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Quest Means Business
Bodies, Debris Recovered from AirAsia 8501; Kremlin Critic's Conviction Sparks Protests; Fall of Oil Prices; Predictions for 2015; US, European Markets Down; Making Phony Fingerprints from Photos
Aired December 30, 2014 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RICHARD QUEST, HOST: The closing bell has rung on Wall Street. The Dow is down, off 54 points. Philips celebrating about that they provide
the lights for the ball in Times Square, rang the closing bell on Tuesday, December the 30th.
Tonight, debris and bodies are now being recovered from the Java Sea. The latest on the crash of AirAsia Fight 8501.
It is a melee in Moscow as Putin's biggest rival is convicted of fraud.
And how to hack a hand. Germany's defense minister has her fingerprints stolen.
I'm Richard Quest. I mean business.
Good evening. As daybreak arrives and approaches in Indonesia, searchers are zeroing in on the location in the Java Sea where the wreckage
from AirAsia Flight 8501 has now been located.
Divers and ships with sonar equipment are on the way to explore the area where the floating debris was spotted. It's roughly 100 kilometers
from the aircraft's last known location. The bodies of two women and a man have been recovered by rescue teams. It was a heartbreaking blow for the
families of those 162 people on board.
Andrew Stevens is with us from Surabaya in Indonesia. We knew it was coming, the arrival of such news is dreadful nonetheless.
ANDREW STEVENS, CNN ASIA-PACIFIC EDITOR: Absolutely, Richard. It's always devastating. There is no way that you can prepare for that sort of
horror.
And certainly the families here -- this is the crisis center in Surabaya -- so many of the families have come here, where they're being
looked after around the clock by officials and also by AirAsia staff. But nonetheless, it has been an absolutely harrowing 24 hours.
It was made worse, though, Richard, in this particular case because the announcement from the head of the search and rescue operation was being
streamed live to the room where the families were, and they're all watching the television of some -- it was a local station.
And as the head of search and rescue was saying that he was 95 percent certain this debris that was being reported was, in fact, part of AirAsia
8501, the television was also showing pictures of bodies in the water.
And I spoke to a man, he was a very close friend of a man who was on the flight with his wife and his three children and his mother-in-law. So,
this man's friend's family had -- were on that flight. And he said, inside that room, it was just chaos.
There were hysterical outbursts from some of the families. People were screaming and crying and clutching each other. You can only imagine
just the scene inside and just how bad it was.
And the families are now having to come to terms with this, and they still have that grim task, Richard, of actually identifying the bodies,
which will be returning also here to Surabaya throughout the coming days.
QUEST: Andrew Stevens, who is in Indonesia. We'll be talking to you in the hours ahead. That debris which was found was at least 100
kilometers from the plane's last-known location. Now, if you join me at the super screen, where we're also joined by our safety analyst --
DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: Hello, Richard.
QUEST: -- David Soucie. This is where we've got. And we've got the search and rescue teams diverting all the air -- the resources into this
area. So, you've got this last-known position, David, and you've got the debris that's been recovered. Now, the reasons why might be behind can be
many and varied.
SOUCIE: Certainly.
QUEST: But you're interested in the depth of the -- the range, the amount of debris that's found.
SOUCIE: Yes. How much is found and where it is. As you mentioned, it could be this -- way because of the drifting.
QUEST: Right.
SOUCIE: A number of different reasons. But what I'm worried about is the fact that there's not a lot of debris there. And all of the debris
that is there, all that debris is from the aft right cargo compartment, the door from the aft cargo compartment. The fly-away kit.
QUEST: But what is that suggesting to you? That either the other stuff is sort of in this area? Or are you just looking at something that's
drifted off?
SOUCIE: Well, that's -- if it's drifting, there would be other things in there with it, too, Richard. I can't put that together in my mind, that
why would it just be those three or four things? There's other things that are even bigger than that that float that's in that cargo compartment,
including cargo.
QUEST: So, where do the searchers go next?
SOUCIE: Well, what I would do at this point is, again on the flight trajectory, try to figure out -- they have to backtrack this anyway. But
they're going to backtrack it and may find that it's just circling here.
If that's the case, the rest of the aircraft could be anywhere. Remember in Flight 17, that aircraft was spread out six miles.
QUEST: David, as we look at this, it's been fairly -- I won't see straightforward, but it's been fairly textbook. The critics may say it
seems to have taken a long time, but it hasn't really.
SOUCIE: Not at all. Not at all, no. What -- it is methodical. It is black and white. Everything we do in an accident investigation is
calculated, it's put together the way that it's supposed to. Thousands and thousands of hours and careers have put this together to where it is that
way, and it takes some time to put it together right.
QUEST: Do you have any theory or any thought yet on why you think -- what you think happened? The idea of the stall is still very much doing
the rounds, that the plane somehow either flew into bad weather --
SOUCIE: Yes.
