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Connect the World

Gang Rape Video Shocks Nation of South Africa; Civil Unrest In Bahrain Greets Formula 1; Austerity Protests Across Spain; Jeremy Lin Heads to Houston; Rafael Nadal Out of Olympics

Aired July 19, 2012 - 16:00   ET

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

BECKY ANDERSON, HOST: Tonight on Connect the World, the teenage boys accused of gang raping a girl in South Africa and filming it for all to see.

ANNOUNCER: Live from CNN London this is Connect the World with Becky Anderson.

ANDERSON: Well, the allegations themselves are appalling. What's almost as shocking, the video went viral in a country where a woman is raped every 26 seconds. It's a further damning indictment, but will anything change?

Also tonight, as the UN accuses Syria of failing to stick to its peace plan, a warning that failure could lead to civil war.

And...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three, two, one now, one, two, three...

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ANDERSON: Up, up, and away, India shows off its military might. But just what is it trying to prove?

Violent, disturbing, and quite simply heinous crime: a shocking case forcing South Africa to confront the horrors of its rape crisis. Seven suspects have appeared in court in connect with alleged gang rape of a 17- year-old girl with severe learning disabilities. That in itself is pretty dreadful to hear. But what's even more shocking and gut wrenching is that they filmed, that is the accused attackers, they filmed the attack and it's gone viral.

CNN's Nkepile Mabuse kicks us off tonight joining us live from Johannesburg. And Nkepile -- I don't know what to say -- this is chilling.

NKEPILE MABUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is chilling. And rape is pervasive in South Africa. It's very common. But I think there are so many aspects of the story that have made it so shocking that it has really shaken this country to the core. It is just so tragic, Becky, so in your face, so public it's practically been impossible for ordinary people to look away, Becky.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MABUSE: They may look ashamed now, but police say when these boys filmed themselves raping a teenager believed to be mentally disabled, they proudly showed their faces. People have seen the videos say this girl, who we cannot identify because she's a minor, pleads with them to stop. They didn't according to police. And instead, offered her 25 cents.

The 10 minute long graphic cell phone clip went viral, leading to eight arrests. It's possession and distribution is illegal in South Africa, but some media organizations have seen it in the public's interest.

MANDY WEINER, 702 EYEWITNESS NEWS: What shocked (ph) me in the video was how relaxed they were, how they were candidly joking with one another, and they were spurring each other on (inaudible).

MABUSE: Police suspect the teenager who had been missing for four weeks had been turned into a sex slave.

Experts say a South African woman has far greater chances of being raped then learning how to read and write. But this particular story has forced the nation where rape has been described by some as a young man's sport to ask itself some serious questions about what kind of a society breeds this behavior.

Government ministers have taken a personal interest in the case, joining the nation in calling for justice.

NONHLANDHLA MAZIBUKO, PROVINCIAL MINISTER OF POLICE: We need to fight this scourge that is in our community. All those that are doing wrong things to women, they must -- they must be brought to (inaudible).

MABUSE: But angry residents blame a broken criminal justice system for allowing far too many rapists to get away with their crimes.

The boys have not yet pleaded. Using a popular African proverb, a local commentator opined that it takes a village to raise a child and the village has failed.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: Nkepile, I want you to stay with me just for the moment. I want to remind our viewers of South Africa's quite frankly appalling record in violence against women. This will really make you think.

In South Africa, a woman is raped every 26 seconds -- 26 second. As I read this, somebody else will be raped. More than one in three South African men admits to having committed rape, that is according only to the country's Medical Research Council. Over 66,000 sexual offenses were reported between March 2010 and March 2011.

These numbers will not surprise you Nkepile. You will know them. But they are shocking.

MABUSE: They are shocking, Becky. And shocking also is speaking to young men who admit to having raped women before. I mean, the way they speak so casually about this thing. I had a chance to speak to a group of young men. And this is what they had to say to me some years back, Becky.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think in situation we come through in life, you know...

MABUSE: You didn't see it as wrong?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I will tell myself that there is nothing I want in life that I cannot get even beautiful woman.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MABUSE: You know, a lot of people see the production and the distribution of this video and it's going public as really a turning point in South Africa. I'll just show you one newspaper headline, The Star is saying "A Nation's Shame" South Africa's disgrace, our barbaric monsters.

