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Trump Offers to Buy Votes at Republican Midterm Convention; Anthropic Team Leader Warns AI Could Kill All Humans within a Decade; Houthis Try to Capture Key Yemeni Port of Mocha; UAE President Visits Germany to Discuss Several Deals; Call to Earth: Coral Farmers; U.S. Open Women's Singles. Aired 10-11a ET
Aired September 10, 2026 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[10:00:00]
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from CNN Abu Dhabi, this is CONNECT THE WORLD with Becky Anderson.
BECKY ANDERSON, CNN HOST (voice-over): And welcome to the second hour of the show from our Middle East programming headquarters. I'm Becky Anderson
in Abu Dhabi, where the time is 6:00 in the evening.
Donald Trump promises a big check to Americans if Republicans win the midterm elections in an effort to sway voters. The president said he would
give every American citizen $5,000.
And tech executives are, quote, "gambling with our lives."
CNN spoke with a former Anthropic employee who quit over safety concerns. We will discuss his warnings.
And CNN gets exclusive access to the Yemeni island of Perim right now at the center of the escalating conflict between Iran's most powerful regional
proxy and Saudi-backed Yemeni forces.
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ANDERSON: President Donald Trump, he now says he expects a war with Iran will end after the midterm elections in November and that oil prices will
go down as soon as the U.S. wins. But for now, there does seem to be little relief in sight as prices continue to climb. Brent crude moving higher.
Once again, of course, that is the global oil benchmark, trading at $104.72. WTI, the U.S. benchmark, at just shy of $100. Well, Americans
feeling the squeeze from flaring oil prices. And amid growing dissatisfaction with his administration's agenda, Trump, it seems, trying a
new tactic to entice voters.
Speaking Wednesday night at the opening of the Republicans' midterm convention, as they are calling it, in Dallas, he made this extraordinary
pitch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Here is my promise. If the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our
economic tremendous economic success, like in history, we've never had anything like what's happening.
But because of our tremendous strength and success economically, I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for
$5,000.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: And if the promise of potentially getting paid wasn't enough, president Trump also made this appeal to American voters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: So please, I ask you this as maybe more important even than the Trump dividend. Please pretend that I'm running and get out and vote on
November 3rd or sooner. Because in actuality, I really am running.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: Well, I spoke to CNN senior White House reporter Kevin Liptak last hour about president Trump's promises and how those so-called Trump
dividends might be paid for. Have a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: We did hear shortly after the president was speaking from the vice president JD Vance. He also was sort
of vague about the specifics of what this would entail because this would be an enormous amount of money.
There are around 270 million adults in the United States. So, if you gave each of them a $5,000 check, that would be about $1.3 trillion. So, where
that money is coming from, unclear at this point. And obviously, the U.S. is already in $40 trillion of debt.
And so, there are some real questions about the finances of all of this, but what JD Vance suggested is that this money perhaps could come from
tariff revenues.
[10:05:00]
Listen to what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We're taking in an extraordinary amount of revenue because the President of the United
States is actually standing up to both foreign companies, but also foreign countries who've been taking advantage of America's workers for pretty much
my entire life.
Those penalties have generated a lot of revenues. They've helped us pay down debt.
What the president is just saying is, if you keep it going to the American people, if you keep us in power and allow us to continue to do these
things, then you're going to share in some of the benefit of this incredible wealth that we're creating in the United States of America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIPTAK: Now, the revenues that the U.S. has taken in from tariffs don't come anywhere close to $1.3 trillion.
And remember, the U.S. has actually had to refund some of that money after the Supreme Court deemed the tariffs illegal. Now the other aspect of this
dividend plan that the president mentioned was that it would have to be spent in the United States.
He says he doesn't want to see it spent in Canada. He doesn't want to see it spent in Germany. How the federal government would actually track that
spending also very unclear. And I do think it's worth pointing out that this is not the first time that the president has promised to send checks
to the American public.
He said he would do that with the tariff revenue. He said he would also do it with the savings that the federal government got from the DOGE program
that Elon Musk was carrying out at the beginning of the administration. Those checks never went to the American people.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON: Daniel Dale, he's been fact-checking president Trump's speech and the 9/11 speeches this week.
Good to have you. Donald Trump made a number of claims during that speech in Texas on the economy. Walk us through them.
