied the tyranny of Putin's Russia.

WATSON: Pure nonsense as the spokesman between the link and his illness. CNN's Matthew Chance spoke with him last year. The 35-year- old walking

with a cane due to severe nerve damage from his first illness which he blamed on the government.

VALDIMIR KARA-MURZA, PUTIN CRITIC AND ACTIVIST: It's a dangerous vocation to oppose Mr. Putin's regime. It's a dangerous vocation to be in Russia

today. But again, these are the risks we know and accept.

MATHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: At that time the Chechen strong man and close ally of the Kremlin Ramzan Kadyrov published

this video on his Instagram account showing Kara-Murza in the cross hairs of a sniper rifle. He could have stayed at his adopted home in the U.S.

state of Virginia where he's lived for years with his wife and three children. But he came back to Russia last month to promote a documentary

about the assassination of his friend Boris, an opposition leader shot dead in the shadow of the Kremlin in 2015. Were you worried about your husband

on this visit to Russia?

EVGENIA KARA-MURZA: I was terrified, not only on this visit. Every time he leaves the house to go on one of his trips, I'm terrified.

WATSON: She says the doctors are giving her husband a 5 percent chance of survival.

EVGENIA KARA-MURZA: The Russian government and President Putin are responsible for what happened to my husband two years ago and now one way

or another. The climate in our country is such that opposition figures can be intimidated, threatened, thrown in jail, shot and poisoned.

WATSON: Ivan Watson, CNN, Moscow.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LU STOUT: Ivan also reports that Kara-Murza is now able to breathe on his own, but he's not out of the woods just yet. He has emerged from a

medically induced coma, but his wife says he is too weak to speak and is communicating by blinking his eyes.

Now, the man you see here is also a high-profile Putin critic. And he is now banned for running

for president next year because of a criminal conviction. A Russian court has handed Alexei Navalny a five-year suspended sentence after his retrial

on embezzlement charges. Now, this disqualifies the opposition leader from his planned presidential bid. He says the verdict is, quote, a cable from

the Kremlin that says they consider us too dangerous to let us run in the presidential election.

Navalny is vowing to get the verdict overturned.

Now, in neighboring Ukraine, there is anger and suspicion after the mysterious killing of a prominent separatist commander. Mikhail Tolstig

(ph) was portrayed as something of a hero by pro-Russian rebels. He was killed by a rocket fired into the window of his office. Separatists blame

Kiev for his killing, but Ukraine's military claims the commander's own soldiers may have done it.

Now, whoever is to blame, Tolstig's (ph) death underscores the escalating violence across the region. CNN's Phil Black takes us inside one

neighborhood devastated by the conflict.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The horrors of war aren't easily swept away. For almost three years, the front line in eastern

Ukraine has shifted close to and around the Nodeska Konyeshenko's (ph) home. She fled as shelling crept closer. Minutes later, the windows

exploded and a shower of broken glass as shrapnel torture the building

Her daughter, Delina Ytsikova (ph) shows me what she calls a gift, a fragment of the large explosive projectile that landed just outside. This

neighborhood in Avdiivka is scarred by war. Residents know the shells falling here are fired by pro-Russian separatists.

The fighters American President Donald Trump recently said may not be taking orders from Moscow. Few here believe that to be true.

Delina says, "I hope the American people will never experience something like this."

On the same street, we meet Vlad Huskov (ph). The 5-year-old beams proudly when he shows us his puppies. But his face darkens when he talks about the

war and fear he's lived with for most of his life.

Vlad (ph) says when the shooting gets close, he and his mother hide in a room with no windows. They hold each other, and he prays. "Save us, God.

Please rescue us."

The war is a constant presence on these streets, one that forces children to stay inside. Marika and her brother Danilo (Ph) are often kept from

school. Their mother (Inaudible) tells me after the most recent shelling, Marika is too scared to be left in a room alone.

[08:26:31] CLEKSII SAVKEVICH, FATHER: It's like roulette, yes? When the shell can hit your house and it's very dangerous for the psychology of

children.