QUEST: -- and either the pilot lost control of the situation or literally the weather itself created aerodynamic stall.
SOUCIE: What you're asking me is the triggering event. The triggering event in any accident is not necessarily the cause of the
accident.
QUEST: Right.
SOUCIE: The triggering event may be the last thing that could have been done to prevent the accident, the proximate cause. We have to look up
that chain.
You talk about these layers of protection that we have. They're really layers of Swiss cheese with holes in them. If those holes line up
in the wrong way, which happened here, that's what we have to do as accident investigators is work that from the accident back up through those
holes and figure out what parts of the mitigation, what part of the safety systems failed.
QUEST: And once you've done that, work out was this a rogue act, if you like --
SOUCIE: Exactly.
QUEST: -- or are we talking about something systemic?
SOUCIE: Exactly. And the systemic is the part where we really get the benefit and where we really honor the people who lost their lives in
this. That's where we can really make their lives count and make sure that we don't do this too quickly and step on evidence.
QUEST: One -- I just want to briefly -- Andrew Stevens was just saying that about the way in which the families heard, they were in the
room together, they heard it on television. They also heard this 95 percent and they saw pictures.
I'm not defending anybody in any way, but I do need your expertise here. There is no easy way to do this.
SOUCIE: No.
QUEST: It's always going to be unpleasant --
SOUCIE: No.
QUEST: -- and heartbreaking.
SOUCIE: And after 30 years of doing this, Richard, I've tried many different ways. I've sat in living rooms individually with people.
QUEST: But then you risk other people hearing second- and third-hand.
SOUCIE: Absolutely right. Absolutely right. And they each take it differently, and my objective as inspector in charge is to make sure that
my time is spent well as well. If I spend too much time with one person and not the other -- and that's the difficult thing, because all you want
to do is help them and coddle them.
And I can only imagine what Tony is going through, what Mr. Fernandes is going through at this point to try to deal with this. This is a
personal thing. This is his baby. He built this. And now there's something that's gone wrong at his leadership.
QUEST: You'll be with us in the hours ahead. Good to see you.
SOUCIE: Thank you, Richard.
QUEST: Now, as we continue QUEST MEANS BUSINESS tonight, a top opposition leader in Russia has been convicted of fraud again. He calls
the ruling disgusting. His supporters are taking to the streets. It's QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: One of Russia's most well-known opposition leaders is tonight being held by police after breaking house arrest and joining crowds
gathered that are protesting against his conviction. Now, despite the freezing temperatures, demonstrators gathered near Moscow's Red Square
after Alexei Navalny, an openly outspoken Kremlin critic, was found guilty of fraud.
Look at the pictures of what was happening, a real melee in Moscow. Navalny denies that he and his brother embezzled over half a million
dollars from a cosmetics company. Alexei Navalny has a history of challenging Putin and the political establishment in Russia, which he's
called the Party of Crooks and Thieves.
Now, in 2010, Navalny exposed what he said was a $4 billion embezzlement scheme at the state-run oil monopoly Transneft. The head of
that company and Vladimir Putin both have denied that claim.
Last year, Navalny was imprisoned for another offense -- imprisoned -- a day after entering the race to be the mayor of Moscow. You're starting
to see the absolute battle. An ally of Putin went on to win that election.
Now, Navalny and his brother, Oleg, have been convicted, with Oleg heading to prison. Alexei Navalny claims it's politically motivated.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALEXEI NAVALNY, RUSSIAN OPPOSITION LEADER (through translator): I am ashamed of what you are doing. What are you putting him in jail for? What
a disgusting act. All of this is being done in order to punish me even more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: Our Matthew Chance is in Moscow tonight. Does -- we think of Khodorkovsky, the protests, the arguments, all this. But he stayed in
prison for many years. Does this just peter out and Navalny gets let go, but Oleg stays in prison?
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think the authorities were very careful not to stage a repeat of the Khodorkovsky
affair by keeping Alexei Navalny out of prison.
They're very mindful of the fact, Richard, that this is the most prominent opposition figure in the country. Very mindful of the fact that
he has a significant degree of support, particularly in the urban centers, like Moscow, where as you say, he scored very highly in a recent mayoral
election.
And they don't want to make him a martyr. And so, they've kept him out of prison, they've sentenced him to this suspended sentence. They've
put his brother in prison, which opposition activists say is the Kremlin's idea of maintaining some kind of leverage and control over Alexei Navalny
and perhaps preventing him from realizing his political ambitions.
And so, a very clever sort of sentence, I supposes, if you look at it from that point of view, on Alexei Navalny.
QUEST: And there's no question in anyone's mind, except maybe those who pretend otherwise, in your view, there's no question that the --
whether Putin personally or the actual administration, the government, is behind it all.