DANIEL DALE, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: And a lot of them were not true. So I'd like people to listen to claims he made about prices in the U.S. and
about supposed investment in the U.S.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We got eggs down lower than during my administration and food prices and almost every other item are rapidly going down. We have more
money being spent from outside countries and companies over $20 trillion. That's five, six, seven times higher than any country ever. Not just here,
any country ever
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DALE: So both of those claims are false. Egg prices have fallen in the U.S. since Trump returned to office. It is not even close to true that food
prices and every -- almost every other item are falling rapidly. The U.S. continues to have more than 3 percent year over year inflation, expected to
get another such report tomorrow.
Food prices continue to rise month over month and they're up 4.3 percent since president Trump returned to office. So just not true.
And then this over 20 trillion investment figure the president keeps uses - - keeps using is plain fictional. There is no basis for it. The White House itself can't justify it. The White House website claims there has been 11.2
trillion in investment under Trump. So just over half of what the president himself says.
And even that White House website figure, 11.2 trillion is a wildly exaggerated, also basically fictional figure. So a lot of inaccuracy from
president Trump on the economy last night.
ANDERSON: All right. Yes. And its really important to fact-check this.
On Tuesday, Trump, during a very important event for 9/11 victims, made some remarks about how he personally was supposedly lifted up and carried
out of a dangerous building by firefighters.
What do we know about the accuracy of that story?
DALE: So basically, all of it lacks evidence and some of it is outright misleading. The misleading components, I think he left the impression that
this supposed semi-rescue by these big, strong firemen happened on 9/11 itself, suggesting he was in a building near the Twin Towers of the World
Trade Center.
He was not down there on 9/11. He was miles away, kilometers away, at Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan.
I think he also suggested he was in this building that was thought to be unstable in the days following 9/11. There is no evidence of that. In
previous tellings of this story, he's made clear that he's situating himself outside, he said, not so far from this building, not inside.
There's no evidence that this firefighter rescue happened at any time. And then he also laid down this premise when telling the story that he had
personally organized a crew of his own corporate construction workers to go down to Ground Zero and help with the rescue recovery effort.
He said that before as well; 25 years later, there continues to be no evidence that happened. We know that Trump was in the vicinity of Ground
Zero. We know he was talking to workers, talking to the media in the days following the attacks. But organizing a search and rescue crew, nobody has
been able to find proof after all this time.
ANDERSON: Right. Got it. Thank you.
Well, now to the questions that really have had people talking this week.
[10:10:03]
Will AI kill us all?
Well, it's the question that we've all been asking after an Anthropic team leader said there was a more than 10 percent chance that it could wipe out
humans within a decade.
His comments came after an Anthropic researcher, a guy by the name of Jacob Coxon, quit, saying AI labs are gambling with our lives in their race to
self-improving intelligence. Coxon explained his fears to my colleague, Anderson Cooper. Have a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JACOB COXON, FORMER ANTHROPIC EMPLOYEE: Yes. So the precise scenario sounds a little bit like science fiction. It sounds like something that's
not real but I think it is frighteningly real and it's easiest to understand it if you think about real things that happened two months ago.
So two months ago, OpenAI agents, AI's, hacked into third-party infrastructure entirely at their own accord and this was like a
concentrated hacking spree that they carried out of their own volition.
And I think that if you extrapolate into the future, the level of capabilities of these AI's with the same independent volition, they could
cause extreme havoc. For example, hacking critical infrastructure, building extinction-level bioweapons. There's a lot of ways that the AI could
actuate itself in the world.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: We mentioned a former colleague of yours who currently works at Anthropic, basically endorsing the assessment that AI
could potentially kill everyone within a decade.
In a follow-up post, he said, to be clear, as we say in our latest risk report, I think the risk from present models is low. What I'm worried about
is superintelligence arising from recursive self-improvement.
As we've said, it's happening faster than we thought. I assume the recursive self-improvement is what you've just spoken about.
COXON: Exactly.
COOPER: Do you agree with him that the current models, the risk is low but it's just the speed with which this is now improving?
COXON: Exactly. I completely agree. Right now, there's no risk of extinction. The current models, the worst they can do is maybe hack into
something, potentially cause a lot of damages in infrastructure. But there is no -- they're not intelligent enough to outsmart us at the level that
would lead to extinction.
I think what's just crazy is to look at the rate of progress and there is a very real possibility that in the immediate future, these are years that
next year, the year after, recursive self-improvement will happen and we'll enter the phase of Evan's post where he argues that there's a chance we
could all die. That is coming soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: Well, Andrew Grill is an expert on the topic. He's also a former global managing partner at IBM. He's joining us from London.