BLACK: Homes are shelled here. Their owners are often too poor to pay for repairs or move somewhere else, so teams of volunteers come to patch up

what they can. But there's no one to help with the unseen emotional damage inflicted on people every day by a war which has become an inescapable and

defining feature of their lives.

Phil Black, CNN, Avdiivka, eastern Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LU STOUT: You're watching News Stream. Still to come, a painful legal limbo. I'll bring you the story of a refugee family torn apart by

President Trump's travel ban.

Plus, a promising technology could one day enable humans to make babies without the need for

eggs and sperm. It's certainly taking the birds and bees to another level. We've got that story just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(HEADLINES)

[08:31:16] LU STOUT: While the world awaits a ruling from an appeals court on whether

to reinstate president Trump's travel ban, refugees cleared to come to the U.S. are hoping to arrive as soon as possible. Now, the state of Utah is

particularly familiar with this issue. It has a long history of providing sanctuary to Mormons fleeing persecution.

A Kyung Lah profiles an African family there caught up there in the current drama.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Nimo Hashi, is a broken wife without her husband. The mother of a toddler without her father. But on government

papers, she's a Somali refugee. Her husband, trapped in Africa and the legal tug of war over the travel ban. What is this back and forth in the

courts like?

"I went from being happy to confused and angry," she says. "sYou don't know what's real or not."

LAH: Are you worried he won't be coming?

"Until I see him at the Salt Lake City Airport" she says, "I won't believe it."

LAH: The last time Hashi saw her husband was in a refugee camp in Ethiopia. Both had fled the bloody war in Somalia. You were pregnant at that time?

HASHI: Yes.

LAH: The U.S. Resettlement Program brought Hashi to Salt Lake City three years ago. Just this year, her husband was finally cleared. But President

Trump's Executive Order slammed the door shut, halting all refugee entries for 120 days. Hashi's husband, stuck in Ethiopia.

ADEN BATAR, CATHOLIC COMMUNITY SERVICES, IMMIGRATION AND REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT DIRECTOR: Actually, when the Executive Order came up, all

these cases were canceled.

LAH: Aden Batar, once a refugee himself says 69 refugees from Iraq, Afghanistan and several African countries had entries cancelled into Utah,

many of them children.

BATAR: When you telling somebody their loved one is not coming -- I bet our president understand how that would be if he was told his wife was not

coming or his daughter was not coming. How would he feel? I want him to think of that.

LAH: But then, a 180, a Federal Judge suspended the ban and gave new hope to Nimo Hashi. Her husband's travel to the U.S. was back on. Refugees began

to trickle back into Utah days ago, greeted by hundreds of cheering Salt Lake City residents. Even Utah's Republican Governor instagrammed the

arrivals saying, "We welcome Utah's newest pioneers."

How is the Refugee Program working for your state and its citizens here?

GARY HERBERT, UTAH GOVERNOR: Very well.

LAH: Republican Governor, Gary Herbert, breaks ranks with fellow Republicans on the Executive Order. He supports a president's right to

review immigration policy. But from the governor's vantage point?

HERBERT: Refugees, as I look at, are mere people running away from bad circumstances. We've had some of that in our own culture. Maybe that makes

us a little more sensitive to this issue. Maybe a little bit more empathetic because of our own history in Utah.

BATAR: American airline, the flight...

LAH: Written in erasable ink on this whiteboard, Abdelsalam Ahmed. That's Nimo Hashi's husband. He's now scheduled to arrive on Friday where he will

meet his daughter for the very first time in person. Do you believe that it's going to happen?

"By the will of god," she says.

LAH: Kyung Lah, CNN, Salt Lake City, Utah.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LU STOUT: Now, Kenya does not have the right to shut down the world's largest refugee camp, that's according to one of the country's top judges

that. That court says closing the Dadaab camp would violate Kenya's constitution.

Now, this camp is home to around 260,000 people, some of whom have lived there for 20 years.

But the government believes the camp has been used as a base for the terror group al Shabaab and

says it is will appeal the ruling. If forced to close, hundreds of thousands of innocent people would be forced back into war-torn Somalia.

Amnesty International has praised the high courts saying this, quote, stopping the imminent closure of the Dadaab refugee camp is an essential

first step in respecting and protecting refugee rights in Kenya.