CHANCE: Well, that's the charge, of course, of the opposition, that it is the administration that's behind it, that the judiciary in this
country is not independent and it does the bidding of its political masters.
That's really at the heart of this controversy and why Alexei Navalny and so many others who've been convicted in the Moscow courts say that
they've received unfair trials and they're victims of political persecution.
But yes. Certainly it's the position of the government that this is nothing to do with them, this is purely a criminal matter to be dealt with
by the courts and has been dealt with by the courts. It's interesting, because the prosecution asked for 10 years in prison for Alexei Navalny,
but he only got 3.5 years suspended sentence. And so, in that sense, he got off pretty lightly.
QUEST: Matthew, the oil price and the economic woes as Russia now goes well and truly into the depths of winter, I saw some polls last week
still suggesting an overwhelming popularity for Vladimir Putin.
CHANCE: Yes. It's one of those, perhaps strange to the outsiders' view, contradictions within Russia. The country is on its knees
economically, virtually, or is on its way to getting down on its knees. Its ruble, its currency is in free fall. The oil price, its main export
revenue earner, has plunged in value. GDP has basically halved.
It's been an absolutely phenomenal precipitous decline for Russia's economy, yet its people are still standing foursquare behind its leader,
Vladimir Putin. Latest opinion polls, 85 percent approval ratings. But let's see how long that lasts as this bleak economic winter continues.
QUEST: Matthew, I notice from the clock on our screen that it is after midnight, so my first duty is to thank you for staying up late onto
New Year's Eve and to wish you happy New Year in the cold economic conditions, physical and otherwise, of Moscow, Matthew. Thank you.
CHANCE: Same to you.
QUEST: Matthew Chance. Now, while Matthew deals with the Moscow side, the floor continues to slide from under the oil price. Join me at
the super screen, and you're going to see what I mean.
You'll be aware since the beginning of the year, we were up in the $130 and $140. The big slide starts somewhere in July, and it falls right
the way down. That really is quite dramatic. It's now down to -- fell less than $4 a barrel, its lowest level now in more than 5 years at $54 a
barrel.
And the chart tells the story of what's been a long and painful year for oil, down nearly 50 percent, and that's despite concerns that Libya
ports have been shut down by warring factions. That could make the whole situation worse.
We need to talk about some of these predictions on this second-to-last day of the year. Ken Rogoff is with us from Harvard. Good to see you,
sir.
KEN ROGOFF, ECONOMICS PROFESSOR, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: Good to see you, Richard.
QUEST: Now, I have my map -- my globe. The prediction for oil and how you see this coming forward, $54 a barrel at the moment, likely to go
less. Whether it goes up and down a bit is irrelevant in some sense. At these sort of prices, next year, your prediction on oil. Is it a key
factor in the global economy?
ROGOFF: It is huge. I mean, for the countries of Europe, in Japan, even the United States, it's a fantastic boost. But you were just talking
about Russia, Venezuela, the exporters, especially the ones that don't really -- that really depend on it daily, it really hurts. But on net --
QUEST: But net -- net?
ROGOFF: Net, it's very good. I mean, the consumers, high-spending consumers are benefiting, ordinary people are benefiting, gas prices in the
US are down a dollar, for example. And in Europe and Japan, the effect's bigger. It's huge.
QUEST: Right. Now, if I turned our globe to Europe here and the eurozone. Now, the eurozone and Europe is in the most appalling state at
the moment. Greece promises to upend it all again with its election on January the 25th. Are you worried about Europe?
ROGOFF: Long term, yes. It's just not clear what they're going to do. It's not clear whether there's enough integration coming, if Italy and
France will reform. Greece clearly is in an unsustainable situation.
QUEST: How can it still be unsustainable, Ken, after 28 -- ? I mean, it's had hundreds of billions. It's had almost -- for a size of the
country that it is.
ROGOFF: Simply put, they were taking in a lot of money every year. Forget about the paper value of the debt. They were borrowing every year.
And now, they're able to borrow much, much less. That's where the austerity is coming from.
No one -- the private sector doesn't want to give them money, Germany doesn't want to give it money from its pockets, and it's very painful. Any
direction they go, they need transfers, really, to relieve what are these austerity programs.
QUEST: Well, before we go to our main entry, I want to just turn the globe across the United States. Five percent annualized growth in the US.
Now, we've got such a difference on both sides of the Atlantic. On the western side, you've got growth, good growth, good job creation. Does that
continue next year?
ROGOFF: Yes. I think, actually, the growth's pretty broad-based in the United States, and we're likely to see wages finally start rising more
significantly, unemployment continue to improve. The US is on a pretty solid ground.
Of course, there's uncertainties in the rest of the world, which are a weakness. But I think net net, it is a big year for the United States
again.
QUEST: So, let's go right across to Russia. Look at it. Vast --
ROGOFF: Very big.