It's really good to have you. Thanks so much. I just want to start with your assessment of what Jacob laid out there to Anderson.
Do you believe AI superintelligence is on the horizon and how are you thinking about these doomsday scenarios?
ANDREW GRILL, AI EXPERT: It's been on the horizon for years. We're getting closer and closer. I think what we heard from Jacob and others is they're
inside the tent. They can see the models that are coming that we can't see.
So I think we should take some of what they're saying as a bit of a warning and a caution.
Are we going to be extinct in four years' time?
I don't think so. But this is probably the wakeup call we needed. The last two months have shown that these AIs are now able to hack without
supervision. If that was a nuclear facility or an electricity grid, that could cause real harm. So I think it's right to be alert but not alarmed.
ANDERSON: Jacob's X post is at 150 million views the last I checked. Elon Musk has said that he's never seen a post on his platform take off like
this. Those of us who follow the space know that AI experts -- and you and I have just been discussing -- it's been sounding off warnings like this
for a while now.
So why do you think that this has broken through so viscerally across the world this week?
GRILL: Well, it comes on the back of the Hugging Face hack and you've covered this. I've covered this in the -- in the last few weeks. And I
think we're now really seeing that, in 2026, these models are behaving the way we don't want them to behave.
I've read all the analysts and the reviews that OpenAI had got some other researchers to look at. One thing stood out. One of the researchers said,
look, nowhere in what we saw were any of these agents basically saying, hey, we should tell a human about what's going on.
So they were doing what's called capture the flag. Here is a task at any cost. Go in and capture that flag. We don't care how you do it. That's what
they were doing. They were doing what they were programmed to do.
What they weren't doing is saying, this doesn't look right because they don't have any real emotional empathy.
I think what we need to look at going forward is, where are the checks and balances?
Where does a human have to be told that something's going on?
ANDERSON: There's a whole debate out there about motives that is dividing the internet right now.
[10:15:00]
And I'm talking about, you know, why it is that we're hearing this, why this has all gone so viral this week.
I mean, Anthropic and OpenAI claim they've got no choice but to go forward on what they see as a possibly apocalyptic path, because they are the most
rational stewards of this technology. They run this frontier technology. If you -- have a listen to how Jacob put it, when asked if these AI leaders
genuinely want regulation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COXON: They completely do. This is completely honest. Just in the same way that the response to Evan's post was sort of surprise. It was like, this
can't be real. Surely a guy working on this technology can't actually believe there's this level of danger. No, that's completely genuine.
And these people are also completely genuine when they are begging to be regulated. This is a genuine -- they find themselves in this scenario where
they're compelled to race toward building a deadly technology. And they would love for some sort of international body to allow them to approach it
at a reasonable pace.
They just don't trust that the people around them are going to get there in a safe way. So they feel like they have to race there, too.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: And then there are the skeptics out there, talking about AI doomers, suggesting this is all a paid influence campaign. They point out
that Anthropic is planning to go public this fall and that the frontier model companies want to look important so that they can dominate regulation
and lock out competitors.
Where do you fall in this debate?
GRILL: Well, certainly the fact that both of them are going public or have advised they're going public with trillion-dollar valuations, that's why
they're being driven forward. They want to get there before someone else does. But the regulation question is interesting. Yes, we want to be
regulated.
Why?
We want to be regulated in the way that we want to be regulated. So they will probably lobby to have certain checks and balances. What they don't
seem to want is regulation that causes them to monitor what's going on.
Now if we take a page out of the pharma industry and the aviation industry, they have mandatory reporting. If something goes wrong with a drug trial or
a plane crashes, there's an instant stop and check what's going on. And there is a kill button.
So you can say, let's stop doing that. I think the regulation they're looking for is, once we've got these very dangerous models out there, we
promise we won't do anything bad.
Remember, what we've seen in the last two months is these models were running for months unchecked. OpenAI didn't know they'd hacked Hugging Face
until they did some investigation. So regulation is fine.
But it has to be a point where the question is, why are you developing these super-powered models that can do more and more harm?
ANDERSON: Regardless of all these competing interests -- and there are, you know, some significant competing interests out there -- the real point
here is that we just don't actually understand what's being built and how it could revolutionize our lives and also, you know, destroy our lives to a
degree.