And for the very first time in a very long time, Becky, I'm hearing South Africans very far removed from this incident living very far from where this happened taking personal responsibility, Becky, asking themselves what kind of a nation makes its young people think that it is OK to act in this way. And already there are people that want to to take action, wanting to go into schools to reeducate young men that they don't have to be violent and they don't have to violate women to feel like men and to feel masculine, Becky.

ANDERSON: Yeah, all right, Nkepile, thank you for that.

Much of what Nkepile has been reporting, particularly those headlines reflecting tweets that I got today. We come to those first. CNN's Isha Sesay spoke to South Africa's minister for women just a short time ago. She told CNN the crime was abhorrent, but defended the authority's response. Take a listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LULAMA XINGWANA, SOUTH AFRICAN GOVERNMENT MINISTER: If the police in South Africa (inaudible) to get hold of this video, they were also (inaudible) to detain the culprits. They are now in jail. And they are (inaudible) our social workers have taken the girl as soon as she was found in the house where she was hidden. They have taken her to a place of safety. She has received medical attention. She has received counseling. I have just visited her, she is safe and in a home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: Pretty much the only reaction we got from the South African government today.

Lots of you reacting on Twitter. Keep your comments coming @BeckyCNN.

Keira says "nothing short of disgusting and reprehensible. How low can humanity go?"

This is a story which fuels such a mix of emotions, outrage, sadness. And it raises, as Nkepile was saying, tough questions about what kind of a society breeds people who conduct themselves like this.

Lisa Vetten is a lawyer specializing in rape, a top expert on this subject in South Africa. And a gender rights activist. She joins me now from Johannesburg. And as we talk, Lisa, tweets along the bottom of the screen here, people that are talking to me about how they feel many of those coming from South Africa today. Individual (inaudible) saying they are appalled.

Let's start, Lisa, with this case. The government minister you've just heard says the police were quick to deal with this case, but it was the mother of one child who was looking at this video that had gone viral flagging that story to the media that flushed it out. How seriously do you think the country takes these shocking crimes?

LISA VETTEN, LAWYER/GENDER RIGHTS ACTIVIST: I think what you see is a very mixed reaction. Clearly, there is a good deal of outrage, shock, and horror on the part of many South Africans, but at the same time anybody who could have watched the video to the extent that it went viral, clearly shows that their sense of outrage and their horrified sense of that woman's violation of her privacy and dignity is not necessarily shared by all.

So I think we see a (inaudible) in consciousness here.

ANDERSON: Nkepile showing us just some of the conversations she had with some guys in South Africa. And that was some years ago. And I want to give our viewers a sense of whether things are improving or not in your country.

If you take into account combined rape and sexual assault figures in South Africa, these numbers aren't going in the right direction. Take a look at these, from 2008 to 2009 there were some 54,000 offenses. 2009 to 2010, that number ticketed over to 55,000. And the following year, last year, over 56,000. That is over a 2 percent increase from 2009.

Lisa, what happens next?

VETTEN: Well, I think firstly we try to encourage more women to come forward and report, because let's bear in mind the figures you've just given us are really the tip of the iceberg. To me, their surveys put the number of women reporting of anything between as few as -- as many as 1 in 7 to a more recent survey which says only 1 in 11.

So I think quite clearly we need to get more people, more women being willing to come forward and report so more of those who are committing these crimes can be apprehended. And so the criminal justice system can do its job in terms of deterring this activity.

I think...

ANDERSON: Can you explain -- sorry, let me just stop you there. Hold on for one second.

Can you explain whether you think South African society is unique and if so, why in this indignity of crime that we see. Already you think it's just something culturally, you know, on a wider scale?

VETTEN: I think South Africa don't necessarily have the highest levels of rape in the world. That's quite a difficult thing to compare. But it's certainly right up there with those countries who do have some of the highest rates of violence and sexual violence.

I think there are very many factors in South Africa that have come together to produce the kind of horrifying figures that we do have.

I think first you've got to look at our history. There's a long history of violence. There's a long history of responding to conflict in a violent manner, of trying to solve problems through using violence. There is a long history of brutal oppression and subjugation, which I think has been in turn (inaudible) very many levels.

We also have, I think, a long history of patriarchy, of not recognizing women's rights fully, of not recognizing them necessarily as being full human beings in full -- and having all the rights of men necessarily do.

So I think...

(CROSSTALK)

VETTEN: ...history and then you look at the situation...

