Donald Tusk Says Some Brexit Leaders Will Have A Special Place in Hell; SDF Commander Says ISIS Isn't Finished Yet; Trump Says Time to Welcome Us Troops Home From Syria; A UN Report Says North Korea Brazenly Violating Sanctions.
GORANI: A special place in hell, the words of the European Council Donald Tusk, he made the comments alongside the Irish prime minister. Take a listen.</s>DONALD TUSK, EUROPEAN COUNCIL PRESIDENT: By the way, I've been wondering what a special place in hell looks like for those who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it safely. Thank you.</s>GORANI: Bianca Nobilo is here. The reaction has been swift in the U.K., especially from Brexiters.</s>BIANCA NOBILO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, as you might imagine. First of all, Downing Street did respond, and they went the rhetorical route. He should ask himself whether he thought those comments would be useful, underscored Brexit is the biggest exercise the country has ever seen. It is a polite way of saying you should watch what you say. The members of the cabinet like Andrea Leadsom, the leader of the House of Commons, says this underscores exactly why she thinks the U.K. should be leaving the E.U. in the first place. She also said that Donald Tusk should mind his manners. This was a deliberative provocative move. Another member of the DUP Sammy Wilson said this devilish maniac is doing his best to keep the UK bound by chains of bureaucracy and control.</s>GORANI: It was deliberate because his Twitter account immediately tweeted out that quote. It wasn't a throw away comment. But we did catch on hot mic, a mic that wasn't immediately turnoff from the Irish prime minister reaction to what Tusk said. Listen.</s>LEO VARADKAR, PRIME MINISTER, IRELAND: -- they will give you terrible trouble in the British press for that.</s>DONALD TUSK, PRESIDENT, EUROPEAN COUNCIL: I know.</s>GORANI: They will give you terrible trouble in the British press, and he chuckles and says, I know. But he didn't seem displeased.</s>NOBILO: No, and he obviously would have been right. The reaction was very strong. You have to ask why he's doing this. Usually, yes, there's been a bit of back and forth and Donald tusk posted on Instagram last year, a dig against Theresa May. By and large it's been cordial. Usually you have to peel back the language to explain a bit of a dig at the U.K. or vice versa. Obviously not the case today. Given that both sides, both saying we have to try and engender good will to get through the impasse, than have this language is quite shocking.</s>GORANI: I asked myself that very question. Why is he saying something like this? It was preplanned, it was scripted. He then tweeted it out immediately. And one theory is, well, maybe he's trying to, to tell ordinary British people if you voted for Brexit, it's not your fault. You can change your mind, you were misled.</s>NOBILO: Yes, I think the reason this took off so much is because it hit on a number of issues. One is so many in the European Commission and Council and many in the U.K. have issues with the way the Leave campaign was conducted. There was a lot of misinformation, some people would say flat out lies, many promises which obviously won't be kept. So, this is alluding to that because it has been slightly misquoted. He wasn't saying it Brexiters, there is a special place in hell for them, for the people who didn't sketch out how this could be done safely. That was the point he was trying to make. So, I think that it's important we consider that. And we know where he stands on Brexit. He's always been against it and I think, Hala, this is really significant about what happened today. Even up until about mid-January, so just over two weeks ago, Donald Tusk was sounding optimistic there could still be a chance Britain might remain. There could be a second referendum.</s>GORANI: That's gone.</s>NOBILO: Now in no uncertain terms, he said the facts are unmistakable and there simply isn't the political will or the leadership from either Theresa May or Jeremy Corbyn to make that a possible outcome of the situation.</s>GORANI: Well, yes. And some accuse Jeremy Corbyn of being a secret Brexiter for other reasons.</s>NOBILO: He has a history as well as being euro-skeptical earlier in his career.</s>GORANI: Thank you, Bianca. This week is another busy one for Theresa May, Dublin and Brussels. We'll see what comes out of that. Thank you very much. Back now to our top story, President Trump's State of The Union, in his speech, Trump did not repeat his frequent false statement that ISIS has been defeated, something his own generals have contradicted but he still defended his plan to withdraw American troops from Syria from Syria.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Great nations do not fight endless wars. Today we have liberated virtually all of the territory from the grip of these blood thirsty monsters. Now, as we work with our allies to destroy the remnants of is, it is time to give our brave warriors in Syria a warm welcome home.</s>GORANI: A few hours ago, the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said ISIS remains a dangerous threat and territory it does not control. We are expecting President Trump to deliver remarks in the next hour to foreign ministers of the global coalition to defeat ISIS at the U.S. State Department. And if any news worthy lines come out of that, we'll bring them to you. Our Ben Wedeman is in Syria now and he has more on the fight against ISIS in eastern Syria.</s>BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Fighters are loading up for the final battle against what's left of the so-called Islamic state. Now holed up in a tiny corner of land in eastern Syria. With coalition air support, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic forces have driven ISIS out of all but a sliver of territory along the Euphrates River. It's easy to see plenty of movement inside the besieged enclave a half mile away as gunfire echoes across no man's land. The active fighting stopped a while ago, these soldiers say. Is that incoming or outgoing, I asked? Outgoing, he responds. He was, however, mistaken. So, the soldiers here have told us it's been quiet for the last at least week or so. But just at the moment the soldier was telling me that, there was an incoming round landing right over there. So quiet, I guess in this instance, is a relative term. He is commanding the anti-ISIS forces in the front and warns against assuming the war is almost over. ISIS isn't finished yet, he tells me. It's still in this area. It's still fighting. It still has sleeper cells in the areas we've liberated. When ISIS was at its height, one of the supporter's favorite slogan was the "Islamic State Remaining and Expanding." That now seems like a very long time ago. As the Islamic State collapses, they are leaving behind their spare change, so to speak. This now not worth anything. Worthless like the debris of their utopian delusion.