I mean, here's how one expert, Ali -- sorry; Shelly Palmer -- I'm sure you're aware of him, he's an AI expert -- put it to me last week.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHELLY PALMER, CEO, THE PALMER GROUP: We have, for the last 100 years or more in modern business, been focused on the deliverable. We are making a
presentation, we're making a deck, we're making a spreadsheet. We're going to go present it to someone. We're making an ad.
Almost everyone in knowledge works on creating deliverables or accepting deliverables in a presentation. We're about to get into a world where you
press a button and, 10 minutes later, you have a fit-for-purpose deliverable in your hand.
The atomic unit of business is going to have to shift from the deliverable to the decision. Now we have to outthink our opponents and our competitors.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: There's so many layers of this, of course.
Do you agree with Shelly there?
And what do you see as the tangible, short-term impact of AI that people should be focusing on?
GRILL: Yes, let's unpack that. I agree with what Shelly has said. Basically, AI demands better humans.
People keep saying, is AI going to take my job away?
What AI is going to do is make you work harder because it will give you the answer faster. You have to use your critical thinking.
Is what I'm reading correct?
What we're going to see, though, is a wholesale change in how work gets done. Companies have been through after COVID, they've been through digital
transformation. They've reengineered their businesses.
You ain't seen nothing yet. When AI comes in, you'll actually have to completely reimagine how work gets done. Even CNN, the way you get your
work done will need to change. And companies now aren't going, oh, now is the time to stop and think about that.
So it's a bit of a smokescreen with this, you know, extinction discussion. But down at the boardroom level, even with this today, this week, boards
are not aware of these risks inside the organization.
If you give an AI agent access to data, websites, financial information and it goes rogue like these others have, you have a real problem on your hand.
[10:20:00]
And boards need to take this seriously as well.
ANDERSON: You brought up the idea of job losses and I do just want to tackle this with you. We keep hearing that AI will do away with millions of
level-entry, white-collar jobs.
Do you buy that?
And what do all these millions of workers, freed up from these menial tasks, as Elon Musk has suggested, what will they do and where will people
get their income from?
Musk talks about a universal basic income. I don't hear policymakers talking about that.
But if we are looking, you know, in the very near future at millions of people being freed up to do other stuff -- and Elon Musk says that means
sort of, you know, lots of leisure time -- you know, how are people going to live?
GRILL: The way I look at it is that we won't see fundamental, wholesale job loss within roles. Tasks will be automated. So think about the job you
do. You can slice those things you do into different tasks.
The analogy I use is focus on what you love and automate the rest. What we're seeing is the reason that AI is now showing up, that all these tasks
don't need to be done anymore because they can be automated, we've had a very inefficient system.
I don't have an answer for what people will be doing if they weren't doing those jobs now but probably a lot of those jobs should never have existed
because they're inefficient. And AI is basically exposing that inefficiency.
It will mean that tasks will be redistributed. I don't see people just lying on the beach and having a universal basic income. Studies have shown
that actually doesn't work.
What I think we'll do -- and I mentioned before about the wholesale change to how work gets done -- work will change and we will adapt. Humans are
very good at adapting to change.
ANDERSON: Back to the bigger story here, I mean, not that that isn't a big enough story, U.S. politicians across the aisle sounding the alarm on all
of what we've heard this week.
Do you believe lawmakers are at a loss on how they can regulate AI?
Is this a reality that we've just got to accept?
Or is Congress sleepwalking toward a crisis?
And any real progress on regulation would have to be global, surely, and would likely need the U.S. and China, the two AI powers, to work together
on this. Xi set to visit Washington later this month.
Do you anticipate that this could be a central tenet of what may be being discussed?
GRILL: Well, I think we're looking at the wrong place to regulate once the model is made and deployed, we're now saying let's regulate how it's used;
10-15 years ago, if you knew that social media might be bad for children, you probably would have regulated it back then.
But only now in Australia, the U.K. they're now looking at safety bans on social media. I go back to my example of the farmer and the aviation
industry.
Why don't we look at what they've done?
That's global regulation that affects everybody.
ANDERSON: It's really good to have you. We'll have you back. I often say this story isn't going away. For sure, this story isn't going away. And we
will be living with it day by day, week by week and month by month. So, thank you. Having your expert insight and analysis is really useful to us.
Thanks.
All right. Still to come this hour, exclusive access to an island near a new flashpoint in this region. Of course, I'm broadcasting to you from our
Middle East programming hub. CNN's Nic Robertson takes us to this place and explains why this place matters to the world. That is up next.