QUEST: -- country. Vast country, huge oil exports. Matthew Chance says Putin remains popular. You see recession in Russia next year, deep.
ROGOFF: Oh, absolutely. I think they're on the cusp of a really systemic financial crisis, even, in Russia. I don't know if it'll be 1998
again, they have deeper pockets, somewhat less vulnerabilities, but this is not ending quickly. It's a very, very difficult time for the Russian
people. I agree the polls I've seen also show Putin still very popular. So, we'll see.
QUEST: I'm going to spin the globe. Never mind where it ends, but when we talk about growth next year, when we talk about your biggest
concern, when you think about what you're most worried about, where should I stop?
ROGOFF: Well, Russia's no fun.
QUEST: Right.
ROGOFF: But it's not that big in the global economy. It's China, really --
QUEST: China?
ROGOFF: -- that's the big concern. Absolutely it'd be China. They are slowing in a way that's controlled. They're trying to change. They're
trying to depend less on exports, less on investment, more on consumers. That just doesn't happen overnight.
And some of what we're seeing in oil prices, commodity prices, even slower growth in Germany, is China has been slowing. We don't know how
much, probably more than they say.
QUEST: China, Russia, the US. I think we've just about done the world.
ROGOFF: Well, this is really fun. I want to do this again.
QUEST: Good to see you, sir.
ROGOFF: Pleasure.
QUEST: Now, sea of red --
(RINGS BELL)
QUEST: -- for the Dow Jones Industrials. Back under 18,000. It was concerns over oil prices. The S&P 500 down half a percent. The US markets
opened for a full day of trading on Wednesday. I think they do sing "Wait 'Til the Sun Shines Nellie." I'm determined to get a version of that out
before we're finished.
European markets have a shortened session on Wednesday. They ended the last full day with a whimper. A slide in energy stocks. The major
markets were down. Political uncertainty in Greece, we were just talking about. Actually, that's more of a slide than I thought, the CAC 40 down
more than 1.5 percent when all was over.
As we continue, how important is your fingerprint? Well, it's certainly very important for things like Apple Pay and the like. But what
if your fingerprints could be stolen? Germany's defense minister is in the headlines, not because of what she said, but because of her thumb.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: OK, it wasn't bad enough that somebody could lift your fingerprint from a glass or from personal effects. You know, they get the
tape and they pull it off. Now, German hackers say they've figured out a way to duplicate prints using just photos of your finger. Can you imagine
this?
The case in point is the German defense minister, Ursula von der Leyen. There she is. Hackers say they were able to create phony
fingerprints by using pictures of her thumb. At a recent meeting in Hamburg, the so-called Chaos Computer Club -- showed how they did it.
And while it's not considered terribly complicated to do, experts do say most people would not have the patience or ability. You and I couldn't
do it at home in the kitchen. Perhaps.
Well, in the demonstration, the dummy fingerprint was able to fool Apple's Touch ID, something that you could get into an iPhone, and that's
the way it's all been done. Marie-Helen Maras is the associate professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
MARIE-HELEN MARAS, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, JOHN JAY COLLEGE OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE: Hello.
QUEST: Good to have you --
MARAS: Thank you.
QUEST: -- Professor. So. They can take a picture of your fingerprint and they can turn it into something real. Is this serious?
MARAS: This is serious. This isn't the first time that that particular group had posted a fingerprint of a German minister online. The
first time, they had lifted a print from a physical object and then placed it on a plastic film and then distributed it.
This time, what they were able to do was take the contours of the fingerprint of the German minister --
QUEST: From a picture.
MARAS: -- from a digital -- a high-resolution photograph, and then reproduce it. And then use it.
QUEST: To access -- what -- do we know why they did this? Are they nefarious or are they do-gooders saying be warned, everybody, this is
coming our way?
MARAS: Well, the group had mentioned that they do this just to show individuals that this technology does not claim what it says that it's
going to do, which means that it's the ultimate identification, that there's no way that you can bypass this type of technology. So, these
individuals want to show how easy it is.
QUEST: Is it your understanding that you and I in the kitchen with a bit of old sticky-back plastic and a few kitchen utensils, we couldn't do
this? You need a bit more than that.
MARAS: You do. Because you need to reverse engineer whatever that technology is requiring. For instance, in order to bypass the technology,
you need to understand specifically what it is looking for. And it does take time, and it does take patience, and it does take a know-how that the
average person does not have.
QUEST: So, first -- in the month when we're talking about the Sony hack --
MARAS: Yes.
QUEST: -- and we've had Target, we've had all the different ones in the United States, Chase Bank and all this. Is this just -- is it
inevitable that our fingerprint, which we thought was the most, last bastion, is going to become duplicated?
MARAS: It is inevitable, because all security can be broken at some point. What we try to do is delay a perpetrator from being able to bypass
security. But nothing is foolproof. You can reverse engineer technology.