ANDERSON: Yeah, yeah, Lisa let -- we're running out of time here. I'm going to have to take an advertising break at some point to pay for the show, but let me just ask you very briefly do you see the South African government doing anything to improve what is an abhorrent situation?

VETTEN: Well, they now decided to institute a national council on gender based violence, which we hope will make a difference. But I think a key area in which we have to start focusing is strengthening the criminal justice system. At this point, the conviction rate is at 4 percent.

And then I think we need to invest very significant resources in protection, particularly those who are disabled and children as well as adults, and also start at looking at prevention, because we cannot continue to have these kind of statistics. We cannot continue to have this number of young men going to the criminal justice system. We actually have to work to try and prevent this in the long-term.

ANDERSON: Lisa, an expert on the subject this evening. We do appreciate your thoughts here on Connect the World.

This is CNN. Our top story tonight, abhorrent, disgusting, there are no words that really describe how our top story makes me or I'm sure most of you watching the show feel. Remember that awful statistic we mentioned, one woman is raped every 26 seconds in South Africa. Since Connect the World has been on air, that is over 26 female victims. Enough is enough. There is nothing we can do about the fact that this crime happened. There is an awful lot we can do, all of us, to try and prevent it happening again.

On Connect the World still to come, a new warning about Syria and civil war. We'll see how the world plans to respond with a peace initiative.

It's considered the last best chance ends in failure.

India as the country joins an elite group, but will a stronger power unbalance the region?

Know the difference between success and failure, we speak to the cricketer who thinks luck plays a big part. That and more just ahead. This is Connect the World. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANDERSON: Very warm welcome back. You're watching Connect the World. This is CNN. I'm Becky Anderson for you. Welcome back.

Now the UN secretary general says there's deeply troubling evidence that Syria is not complying with an international peace plan. Ban Ki-Moon cited reports of escalated violence and shelling of civilian areas. Reports at least appear in principle to match amateur video out of Syria today.

Western and Arab nations meeting as we speak in Paris where talk turned to a UN resolution that would allow amongst other things, "all means necessary," and I quote that to end the Syrian crisis. A significant development. We're going to have a live report on that in just about 15 minutes time.

First, it's some of the other stories connecting our world tonight. Anders Behring Breivik told an Oslo court today how he planned to kill the entire Norwegian government and decapitate the former prime minister with a knife. He said he originally planned three bomb attacks and a gun action, but had enough explosives, he said, to make only one bomb.

His attacks last July left 77 people dead. Today is the first day he entered the court without making a fist salute. Apparently, at least in principle, out of respecting a request from the family's -- the victims' families.

Media magnate Rupert Murdoch and his son James will give evidence at the British inquiring into media ethics next week. Rupert Murdoch, who is of course, the chairman of News Corporation, will appear for the Leveson inquiry on Wednesday and on Thursday. His son James will give evidence on Tuesday.

Now that inquiry into media ethics follows allegations of phone hacking at Murdoch's now defunct Sunday newspaper News of the World.

The chairman and CEO of Repsol says Argentina's government is unfit to lead the country and that Europe should force it onto the right path. Argentina has moved to privatize the Spanish company's Argentinian gas unit. This comes just days after it took control of Repsol's YPF oil division.

Speaking exclusively to CNN, the Repsol CEO and chairman said the decision was not in the public interest.

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ANTONIO BRUFAU NIUBO, CEO, REPSOL: The European authorities, not just the Spanish government, should true to force Argentina to come back to the -- to the right -- to the right road.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: Well, a video of the Iranian president being confronted by a crowd is circulating on the internet. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was touring the southern city of Baba Abbas (ph) when his car was mobbed by civilians, some of them angry at their growing poverty. A young women even managed to evade bodyguards and climb on top of the car. Earlier, an elderly man yelled at the president that he was hungry.

Those are your news headlines at this hour here on CNN. We're going to take a very short break. When we come back, though, with the Bahrain Grand Prix fast approaching, the crews experience just what they were hoping to avoid. Don Riddell with the very latest up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANDERSON: You're watching Connect the World live from London. I'm Becky Anderson. Welcome back.

On the eve of the Bahrain Grand Prix practice runs, the focus still on safety concerns after a fire bomb exploded and nearly Force India team members, the four mechanics were caught up in a clash between protesters and police on a motorway -- and this is a big story, it's one we've been doing for a couple of week now. Don Riddell at the CNN Center with more.

Don, what do we know at this point? This race is still on as we speak, right?