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ANDERSON: There is a new flashpoint in the escalating conflict between the U.S. and Iran and it is the port city of Mocha. If Houthi rebels manage to
gain control of that strategic city, it would increase their leverage over the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait.
Now Mocha sits on the edge of a crucial waterway. Prewar, around 10 percent of the world's oil trade transited through this strait. This is not the
Strait of Hormuz, as you see on the right hand side of your screen there. We're talking about the Bab-el-Mandeb, of Yemen, to the left, to the west.
That's the amount of oil going through that strait now down to about 5 percent. To help keep global energy supplies flowing and prices down, Saudi
Arabia diverted its oil exports from the Strait of Hormuz to the Red Sea.
So capturing Mocha would give Iran's most powerful regional proxy and Iran itself an advantage in controlling the global flow of oil.
Well, the battle for control of the strait happening as the Houthis and Saudi Arabia trade attacks this week, with dozens of people reported
injured.
And now Yemen's military is on patrol as the Houthis begin an offensive that could land them control of Perim Island in the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait,
further strengthening their ability to prevent ships from passing through the narrow gateway.
Well, CNN's Nic Robertson and his crew were granted exclusive access to Perim Island. Let's take a closer look now at what they saw there.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yemen's navy is taking us to Perim Island, the heart of a little-known local war that's getting
pulled into America's war with Iran.
So what happens here next could affect us more than the Iran war already has. These islands, this vital waterway, the price of oil -- it is all
vulnerable right now. And what happens here could impact President Trump's political fortunes.
In recent weeks, Iran-backed Houthis have hit several Saudi oil tankers on these waters. They're a bypass to the Strait of Hormuz. As we find out,
Houthis are a constant threat here.
Suddenly, we just had to turn around. We're told it's because drones have been reported.
In the end, this is a hot war and this is one of the epicenters of that war.
Our second attempt getting closer.
This here that you're looking at out across the Red Sea, the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait the narrowest point on that Red Sea.
Those ships out there. That's what this is all about: commercial shipping critical for the global economy. Eventually, we make it and greeted by
Yemeni government forces keeping the vital waterway open.
ROBERTSON: Not many outsiders make it here. We're the first international journalists they've seen in years. But we're not going to have long. The
Houthi drone is still a threat.
And it looks for all the world like the place that time forgot. It is really stuck out here in the middle of the ocean, looking out across the
ocean this way.
Yes. Bab-el-Mandeb. Bab-el-Mandeb.
[10:30:00]
And there -- (INAUDIBLE) -- you can see Africa across there. Djibouti, literally just across the sea there.
Perim is at the strait's narrowest point, just 12 miles from Africa. Since Iran blocked shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, Saudi diverted its oil
exports through the Red Sea, helping keep global oil prices down.
10 percent of global oil used to flow through here, it's down to about less than half of that or about half of that now.
And if the Houthis get control of the Red Sea, if the Iranian proxies, the Houthis, get control of the Red Sea, they could shut the oil flows here
down -- down to almost nothing.
What we don't see on our short visit is a military force that measures up to the scale of what's at stake for the rest of the world. For the
commander in charge of this region, that's a worry.
Because the Houthis would try to kill you, right?
The Iranians would love to have you dead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So many times.
ROBERTSON: So many times. I know.
Vice President Tarik Saleh is a rarity at the moment. A political leader still in Yemen and still fighting the Houthis.
TARIK SALEH, VICE PRESIDENT, YEMENI PRESIDENTIAL COUNCIL (through translator): We told the world that this is an Iranian plan but no one
listened to Yemenis back then. That this is a battle that would not only affect Yemenis but the region and international community.
ROBERTSON: This is Iran trying to put pressure on President Trump.
SALEH: Exactly.
ROBERTSON: Are you getting any support from the United States?
SALEH: Just talk.
ROBERTSON: Just talk. How do you feel about that?
"Disappointed," he says.
Even so, Saleh is bullish about his troops, claiming gains on the battlefield with new equipment and new tactics hitting Houthi hideouts with
quadcopter drone attacks similar to those used in Ukraine.
But it won't be easy. After years of fighting, the Houthis are well dug-in, control the capital, the northwest of Yemen, including much of the Red Sea
coast.
The government has the east and the south, with the Houthi attacks pressing toward the last stretch of Red Sea coast under government control.
What Saleh's troops organized for us next is a hard reality check about what they're up against.