QUEST: Are you disappointed, worried, concerned, by what you're hearing from this development? How would you describe that?
MARAS: I'm concerned that we -- that today, we still do not protect our information the way that we should. And our information is usually
stored in third-party databases. So, the fact that we can't protect personal information, financial data, and now we want to add biometric data
to this mix, that concerns me.
QUEST: Thank you very much, indeed, for coming.
MARAS: Thank you so much for having me.
QUEST: Thanks. Now, as QUEST MEANS BUSINESS continues, we'll return to 8501, the AirAsia plane, and we will talk more about the debris that's
been found. This is QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: Hello, I'm Richard Quest. There's more QUEST MEANS BUSINESS in just a moment. This is CNN, and on this network, the news always comes
first.
A major recovery operation is set to resume on Wednesday after search teams found debris from AirAsia Flight 8501. Three bodies have been
recovered from the Java Sea, 162 people were on board when the plane went missing.
A Russian opposition leader has been detained by police just hours after his conviction on fraud charges. Alexei Navalny defied house arrest
to join his supporters at a rally in Moscow. The police arrested him and sent him home. Navalny and his brother were both guilty -- found guilty of
embezzlement. Critics say it's an effort to silence dissent.
The death toll from the fire aboard the ferry in the Adriatic Sea has now risen to 11. It's unclear how many passengers are still missing.
Italian officials say other victims are likely to be found on the wrecked ship because of discrepancies within the passenger list.
Earlier on Tuesday, two Albanian men were killed while helping to tow the ferry. The Italian navy says that a cable connecting the men's tugboat
to the ferry snapped.
The former U.S. President George H.W. Bush has been released from hospital in Texas. The 41st president spent the Christmas holiday in
hospital after experiencing shortness of breath last week. A spokesman for the president said he was grateful to the staff of the Houston Methodist
Hospital for their superb care.
As we've been reporting, search and rescue teams have now recovered three bodies from the AirAsia flight 8501. And now all resources are being
diverted to the area in the Java Sea where the wreckage from the plane has been located. It marks an important step in the search and simultaneously
a devastating blow for desperate family members. AirAsia's chief executive is Tony Fernandes. He's addressed the grim discovery at a news conference
with the victims' relatives and reporters.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
TONY FERNANDES, CEO, AIRASIA: The only slight benefit is that for the people in there, there is some closure. This is a scar with me for the
rest of my life. It doesn't change anything and, but for a very little percent there is at least some closure as opposed to not knowing what's
happened and holding out hope.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
QUEST: Mary Schiavo is in Charleston, South Carolina - our aviation analyst. Mary, unfortunately we talk on these sad occasions, but as we put
this together now, some debris has been found, some bodies. Even allowing for reverse drift and the passage of time, Mary, they're in the right area?
MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: They're in the right area and I think rather close proximity. I mean, we -- you and I have worked on other
ones where they are spread wide and far and even in TWA 800, the wreckage was just over vast amounts of water even though it was in a much shallow of
water off the coast of New York. But I think it's a rather compact and contained area.
QUEST: And once they've - but the recovery of victims is primary, then you've got to get the data recorders and the various recorder. Will
that be difficult, do you think?
SCHIAVO: Well I don't think so, particularly if the report which is unconfirmed but it's an interesting report - that someone has actually seen
or think they have determined where the shadow of the plane is in the water. If it is still in the form of a plane, and of course the black
boxes are in the tail, they can go in and get those out without at all interrupting the recovery of the bodies. They could have those quite
quickly - the black boxes.
QUEST: While we wait for all of this, let's talk aviation in more general terms, Mary, because Asian aviation is growing at 8 and a 1/2
percent a year. At the same time, U.S. aviation is 3 and 1/2, Europe is 2 percent/3 percent. So the growth area is in Asia. Should we have concerns
about infrastructure, regulation --
SCHIAVO: Yes.
QUEST: -- and ability - not with AirAsia per se, but just of a growing like topsy industry there.
SCHIAVO: Yes, because you know the Federal Aviation Administration did - and this stemmed from work back in the 90s - but they do review other
countries' ability to enforce aviation safety regulations. And they actually issue grades, you know, they say you're comparable to us or
they're not.
And you know the United States has been a - the Federal Aviation Administration - has been very critical of Indonesia. Indonesia has not
gotten top grades, not because they don't have the laws on the books. They don't have enforcement personnel. They don't have inspectors like FAA
inspectors. They don't have people who go out and make sure that everyone follows the law and follow up after there's been some kind of a problem.
And we've seen firsthand in the United States that if you don't have a cadre of inspectors and people actually enforcing the law, some in the
airline industry do get a little lax.
QUEST: As we pull the strands together from this, 111 crashes this year but - which is actually one of the better years - but because of MH
17, 370 and this one, the actually fatalities is much higher. It's playing with numbers, isn't it?