DON RIDDELL, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, what happened last night was exactly what everybody involved wanted to avoid, but it did happen. It was what a lot of people were worried about. These four Force India employees were making their way back from the track, back to the hotel on Wednesday evening and they got caught up in a traffic jam, because there was a confrontation between some protesters and the police.

A petrol bomb or a Molotov cocktail was thrown over their car. It exploded. And that, of course, created a pretty dicey situation for the guys in the car.

They managed to get their way out of it. They got back to the hotel. I've spoken to someone at Force India today who confirmed that they really were shaken up when they got back. And one of them said I want to go home. And someone else from the Force India team said I want to go back to Europe as well. So as far as we know they have now left Bahrain and will play no part in the Grand Prix this weekend.

Of course the authorities and the Bahrain International Circuit have (inaudible) and played down events, but I mean, that's a real wake-up call for the organizers of this event. And of course it was the big talking point in the paddock today.

The teams will be heading for the track for the first practice session tomorrow morning, on Friday morning. And of course everybody will be hoping there are no further incidents like that, because that was really quite frightening.

Force India have pointed out that they were not targeted in this incident. It was an unmarked car these guys were traveling in, but a scary situation nonetheless.

ANDERSON: Yeah, that context to the story, of course.

All right. Let's move it on, let's talk about tennis. Novak Djokovic, we know he's had plenty of emotional matches in his career. We've watched most of them. The one on Thursday, though, Don was especially tough, wasn't it?

RIDDELL: Yeah, this was really quite hard to watch at times. You know, we all know that Djokovic wears his heart on his sleeve, but I was watching this morning when he was warming up for his match at the Monte Carlo Masters. And he got a phone call to say that his grandfather had died.

Now his grandfather Vladimir is someone that Djokovic has referred to as my hero and a fighter. It's reported that they actually sheltered together back in 1999 when NATO was bombing Belgrade. And so they're very, very close. But he passed away right before Djokovic played a match today.

Now you would forgive Djokovic, or frankly anybody for pulling out of the match, but to his credit he came back onto the court shortly afterwards to play Alexander Dolgopolov and you could see what it meant to him at the end.

This was just after he played the winning shot. You can see him there looking to the heavens. And by now everybody in the crowd new what had happened. They knew what this meant. And Djokovic was frankly inconsolable.

But he came from a set down to win that match. It was a brave performance. A very, very impressive performance from the world number one. And we're all used to seeing him joking around and clowning around on the court. He always gives very entertaining post match interviews on the court, but there was none of that today. He left in silence.

And an ATP statement later on said that he was totally exhausted, physically, mentally, and emotionally. And who could blame him for heading off the court without saying anything after that match.

An incredible performance from him under the circumstances. No word yet, though, Becky on whether he'll be able to complete the tournament.

ANDERSON: Yeah. All right. Good guy.

Don, thank you for that.

Don back in an hour with World Sport, of course, as ever.

Still to come more Connect the World, officially still under a cease- fire, but reports of yet more people being killed in Syria with world leaders in Paris as they try to say what is a fragile deal.

India takes pride in a successful missile launch. It promises the world its intentions are solely defensive.

And talent may not nature may not -- according to a former English cricketer, luck can make all the difference between success and failure. That story still to come.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

* (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANDERSON: A very warm welcome to our viewers across Europe and around the world. I'm Becky Anderson for you. These are the latest world news headlines on CNN.

News just coming into CNN Center. A senior Iraqi army official Anbar province tells us the main border-crossing posts, along with seven other small security border posts, are now in the hands of Syrian rebel forces.

And we're also getting an update on a Turkish border post briefly seized earlier today by the rebels. Ivan Watson reports that the Free Syrian Army is no longer in control of that compound.

Western nations are furious that Russia and China have once again vetoed tough UN action against Syria. These vetoes torpedoed a new Security Council resolution that threatened sanctions. Russia and China say it was one-sided and could have led to military intervention.

Investigators are looking into a deadly bus bombing that left at least seven people dead in Bulgaria on Wednesday. Officials believe a male suicide bomber carried explosives in his backpack onto a bus packed with Israeli tourists. The Israeli prime minister says Iran and the militant group Hezbollah are behind the attack.

And Spanish workers are on strike. These are live pictures out of Madrid for you this hour. We've just come off these live pictures just earlier on today, in fact, pictures out of Madrid for you, the country's two main unions staging a walkout in response to new pay cuts and tax increases.