So right now we've just got into a big armored vehicle. Interestingly, it's all Blacked out. The windows are Blacked out, so we don't know where we're
going.
It's here to a highly secret and secure stash of Iranian made Houthi weapons snatched, the Yemeni military says, from smugglers at sea.
This sophisticated anti-ship missile capable of hitting tankers from hundreds of miles away, cutting edge anti-aircraft missiles, ultra- high
spec optic radar. They readily admit more gets through to the Houthis than they can catch.
What's Iran's strategy with the Houthis?
ABDEL NASSER EL-MAMLOUH, DIRECTOR, NRF MEDIA (through translator): The U.S. siege on Iran in the Strait of Hormuz has made Iran look at its
options and activate the strongest one.
The Houthis to close Bab-el-Mandeb, they're saying if our economy collapses in Iran, so will the world economy.
ROBERTSON: In recent weeks, the Houthis have been stepping up attacks on Saleh's forces. In Mocha, it's a vital trade port, a regular Houthi target
hit multiple times. So much so, the harbor walls are littered with sunk and sinking ships.
And here this is a piece, the tail fin from one of those Houthi missiles. See it heavy, ripped into the ground splattered across here and the port
all across this boat here. So many missiles landed.
The port authorities had to shut the whole port down. 16 people lost their lives, the port director tells me. And 1,500 employees are now without
work. The Houthis, he says, are trying to kill their economy as well as the people.
ROBERTSON: More than 10 years of civil war have all but broken Yemen. Humanitarian groups say more than half the population need their help. But
now Iran's war with the U.S. threatens to push Yemen over the edge. Saleh has a salutary warning for Trump. Yemen's losses could be his economic
pain.
SALEH: We see the high cost paid by the international community to secure the passages of few ships through the Strait of Hormuz.
[10:35:00]
If the Yemeni forces were supported right now, they will make more achievements with a much lower cost than the Strait of Hormuz.
ROBERTSON: Trump's Iran legacy is getting more complicated -- Nic Robertson, CNN, in the Bab-al-Mandeb Strait.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON: Let's get you a quick check of oil prices, because I think it's important at this point. There's a lot going on. This is the second strait
in this region, of course, under pressure. It's a really important chokehold on the global economy.
Brent crude global benchmark trading at $104.09; WTI -- that's the American index -- just shy of 100 bucks on the barrel. These are -- these are high
prices. Haven't seen these prices since June at least. I mean, they've been higher in the last six months, of course, since the Iran-U.S. war.
But I mean, these are significantly higher than they've been of late.
Still to come, as the president of the UAE visits Germany, we'll hear from special envoy Badr Jafar about what kind of AI and energy deals we should
expect to see and what's the bigger picture here.
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ANDERSON: -- visiting Germany. It is the first time that a UAE president has made a state visit to Europe's largest economy, sitting down with his
German counterpart to discuss investment, AI and energy deals worth billions, all in an effort to deepen an already pretty robust relationship
going back more than half a century.
The UAE is Germany's largest trading partner in the Gulf, with bilateral trade topping $15 billion last year. Significant announcements could be on
the cards for this visit, especially on energy and AI. I spoke to the UAE's special envoy for business and philanthropy, Badr Jafar, who is in Berlin,
about what we can expect.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BADR JAFAR, UAE SPECIAL ENVOY FOR BUSINESS AND PHILANTHROPY: So AI and energy have become one story. You can't build AI without energy and you
can't run a modern energy system without AI.
This year, the world, I think, will invest around $3.5 trillion in energy and spend around $2.5 trillion on AI. So call it $6 trillion, roughly $16
billion a day.
And where that capital lands, I think, will decide who leads. Germany and the UAE come at this, I think, from complementary sides. Germany brings
engineering depth, research standards and, of course, highly skilled industrial base.
[10:40:05]
And the UAE brings competitive, low-carbon energy, patient capital and, very importantly, speed of execution and, of course, one of the fastest
growing AI ecosystems anywhere.
Masdar already co-owns Baltic Eagle, which is a roughly 500 megawatt offshore wind farm, powering close to half a million German homes. There
are long-term LNG agreements with ADNOC UAE (ph) and Bazefe (ph) battery storage partnerships.
And, of course, XRG (ph) is important investment in Covestro, which, of course, is a champion of German material science.
So what else is in store?
I think we should watch for advanced materials, water and cooling technology, logistics and skills. Above all, vocational training, which, of
course, Germany does better than anyone.