SCHIAVO: Well, not really. It's not playing with numbers where Malaysia is concerned. And I think - I don't think that we can dismiss
three as a fluke. Yes, they're different causes - well we don't know the cause of two of the three - but it does concern decision-making by
carriers. And it does concern business models, it does concern, for example, Malaysia went through Ukraine when other carriers didn't. You
know, Malaysia, this carrier is headquartered there, went into this thunderstorm. We'll have to see if others diverted or cancelled flights.
I think they really have to look at the overall picture to see what's going on. Is there a fluke or is three a trend?
QUEST: And crucially, to that point, David Soucie was saying earlier what you're looking for is whether it's systemic. Was this an isolated -
SCHIAVO: Right.
QUEST: -- event. If it's an isolated event, tragic though it is, but if it's systemic, that's when you get interesting.
SCHIAVO: Yes, and I think the cockpit voice recorder - you know, the pilot had so many thousands of hours., just an amazing number of hours
really. But the co-pilot was much, much more his junior officer. And that issue has come up that came up on Asiana, that came up on American Airlines
in Little Rock, that came up on the Singapore crash - 006. I mean that's come up so often, we'll have to see if that particular systemic problem -
the cultural issue of deference - also plays a role here.
QUEST: We'll talk more about it, Mary. Thank you. Now, few people can fully fathom the agony that these families are going through. The
relatives of the passengers onboard MH370 are still waiting for their own closure nine months after that crash. As Will Ripley now tells us, some of
those families are offering empathy and support for the loved ones of this latest tragedy.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
(CRYING AND SCREAMING)
WILL RIPLEY, TOKYO-BASED CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anguish becomes anger. For the families of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, days of waiting turned
to weeks and now almost ten months. For them, the news from Indonesia brought everything back.
STEVE WANG, MOTHER ON BOARD MH370: The fear about losing someone, the pain and maybe the desperation.
RIPLEY: Steve Wang feels for the families of AirAsia flight 8501. He knows what it's like to sit at the airport and wait for a plane that never
comes. To hope against all odds the person you love may still be alive. Even after ten months, you're still hoping for a miracle?
WANG: Yes. Though it is painful, but I don't want to give up.
RIPLEY: Wang's mother was only 57. He hasn't spoken her name since March, when MH370 disappeared.
WANG: No, I never said it.
RIPLEY: You've never said your mother's name out loud?
WANG: Yes.
RIPLEY: He still listens to the voicemail she left him just before boarding the plane.
WANG: She want me to pick her up from the airport and she said to bring her a coat. And you - it's hard to believe that a man my age will
cry suddenly.
RIPLEY: So you just turned 26 and your mom wasn't there for your birthday for the first time?
WANG: Yes.
RIPLEY: Of the 239 people on MH370, 154 were Chinese. Hundreds of relatives spent weeks at Beijing's Lido Hotel. In the grand ballroom,
walls became giant message boards full of prayers for their parents, for their children to come home. Today, it's all gone.
WANG: Nobody talks about it. What will they do? Will they keep on searching for the plane or they just give up? I don't know.
RIPLEY: Wang prays for the families of flight 8501.
WANG: I just want them to be strong because you are not alone.
(SINGING)
RIPLEY: He also prays every day for his mother, one of 239 souls on MH370 still missing.
(CRYING)
RIPLEY: Will Ripley, CNN Beijing.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
QUEST: Because the news never stops, neither do we. This is CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: Barcelona Football Club's been dealt what some would say is a devastating blow in the arbitration court. FIFA's punishment for the Club
signing underage players was a one-year transfer ban and it's being upheld. Barcelona's president is furious.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
JOSEP MARIA BARTOMEU, PRESIDENT, FC BARCELONA, VIA INTERPRETER: Today a great injustice has been committed. It's an injustice against Barca,
against all the children and families affected by the decision, against all members of our club and also for the football world in general.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
QUEST: Don Riddell joins us now from the CNN Center. Don, if there is a rule against signing underage players and you have actually done it,
then as the criminals would say, 'you're bang to rights, guv.'
DON RIDDELL, ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT FOR "WORLD SPORT": (LAUGHTER). Well, Barcelona don't seem to think so judging by the tone of their
comments today. I think they really were expecting this court of arbitration for sport ruling to go in their favor. It hasn't, they are
absolutely furious, but CAS has basically agreed with FIFA's ruling that they had broken the rules and these rules are designed to protect young
players - players who are under the age of 18. And while these footballers, these young players who signed for La Masia, Barcelona's
world-famous academy, well perhaps their dreams are coming true with a move like this. It can be in breach of the rules if not done properly.
QUEST: Right.
RIDDELL: Barcelonans say that they - if any error was made it was an administrative error and certainly they abide by and respect the spirit of
the laws, but CAS and FIFA clearly believe otherwise.