</s>GORANI: And Ben Wedeman joins me now live from inside Syria. What are some of the biggest challenges? Because we're talking here about a very small slice of territory. What are some of the biggest challenges and dangers that these forces face as they try to root out the last remnants of is?</s>WEDEMAN: Hala, the biggest challenge at this point is the fact that there are as many as 1,500 civilians in addition to about 500 fighters according to Syrian Democratic forces commanders. It's in a very small area by some estimates three square kilometers. So, it does appear at this point the attitude of the anti-ISIS coalition is perhaps just to sit it out, wait it out because we know that every day dozens, sometimes as many as 200 people are leaving that area because of the conditions inside. They're running out of food, running out of fuel. There is a lot of illness inside this town. So, they may simply just keep the siege on until some sort of surrender takes place. In terms of the military challenges, what we know from one commander, the one you saw in that report we spoke with, he said as a result of the shrinking of the Islamic State from the boundary, from basically the outskirts of Baghdad to western Syria to this very small enclave, a lot of the most hard core fanatical ruthless fighters of ISIS have ended up in this small area. So, we're not dealing with run of the mill fighters here, many of whom who have left. We are talking about the real hard core who are putting up, according to this commander, point of fight.</s>GORANI: And what about, of course, the U.S. President and the reiterated his pledge, what difference would it make to those on the ground fighting forces, what difference would it make to them when American troops withdraw?</s>WEDEMAN: Well, according to sort of the number the pentagon puts out, there's around 2000 U.S. special forces in Syria. And what we saw when we were up in the front is that coalition aircraft are very active and present in the skies over this small enclave. Now, the worry is when this force leaves, that there will be a power vacuum, a power vacuum which traditionally ISIS has been able to exploit through a -- through sort of intimidation and terrorism. And what we've seen in Syria over the last six months is a wave of assassinations of people connected with the anti- coalition, the anti-ISIS forces, people who are in local government. And we can see also in Iraq, uptick in the amount of terrorist attacks on the government and government facilities there. So, very much a danger of a power vacuum being filled by is yet again. So, yes, an important battle may soon be over, but the war against ISIS is not. Hala?</s>GORANI: Certainly not. Thanks very much, Ben Wedeman, live inside Syria. Mr. Trump also made some big news on North Korea in his state of the union speech. He announced when his next summit with Kim Jong-un will take place, praising their warm personal relations. CNN's Will Ripley has that story.</s>WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: President Trump continues to be optimistic about North Korean denuclearization, so optimistic, in fact, he's moving forward with a second summit with Kim Jong-un in Vietnam three weeks from now. At his state of the union, President Trump touted the results of what he called his bold new diplomacy.</s>TRUMP: Our hostages have come home. Nuclear testing has stopped, and there has not been a missile launch in more than 15 months. If I had not been elected President of the United States, we would right now, in my opinion, be in a major war with North Korea. Much work remains to be done, but my relationship with Kim Jong-un is a good one.</s>RIPLEY: Despite that good relationship as the President said, there certainly is a lot of work to be done. We heard from a U.N. Security Council diplomatic source who shared with us a confidential report that was released last week. It says that North Korea's nuclear program not only remains intact with missiles ready to launch at any time, but you have these satellite images showing that North Korea has been expanding key missile bases that could potentially pose a threat to American troops in this region. North Korea, they are also accused in this U.N. report of moving around ballistic arsenal trying to guard against military strikes. How would they do that? Using civilian airports like in Pyongyang. I've flown into it many times. They use it to test ballistic missiles. To be clear, bolstering missiles, it's not a violation of any written agreement with the U.S. although some say it goes against the spirit of the Singapore summit. Speaking of sanctions, this U.N. report also accuses North Korea of brazenly violating U.N. Security Council sanctions to the point that they have become ineffective. The allegations, illegal ship to ship transfers of petroleum products and coal. One transfer worth 5 1/2 million dollars. Also accused of violating an arms embargo with the middle east and Africa. They say sanctions shouldn't be in place at all. They point to steps they say they have already taken. Probably the most dramatic was one I witnessed last May, they blew up the tunnel entrances at a test site. North Korea has also returned American detainees. They have handed over Korean war remains. They have continued a year long pause in missile testing. Despite all that, just last month in the United States, the Pentagon's missile defense review called North Korea an extraordinary threat to the U.S. a lot to talk about when President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un meet in Vietnam later this month. Will Ripley, CNN, Hong Kong.</s>GORANI: Certainly, a lot to talk about. Still to come tonight, the governor of Virginia, the lieutenant governor, and now the attorney general all embroiled in scandals. We'll tell you all about them next.