So the vocabulary has widened, I think, Becky, from barrels and cargoes to molecules, electrons, data and people at the heart of everything. This is
not a departure from the energy partnership. I think it's a maturation of it.
ANDERSON: And how does this partnership fit into the wider UAE strategy?
And I'm thinking about the headline partnership, which is that of the U.S.- UAE at this point.
JAFAR: So I mean, look, the UAE's approach, Becky, is simple. Strong relations are not mutually exclusive with the United States. We have a $1.4
trillion 10-year investment framework in Europe. There are major commitments in France and Italy and, of course, in the U.K. And now a
deepening partnership with Germany.
In Asia, our trade with India crossed $100 billion after our economic partnership agreement. And China is our largest trading partner. Underneath
all of that is, I think, a network. In five years, the network has signed close to 40 comprehensive economic partnership agreements and nearly half
already in force.
Our domestic market is 10 million people but those agreements connect us to markets home to well north of 2 billion people. And that is what Germany
should see. The UAE is not simply a market. It's a platform. And south-to- south trade is approaching, as you know, Becky, $7 trillion a year, which is roughly a quarter of all goods traded globally.
And it runs through hubs like the UAE. So a German company operating from the Emirates is trading with the fastest growing economies on Earth from
one place under rules that it understands and in a world that is fragmenting into blocs.
Our choice, the UAE's choice, is to be the node that stays connected to everyone, not a wall but a network.
ANDERSON: There are strong mutual values then here, in innovation, in modernization, in stability. There are, of course, challenges for both
sides. The UAE, the Iran conflict has evidently impacted maritime trade and energy.
I mean, data centers have also been targeted and will require extra security.
What's the message from the UAE in terms of its competitiveness, given that it is in this currently contested space and security as a long-term partner
for both outbound and inbound investment?
JAFAR: Look at the evidence, not the headlines. No open economy is immune to a disruption of trade routes and I will not pretend otherwise. Immunity
is not the claim. I think continuity is.
More than three-quarters of the UAE's economy, as you know, Becky, is now non-oil. Non-oil trade grew almost 30 percent last year to pass $1 trillion
and grew another 13 percent in the first half of this year, a record half in August.
So just last month, business conditions across our non-oil economy improved at their fastest pace since 2024, with new orders at their strongest in
more than two years.
Why?
Because the alternatives were built before they were needed. Ports on our eastern core -- on our eastern coast, cross-country pipelines, a national
railway, strategic storage and, of course, very close coordination between government and business.
None of this was improvised. And that is the deeper answer for a German board or any company board, for that matter. The UAE is not a place
protected from the world.
[10:45:02]
It's a place built to keep moving when the world is difficult. The 2000 German companies there never stopped. If you're waiting, as they say, for
the perfect moment, there's no such thing. But there is, however, a partner that has shown you how it can perform under pressure.
ANDERSON: European economies, under serious pressure amid a cost of living crisis, a fragile industrial sector, lagging AI innovation this week has
put the spotlight on Germany's political system going through quite a stress test with the rise of the AfD.
And we are seeing, you know, a movement of right-wing politics across Europe at this point. No country, it seems, necessarily immune from that
movement. I wonder how that all factors in to the UAE's strategic thinking when it comes to long-term partnerships, not just with Germany but with the
wider European space.
JAFAR: I leave German politics to Germans and European politics to Europeans. That is not my role. And it's not the UAE's. What I can tell you
is how we behave whichever way the political weather blows.
We do not invest in election cycles. We invest in decades. This relationship between the UAE and Germany has now run through seven
chancellors and every kind of coalition and it has grown under all of them. And that is not luck. It is the result of a deliberate choice to be
consistent.
And consistency, I think, is the most underrated policy in a partner. And to a German, I would say, you know, the investment that we bring answers
the concerns people actually have -- jobs that stay, plants that get modernized, energy that is affordable and secure.
A competitive industry and a fair chance for the next generation, you know, are not partisan politics. They are what everyone wants for their country.
And what we learned, Becky, this year in the UAE is that what carries you through a difficult period is what you built before you needed it.
And that includes, very importantly, strategic partnerships. So we will keep building patiently with everyone who shares that long-term view,
Becky. Politics has its seasons. Trust does not.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON: Badr Jafar speaking to me from Berlin.
Well, next up, we head to French Polynesia to catch up with Coral Gardeners, boosting reefs in the face of rising temperatures.