QUEST: I'm sure Mr. Justice (How's your father sitting) would say, 'That's what they've heard from every crook known to man and every petty
thief.' Listen, this ban, it's not just for them to - for joining the academy, it goes the whole hog for Barcelona right the way up to the full
team.
RIDDELL: Well this is going to have serious repercussions on them now - certainly for the next 12 months, but arguably beyond that. There are
two transfer windows during every calendar year -- in January and in the summer. And they've now been told that they can't make any new signings in
the upcoming window next month or in the summer which means that it'll be January 2016 before they can sign any new players. That will be in the
middle of the season after this. It's really hard to sign any significant players during the January transfer window, Richard, so you could argue
that they're not really going to be able to properly bolster their squad until the middle of 2016. And given that their biggest rival Real Madrid
are in the ascendency in Spain right now, given that Barcelona -
QUEST: Right.
RIDDELL: -- have a lot of aging players and a lot of holes in key positions all over their field, this really will be very damaging for them.
QUEST: How much of this - let me just be cynical - how much of this is FIFA attempting to deflect ethical questions from its own rather dubious
behaviors over the World Cup bidding? It can say, 'Well look what we are doing underage players - we're flying the flag!' Or am I just being a
cynic?
RIDDELL: You are so cynical, Richard, you're very, very cynical. I mean, FIFA were actually looking into this almost two years ago. That's
how long this thing has taken to play out. So in this case, I don't think that really is the case. And remember today's ruling is form the court of
arbitration for sport. But it's hugely damaging - not just for the Barcelona first team but also for their brand. They have been beset by
off-field problems over the last couple of years. And it's hugely embarrassing for their academy which is the envy of the world -
QUEST: Right but it just means -
RIDDELL: -- I mean La Masia produces some amazing football players.
QUEST: It just means now they'll have to run a better team with what they've got.
RIDDELL: Yes, and what they've got right now if you exclude the front three, is not very good, so worrying times for Barcelona fans.
QUEST: You'll be here to help us understand as the year - as these 18 months goes on. Don Riddell - happy New Year to you, sir. As always, --
RIDDELL: Same to you.
QUEST: -- thank you. Now, the Barcelona transfer ban offers a unique opportunity to the biggest rival as Don was saying - Real Madrid. Real's
looking to expand in every way and as Amir Daftari reports, the Middle East may offer an untapped market for the world's richest football club.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
AMIR DAFTARI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: European football just keeps getting bigger and that extends to its global reach. For a game that has always
chased prosperity in the professional era, the Middle East is an understandable goal.
JAMES PERCY, DEPUTY EDITOR, "SPORT 360": Obviously moving into this part of the world is - has a number of benefits, not just from a
merchandising perspective, but also simply because there are some very wealthy football lovers.
DAFTARI: Arab billionaires buying top teams from Paris to Manchester is all very well known. But this region is still fertile ground to growing
even bigger families for European clubs, especially in the UAE. And no one seems to be going after this market more aggressively than Spain's most
successful team.
PERCY: Real Madrid had really picked the iron up (ph) and now they want to establish themselves as the club of the Middle East. Manchester
United always looks to the Far East, but I think Madrid have seen - have seen - an opportunity here not just because they're already a very popular
club who had success the early part of the decade (ph) whose players probably wasn't (inaudible) Luis Figo which really captured the emotions of
people in this part of the world.
DAFTARI: But emotions aren't the only thing Madrid are trying to capture. Appetites are also part of their game plan. This is the Real
Madrid Cafe in Dubai, the only one of its kind anywhere in the world. Here you can enjoy cafe con leche alongside your very own Real Madrid cake. And
it doesn't stop there. There's now talk of a Real Madrid theme park and resort. Even the famous Santiago Bernabau, Real Madrid's home ground may
soon be known as the Abu Dhabi Santiago Bernabau. This after Real struck a half a billion-dollar deal with IPIC, Abu Dhabi's International Petroleum
Investment Company.
However, not all of the club's attempts to woo Middle Eastern fans have been pitch perfect. Take a look at these two Real crests. Can you
spot the difference? That's right - the cross on top of the crown. The soccer team dropped the Christian symbol after signing a lucrative
sponsorship deal with the National Bank of Abu Dhabi. Although there's no official comment on the change, Spanish media reports that the logo was
altered by Real in order not to offend strict Muslims. Some fans are not happy about it, expressing their anger online. Now, not everyone will
appreciate Real Madrid's Middle East mission, but the beautiful gain can sometimes be a tricky business. And so far, the Spanish giants are having
their cake and eating it too. Amir Daftari, CNN Dubai.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
QUEST: From football on the cake to the sexual revolution. (RINGS BELL).