Now, Kenya and the international community must work towards finding alternative solutions for refugees, including local integration options.

And Somalia is one of the seven nations listed on Donald Trump's travel ban. And it has just selected a new president, Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo,

is also a U.S.-Somali duel citizen. He was elected by parliament on Wednesday.

Now, relations with Washington will be just one of the issues he faces. Somalia is one of the world's poorest countries and is battling al Shabaab

as well as other terror groups.

Now, a new technology could one day enable people to make babies from skin cells. It's already been done in mice. Now, hear my conversation with a

renowned stem cell scientist about the ethical implications of that breakthrough next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LU STOUT: Welcome back. Now, scientists are bring attention to a new advanced reproductive technology. It's called in vitro gametogenesis, or

IVG. And with this process, adult cells, like skin cells, can be reprogrammed to behave like embryonic stem

cells. And these can then can be stimulated to grow into eggs or sperm in a culture dish. Now, these so-called artificial gametes

are then used to form an embryo for implantation into an adult womb.

Last year, Japanese scientists revealed the birth of mice from eggs made from parents' skin

cells. Now, in theory the need for healthy human sperm and eggs could one day be bypassed all together. IVG could to replace IVF as a treatment for

infertility.

Now, George Daley is the dean of the Harvard Medical School. He is a pioneer in stem cell research. And he and his colleagues published a

paper recently about some of the ethical and legal questions raised by this new technology. And I asked him when this might become a reality in humans.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GEORGE DALEY, HARARD MEDICAL SCHOOL: Well, it's already a reality in mice. And we expect that there's no real biological distinctions between the

ability to generate gametes in a dish, whether it's mice, monkeys or humans. Now, it hasn't worked in humans yet,

but we anticipate that sometime in the future it will. And so my colleagues and I have decided to sound the alarm to raise the

issues of both scientific and ethical so that we can have a public debate and decide the permissible and impermissible applications of this

technology.

There's many ways that this new technology is going to teach us about human development, about reproduction and fertility and may give us new ways of

treating infertility. So the positive medical applications are tremendous and very exciting.

LU STOUT: As a scientist, I can tell that you're very excited about this upcoming breakthrough about what could happen next. You also express that

you're conscious and aware of the ethical implications of this. So have you been able to game out in your mind sort of the unintended negative

consequences of this technology and how to avoid that?

[08:40:20] DALEY: Well, if we think back 40 years, this debate also started around the time of the birth of Baby Louise Brown, the world's

first test tube baby, born from in vitro fertilization. What was anticipated at that time, and concerns were raised, was that human

reproduction might become commodified, that we would have really large- scale reproduction in a dish.

We also raised concern at that time, and once again, for coupling gene editing technologies in a way that would allow us to create human

enhancements. Now, with advances in gene editing technologies, especially a very feasible one called crisper, we now have remarkable capability of

going in and editing genes.

Now, of course this, could be done once again to eradicate disease, but what is I think more concerning for individuals is whether or not we would

use gene editing for human enhancement. It could start with something as simple as influencing your offspring's height or eye color, but what if we

learned to be able to manipulate things like learning and memory? Then it becomes more of a

concern as to whether the technology will be used only by the privileged few or be available more globally.

LU STOUT: You know, scientists today have access to some pretty powerful technologies. In this era though among the public there is a rising rather

lack of trust in experts, a lack of trust in scientists. Do you fear of a public backlash due to this kind of

research?

DALEY: Well, I certainly hope not. I feel very strongly that science is one of the last

bastions of truth-telling. Our goal is really to be transparent, open and candid about both the medical

opportunities and the ethical challenges. I think by scientists coming forward and engaging actively

with ethicists and members of the public, we will win the kind of confidence that we need to be sure that these new technologies are used for

human good.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LU STOUT: Science is one of the last bastions of truth-telling. That was part of our conversation with George Daley, dean of the Harvard Medical

School. Now, Daley and his colleagues raise the prospect of same-sex couples being able have

biological children or a person infertile, say, from cancer treatments also having a chance at biological children.

And that is News Stream. I'm Kristie Lu Stout. But don't go anywhere. World Sport with Alex Thomas is next.

END