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[10:50:00]
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ANDERSON: Well, coral reefs are in decline globally as climate change continues to fuel marine heat waves and mass bleaching events. And things
may be about to get worse, I'm afraid. Scientists predict a strong El Nino this year, which could raise ocean temperatures to dangerous levels.
Well, today on "Call to Earth," CNN's Bijan Hosseini is in French Polynesia, continuing our coverage on Coral Gardeners, an organization
dedicated to reef restoration as part of the Rolex Perpetual Planet Initiative.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(MUSIC PLAYING)
BIJAN HOSSEINI, CNN SENIOR PRODUCER (voice-over): This is a morning commute I could get used to, geared up in the crew uniform.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (from captions): I think you're ready.
HOSSEINI (voice-over): I feel ready.
I'm catching a ride on the unmistakable black boat of Coral Gardeners, a fixture on the lagoon surrounding Mo'orea. It's mid-August, which is the
busiest time of year for their reef restoration team.
This is your office. I don't think I've ever seen water this clear.
How often are you out here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Every day.
HOSSEINI (voice-over): Coral Gardener Taiano Teiho and reef restoration manager Jono (ph) have brought me to Tiaeea (ph). It's the largest of seven
nursery sites that they manage across French Polynesia.
TAIANO TEIHO, CORAL GARDENER: Welcome to our main nursery. That's where we have mostly the old the corals that we harvest in the water. So get them
grow big enough to outplant them back onto the reef.
HOSSEINI: And is that what these guys are doing over here?
Are they outplanting right now?
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is a part of the team who are outplanting some of the big corals that we have.
HOSSEINI (voice-over): Every July through October before the summer heat and humidity kick in, they spend most days collecting coral, nurtured for
up to two years in their nurseries. And then they attach them back on the nearby reef.
But this season has added pressure, with a potentially record-breaking El Nino arriving here in just a few months. They're hoping to super boost the
reef by outplanting more heat-resilient coral than ever before.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, man, it's an underground city.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You said how much coverage now?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We started at 20 percent coverage. Right now we have 65 percent coverage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How long will it take to get to 100 percent?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Years and years.
HOSSEINI (voice-over): They've been restoring the site since 2020. So it's taken nearly seven years and surviving 2024's global mass bleaching event
to get to this point. It's a practice in patience and perseverance but it is working.
But you're right, just by putting the coral out there, you see all the life that you've given home to.
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HOSSEINI (voice-over): One thing is clear: there is no rest for the weary here and the guys are now teaching me how to fragment coral in order to
refill the nursery. Suffice to say, I'm going to need a lot more practice.
The coral is so fragile, so it's scary. You know, you're worried that you're going to chop off too much or chisel off too much. Also, it's just -
- it takes so much patience but you're also running out of breath. So you got to make sure that you're keeping your body calm.
Man, it's hard work. And then these guys make it look easy.
Each fragment is tied to a rope.
It's harder than it looks.
Each rope gets 15 fragments.
That's good. Look at that one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's good,
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey.
HOSSEINI (voice-over): And this rope we've adopted as our own. I'll be back to check up on the progress of the coral on our rope. But I'll leave
its care to the professionals and hope for the best in the coming months.
What happens if it is a really, really strong El Nino?
And you do lose some coral?
What happens after that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Me, I want to say, you know, its -- nature is the winner most of the time. So we're just going to adapt ourselves.
HOSSEINI: And you learn from it, don't you?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Exactly. You know, we are practitioners. We try, we fail, we adapt, we improve. And if it works, that's good. But if it's more
in the DNA proper research, we're going to need everybody's hands to help on that, you know.
HOSSEINI: It's romantic (ph).
(INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're welcome.
HOSSEINI: I want to come back out tomorrow, the next day, the next day and the next day.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON: And head to cnn.com/CalltoEarth for more. We'll be right back.
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[10:55:00]
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ANDERSON: We're just hours away from the U.S. Open semifinals in the women's singles. Elena Rybakina is in the final four. She's going to face
American Coco Gauff for a chance to reach the finals.
Gauff reached the semifinals after rallying from behind and saving two match points. She's aiming for a second U.S. Open title after her last win,
of course, back in 2023.
Right. From the team working with me here, it's a very good evening. That's it for CONNECT THE WORLD. You can find me online @BeckyCNN and on Instagram
and X. Stay with CNN. "ONE WORLD" up next.
END