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: A man who was helped and largely instrumental in the invention of the pill read the book "From the Pill to the Pen." And he says that by
2050, sex will be for recreational purposes only rather than procreation. It's a prediction from the co-inventor of the contraceptive pill - he's
Carl Djerassi - who also said that women will freeze their eggs as a matter of course. It will be the norm not the extension - exception. Invention
of the pill as it's known today helped usher in the sexual revolution in the West in the 1960s. It changed the way women live their lives. Then it
went on to change society. So asked this revolutionary scientist and the author of "From the Pill to the Pen" if he knew when they were doing their
work on it, just how powerful the little pill would be.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
CARL DJERASSI, CO-INVENTOR OF THE CONTRACEPTIVE PILL: It was an extremely important development because it separated sex from -
reproduction from contraception - sex from contraception and it occurred at exactly the right time when we finally started on recognizing the changes
in women's role in the world. So that many people credit sexual revolution as well as the liberation you might say of women to the pill. That's
overdoing it. There's no question it facilitated it greatly, but I think the timing was superb because the 1960s were exactly the time when such a
new technology could have been introduced. If we had done our work as chemists, we're the first ones before the biologists could start (ph) and
the clinician -- if they did it 15 years later, you would have no pill today.
QUEST: Why do you say that?
DJERASSI: I say that because usually you assume that enormous technological developments like the pill, computer, smartphone have
enormous societal consequences. But every once in a while you can turn it around and the societal consequences, the change in the beginning of the
really woman's movement, created a window of opportunity where the pill could be introduced readily.
In the meanwhile, the pharmaceutical companies changed completely their attitude towards contraception for frankly understandable reasons and
now it is a social movement rather than a technical development. And the really important thing that happened sort of 20 years later IVF -
introduction of in vitro fertilization -- which enabled sex reproduction without sex, which is exactly the opposite of the pill.
These two together have changed and are changing fundamentally sex and reproduction in a certain part of the world and that I want to emphasize
because during the last 50 years, and people would not have predicted it at the time that you are talking about. The world is not anymore poor or rich
or developed/underdeveloped, but geriatric and pediatric. And the geriatric world - Japan and Europe especially and other countries pretty
soon - have over 1.5 children per family - you need 2.1 to reproduce yourself. And nearly 20 percent of the people above the age of 65 - those
are the people who are not necessarily interested in contraception. They're interested in conception.
QUEST: What we have here of course after listening to the fascinating way in which you put it, you do have this confluence of events, but you
also have at the same time a commercial imperative, don't you? You also have the pharmaceutical companies spotting the opportunities and you have
that particularly on the contraceptive side.
DJERASSI: Yes, well it's true. But that's the standard. No new drug - no new drug - can be introduced in the world without participation from
the pharmaceutical industry.
QUEST: What is the shift that now takes place prospectively in the area of reproduction? Because we had Facebook for example saying that they
were going to allow their employees and pay for their employees to - female employees - to freeze their eggs so that in the future they could be
fertilized. Do you see that as a major - as a major trend more people will be doing that?
DJERASSI: I see that as the trend - talking about the storing of young unfertilized eggs - that has not been done to any extent as yet.
QUEST: Did you realize what you were do - I mean obviously you realized what you were doing - did you have an idea of how big it was going
to be?
DJERASSI: In a way no because no one really did. Because what happened in the first 30 year - from '60 to '90 - from 1960 to 1980, was
pretty well unexpected. But what has happened since the use of the combination of in vitro fertilization on the one hand and contraception on
the other, is a very different proposition - no one would have dreamt 30 years ago that you'd now have five million people who were born without
sexual intercourse. And no one is dreaming that in 30 years, you're going to have tens and hundred thousand of young women - young women now in 2015
- who'll start freezing their young eggs and consider the option of using it if they postpone childbearing later.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
QUEST: The little pill that can. A "Profitable Moment" - the final one for 2014 (RINGS BELL) after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: Tonight's "Profitable Moment." It's been an extraordinary news year, whether it's MH370, MH17, Ukraine/Russia, oil, Ebola. For those
in the markets and those investors or those just merely trying to protect their pension and their financial future making investment decisions in
2014 has been the most extraordinarily difficult of years.
And as we come to the end of the year, when you look at the gains, as I was only doing, over what pensions and the like, and you realize that
volatility made it just about impossible to know where to put your money. Put it safe and you go nowhere. Put in the market, and you were at
terrible risk. And I wish I could say that 2015 is going to be much easier, but it's unlikely to be that way. We've got problems in Europe
still to be sorted out, oil remains low, Russia is still an issue, the Middle East has still got turmoil. Pulling the strands together for the
investor in 2015 will be the challenging art. Because not only do you want to make sure you make a little money on the way, more importantly, you and
I, well, we don't really want to lose any money at all. And that, as they say, is "Quest Means Business" for this year. I'm Richard Quest. Whatever
you're up to in the year ahead, (RINGS BELL) I hope it's profitable. I'll see you in 2015.
END