Those are your headlines this hour.

All right. Spain's EU bailout has been given the green light by German lawmakers. Members of the lower house voted in what was a wide majority to give Spanish banks money from Europe's bailout funds. And with Spanish bond yields topping 7 percent again today, that is a timely intervention.

There are more austerity protests in Madrid tonight. We're going to try and get you live there, now. Al Goodman is standing by for us. And we've just been looking slightly earlier in this show at thousands on the streets of Madrid and, one assumes, in cities all over Spain tonight.

AL GOODMAN, CNN MADRID BUREAU CHIEF: Hi, Becky. Well, an estimated 80 cities across Spain, of course Barcelona, the second city, right here in Madrid. This demonstration more than two hours old, and you can still see, the street is quite packed behind me, leading up this way.

Now, they're out here protesting the austerity cuts, protesting the economic crisis, protesting the high rate of unemployment, more than 50 percent for young Spaniards, like our guest, Alejandro Erquicia, 25 years old, three years out of university. What's it like trying to find a job in Spain, now?

ALEJANDRO ERQUICIA, JOB SEEKER: It's very difficult. There aren't job opportunities, and they aren't being created. They want to call us the lost generation, but we want to work. We want our possibilities to be out there.

GOODMAN: You are a dual-national, American and Spanish citizen. You've got a plan, what's that?

ERQUICIA: My plan is to move to the States, as many of my fellow generation, colleagues, we have to go abroad or go to a different country to find jobs there, since here they aren't being created. We have to leave the country.

GOODMAN: Becky, a tough road here for Alejandro and for many of the people here, surely some of them are among the unemployed. Becky?

ANDERSON: All right, Al Goodman in Madrid for you this evening. Protests there on the streets and in cities around the country, Spain struggling to convince investors it can pull itself out of what is this huge economic black hole.

Keep in mind, Spain is the eurozone's fourth-biggest economy, far bigger -- in fact, it's Europe's fourth-biggest economy, far bigger than Greece, Ireland, and Portugal, whose governments have been bailed out.

So, it matters what's going on there. Spain's borrowing costs once again rose today after the government went to the markets to try and raise some much-needed cash with an auction. The interest, well, I can describe it as pretty soggy, I'm afraid. Earlier, I spoke to my colleague Nina Dos Santos about that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Pretty soggy it was, Becky. Yes, they went to the bond market and issued another bunch of bonds here. We're talking about $3.7 billion-worth of five-year, two-year, and seven-year securities.

But this is what I want to show you, is that every time Spain goes to the bond markets to issue bonds, its biggest customer has a little bit less left in his pockets and the demand is waning, here.

Because a lot of these Spanish bonds actually end up inside the coffers of those Spanish banks, don't they? And those are the very institutions that need to be bailed out. So, again, we need to see governments like Spain issuing more bonds to bail them out in return.

And each time they go to the markets, the appetite gets a little bit weaker. That's one of the reasons why, although they didn't actually issue ten-year bonds, but remember, ten-years are the benchmark, that in a secondary market went up again to 7 percent.

ANDERSON: It isn't, though, the first time we've seen this crucial 7 percent level on the ten-year debt. But today, certainly, the institution investors around the world, the international investors, are looking to Spain again and saying bad bet. Why is that?

DOS SANTOS: Well, if you look at the 7 percent mark, it's not particularly significant from a numerical point of view, but it is an indication that this country is in trouble.

Because historically, what we've seen is that all of these countries that get above 7 percent, like Greece, Portugal, and Ireland, they stay above 7 percent. And the reason why, when it comes to the issue of Greece, is this.

If you take a look at the exposure to Spain, it is so much bigger for all these countries. Now, this is just a few of the many countries that are exposed -- whose banking systems are exposed to Spain and its banks, but if you take a look at, for instance, Germany, we're talking about an exposure of $146 billion.

ANDERSON: Versus -- exposure to Greek assets of -- it's quite a smaller amount --

DOS SANTOS: It is smaller.

ANDERSON: $13 billion.

DOS SANTOS: But herein lies the catch again, Becky, because remember that that figure includes a haircut. Remember that the Greeks imposed a 50 percent haircut, 75 percent in real terms, on investors.

And what investors have been telling me is that with this 7 percent profile we're seeing for the Spanish ten-year yield, people could be pricing in a similar scenario for Spain. It's a $1.4 trillion economy. It's an awfully big problem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: All right. Well, we're going to take a very short break, here. When we come back, good-bye Big Apple, hello Houston. Linsanity has a new address, and it is deep in the heart of Texas. That and your sports headlines up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANDERSON: Hello, 39 minutes past 9:00 out of London, I'm Becky Anderson for you. For pro basketball fans all over the world, but particularly in New York, Linsanity was fun while it lasted, but Jeremy Lin now has a new team, and it's down in the Lone Star State of Texas.

We talked about this last night, but I know CNN's just grabbed an interview with the boy. Why's he off down there?

PEDRO PINTO, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Well, it has a lot to do with the fact that the New York Knicks didn't want to match the contract offer that was given by the Houston Rockets, which is going to earn him $15 million in the third year of his deal, a total of $25 million for the three years.

CNN spoke with Jeremy Lin just a few minutes ago. He's going to hold a press conference down there in Houston to answer a lot of questions. One of the questions that our Mark McKay asked him was, why did you decide to leave New York and head to Houston?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEREMY LIN, HOUSTON ROCKETS GUARD: It's definitely nice to be able to have more job security, and I think -- the thing that I'm really excited about isn't necessarily X amount of dollars. It's the fact that I signed a three-year deal, so I get to play this game in the NBA for three more years.

And at the same time, I don't think it's all about money, but I think that at the same time, how much they put shows their investment and their belief in you as a player. I'm just excited for this opportunity to be able to play basketball and to be able to do it with this team and this organization.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINTO: Still very humble, Jeremy Lin. You have to take into account that this is a man who was no one just a few months ago. You'll hear a lot more from Jeremy Lin on World Sport in less than an hour's time, a full interview with him. That was just a little snippet of it.

ANDERSON: Yes.

PINTO: But as I was saying, Becky, this is a guy who came out of nowhere, started playing for the Knicks, became a sensation -- overnight sensation. And now in Houston, I think they'll build the team around him, while at the Knicks, they had just signed two other point guards, and he was a little unsure about what his role was going to be.

ANDERSON: This really is the American dream, isn't it?

PINTO: It is.

ANDERSON: And you know --

PINTO: It still happens.

ANDERSON: -- and like you said, a very humble guy. He's hit the big time, big time --

PINTO: He has.

ANDERSON: -- as it were.

PINTO: Now, he's going to get some big, big dollars, as well, to go along with that.

ANDERSON: Amazing stuff. We're going to have to -- what is it? He's been sharing a room with his brother until recently.

PINTO: Yes.

ANDERSON: He can buy his own flat, maybe. Or at least rent his own flat.

PINTO: He was sleeping on a teammate's sofa in the first week he was playing with the Knicks.

ANDERSON: That's unbelievable, isn't it?

PINTO: And now, I don't think he'll need to do that.

ANDERSON: No, he won't. No, he won't. Listen, you and I are looking forward to the Olympics just -- what is it? -- eight or nine days away, now, in London.

PINTO: Yes.

ANDERSON: One athlete who won't be here is Spain's Rafa Nadal. Today, just hours ago, pulling out of the event. Why?

PINTO: Yes, it was a little surprising. He released a statement saying he wouldn't be able to compete in London because of a knee injury. And it's an old story for Rafa Nadal, unfortunately for him. It's tendonitis in his knees, which flares up, he needs to rest, he needs to do physical therapy.

And today was just the cut-off point of deciding whether he had enough time to recover to be at 100 percent or not. In his statement, he said it was one of the saddest moments of his career, also because he was supposed to be the flag bearer for Spain in the Opening Ceremony.

He added that he didn't want to be selfish and come to London knowing that he wouldn't be able to win and denying the opportunity of a fellow Spaniard who was in better condition to play. So, it's definitely a big, big miss for the Olympics. A lot of tennis fans will be disappointed.

ANDERSON: Yes, and that's what he said today, and I buy that completely. And the guy's got to get fit. And when you're at that level, you may have to miss a tournament, I suppose.

But some people are tweeting today that he's not that good and grass at the end of the day. The Olympics, so far as tennis stars are concerned, isn't the biggest tournament in their schedule, as it were. And is he getting himself ready for the US Open? What do you think?

PINTO: I think that there are a few factors that might play into this decision. The first is that he's not at 100 percent. Let's take that as a given. We're not doubting that. The fact that he struggled at Wimbledon here last month, losing in the second round to a guy who was ranked 100 in the world, obviously played on his mind.

And the US Open is just a couple of months away. Just imagine if he would've come to London, he would've lost in the first or second round. The mental aspect of tennis is so important to these players that it could have taken away the confidence that he would have had for the rest of the season.

And as far as the gold medal is concerned, he won that in Beijing, so he's got that check on his list. So, yes, maybe he had more to lose than to gain by coming here and becoming not only more injured in his knees --

ANDERSON: Yes.

PINTO: -- but losing the confidence he needs.

ANDERSON: I don't doubt, though, he will be disappointed that he's not carrying that flag, because for any athlete, you and I know, that's such a big deal, isn't it, in the end?

PINTO: And he's an emotional guy. I've spent some time with Rafa -- I'm actually flying out to America tomorrow --

ANDERSON: Sure.

PINTO: -- going to spend some time with him this weekend, and we'll talk about this, I'm sure. Also about the rest of his season. He's such an emotional guy. He's so proud to be Spanish. He's loved helping Spain win the David Cup a couple of times that he'll be especially disappointed about that, I think.

ANDERSON: Yes, across Spain, let me tell you, I was in Manacor once during Wimbledon, I think, when he was having a particularly good tournament. You cannot move in the bars for those guys when you go in. He is the biggest thing, as we would say.

PINTO: Yes. He's a living legend there.

ANDERSON: He's a living legend. And what a good guy as well.

PINTO: Yes.

ANDERSON: Enjoy the interview this weekend.

PINTO: I will.

ANDERSON: I will see you Monday.

PINTO: Yes.

ANDERSON: Pedro Pinto in the house, back in about 45 minutes "World Sport" tonight. You're watching CONNECT THE WORLD. Four years ago, Beijing, of course, was all fired up. So, does the city still carry a torch for its Olympic Games? That after this.

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ANDERSON: If you've been with us all week, you'll know that you and us -- we have got our Eye on Kazakhstan. Let me get the camera right, as well. What is wrong with me?

Already the largest economy in central Asia and predicted to grow by another 6 percent this year alone, Kazakhstan is driven by exports of oil and metals, its great trade that most countries can only dream of, isn't it? And as Fredrik Pleitgen reports, it is now looking to boost its economy even further. Have a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(COW MOOS)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These are Black Angus cattle, but we're not in the Australian outback. This is northern Kazakhstan, where Maksut Baktibayev is breeding the animals to build a beef industry.

MAKSUT BAKTIBAYEV, CATTLE FARMER: Doing some livestock requires some kind of long-term investments and requires some technology and requires employees which are ready to work with you. But -- and this is the challenge we've got now.

PLEITGEN: A massive challenge in a country that has virtually no cattle farming infrastructure to speak of. In the days of Communism, Kazakhstan was one of the main beef producers in the Soviet Union. But after independence in 1991, almost all industrial cattle farming disappeared.

PLEITGEN (on camera): Kazakhstan's new cattle industry is still in its infancy, but the long-term goal is to make this an export industry. To do that, the country is building a stock of breeding cattle and a workforce to take care of them.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Most of the animals on this farm were flown in from Australia, Canada, and the US.

(COW MOOS)

PLEITGEN: They recently had their first calves, bringing the total number of cattle here to almost 2,000. And the farm has also imported some foreign help.

Jacob Schubert is from Nebraska in the US. An experienced cattle farmer, he's trying to help introduce western technology and methods of farm management.

PLEITGEN (on camera): If you had to say that this would be like the American industry, in what year would we be?

JACOB SCHUBERT, CATTLE FARMER: I would say about 1920. 1920s or 30s. But we do have a lot more potential to grow very fast here, because we can import the excellent genetics, we can import all the technology. So, we have the chance to jump ahead 100 years in -- what took America 100 years to do we should be able to do in 15 years.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Other factors also play a role, though, like the extreme cold winter. With temperatures dropping under 30 degrees below freezing, the Kazakhs needed to import cattle that can take extreme temperatures.

But the country has a long tradition as a farming nation. It's the world's 6th largest exporter of wheat, and fields are abundant in the vast plains in the north.

Kazakhstan has recently put in place a national plan to not only increase its agricultural output, but also the quality of the product produced here.

MUSLIM UMIRYAYEV, DEPUTY MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE: The main issue for us is the ternary. Because if we want to be an exporter, we have to be sure and we have to assure other countries that the ternary control and food security is proper in Kazakhstan.

PLEITGEN: People like Maksut Baktibayev are pioneers in Kazakhstan's new quest to become a cattle-farming nation. The government is helping him with easy, low-interest loans in the hope that these Black Angus might be the nucleus of a whole new branch of this country's economy.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Azat, Kazakhstan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: This is CONNECT THE WORLD. I'm Becky Anderson in London for you. From strikes to security shortfalls, the organizers of the London Olympics have certainly had their fair share of teething troubles, haven't they? But it does remain to be seen whether they will define the Games in years to come.

All this week, we've been looking at the legacies of past Olympics, from the bankrupting Montreal Games to the reinvention of Barcelona, and yesterday, Atlanta, an Olympics touched by terror.

Well, today it's the turn of Beijing, the last city to host the Games, of course, back in 2008. And as Stan Grant now reports, four years on, the Olympic spirit, it seems, is still going strong.

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STAN GRANT, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The eyes of the world were fixed right here. This is the fabled Bird's Nest, the stadium of the Beijing Olympics, a place of dreams that now hold so many memories. And four years later, the people are still coming.

GRANT (voice-over): "It's a memory that will last forever," he says. "It made China greater and stronger."

On giant screens around the stadium, those magical moments live on. The Grand Opening Ceremony, the lighting of the cauldron and, of course, those extraordinary athletes.

TRACEY HOLMES, CCTV ANCHOR: The Olympics brings you everything. There's great passion, there's great tragedy, there's a real sense that the world comes together.

GRANT: Tracey Holmes is a sports broadcaster for China Central Television. For various international networks, she has covered nine Olympics, Winter and Summer. She's doing here PhD on the Olympics and politics.

HOLMES: When people talk about politics and sport not mixing, well, I think they don't understand the Olympic Games. It's all about politics. And it's all about making changes in a country.

GRANT: China's Olympic Games was a political statement, she says. "One World, One Dream," that was the official Games slogan. But this was China's world, a coming out party for an emerging superpower. The cost of all this, officially $15 billion. Unofficially, three times higher, an expensive public relations campaign.

HOLMES: There were lots of negative images surrounding Beijing and China before 2008. And now, when you look at the images that are shown, it's of modern cities, it's of new infrastructure, it's of winning and glory and power.

GRANT: One of the winners was not even on the track or in the pool. Gao Xin was a sports marketing graduate who heard about the so-called green Olympics and saw big bucks. He formed an irrigation company, bid for the contract to water the Olympic Park and stadium, and found his fortune.

"It was a 30 million yuan bid, $4 million," he says. "Winning the project laid the foundation for our company." He now has contracts all over China, his company turning over millions of dollars a year.

All of Beijing's Olympic venues are still in good use. The Bird's Nest stadium is a tourist attraction, the Water Cube has been transformed into a water park, drawing people in the thousands. China is still celebrating. China's influence and power continues to grow. It topped the medal tally in 2008, the most dominant sporting nation on Earth.

But for all the glory, one painful image remains: the pride of China, at the time the reigning world and Olympic 110 meters hurdle champion Liu Xiang, limping off the track, crippled by injury. His anguished face is still beamed around the stadium.

This is China's unfinished business: Liu Xiang's bid to win the gold medal in London that eluded him in Beijing.

"I've come to see this stadium. I can see Liu Xiang running. Even though he didn't, I still feel he did. We Chinese are proud of this."

GRANT (on camera): So, the Beijing Olympics are really just a memory now. Of course, what remains is this magnificent stadium. The torch is being passed to London, full steam ahead, London 2012.

Stan Grant, CNN, Beijing.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: That's right. And seven days and counting. In tonight's Parting Shots, there's an old saying, you get what you pay for. Well, when it comes to getting a tattoo, it's probably wise to invest a little more.

Jerri Peterson had the rare honor of carrying the Olympic torch last month, a moment she says was so special, it was worthy of getting inked. When she arrived back in the US, she paid $10 to have "Olympic Torch Bearer" emblazoned on her arm.

No spell check, though, at that tattoo parlor, ending up as an "Oylmpic Torch Bearer," sadly, instead. She's a good sport, though, saying she's still laughing at the mistake. And there it is in all its glory.

I'm Becky Anderson, that was CONNECT THE WORLD, thank you for watching. The headlines after this.

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