join isis and kill the president of the united states. authorities caught on just in time. 100 nuclear weapons in the hands of north korea. experts warn the worst case scenario could be a few years away.

and the madonna mishap that has people around the world saying aww. welcome, everyone. thanks for joining us whether you're watching in the u.s. or around the world. i'm errol barnett. >> i'm rosemary church. this is "cnn newsroom." we begin this hour in new york where three men are facing terror-related charges over a long list of planned crimes including attacking police and the fbi, hijacking a jetliner to fly to isis territory, and assassinating president obama. >> two of the men appeared in a brooklyn courtroom after their arrest wednesday. the same day they were scheduled to fly to turkey. cnn's justice correspondent pamela brown has details on what allyegedly had planned. >> reporter: the fbi says one of the men arrested today boasted

about wanting to kill president obama and blow up coney island in new york city. another man proposed shooting police and fbi agents. plans they allegedly said they put in place if they weren't able to join notice is syria. >> two of the individuals were seeking to fly to syria. one was arrested at the international airport, jfk airport, as he was ready to board the flight. a second individual had a later flight scheduled. >> reporter: in court documents prosecutors point to sdfrgz on line including one last -- conversations on line including one last summer where he wrote about his desire to "shoot obama and get shot ourselves. will it due? that will strike fear in heart of infidels." that post brought fbi agents to his front door. >> they came as members of the joint terrorism task force, they identified them as such. >> reporter: even after been interviewed by the fbi, he began communicating with an isis website administrator in iraq who encourage him to join the

terrorist group overseas according to court documents. investigators say later communications revealed the two men began coordinating travel to turkey often seen as a gateway into syria by foreign fighters. >> to prove a conspiracy, you only have to show that there's been a material effort or forward step in furtherance of the conspiracy. clearly those communications would indicate that there's been a forward step in the conspiracy. >> reporter: in court documents released both suspects are accused of purchasing roundtrip tickets to turkey with the help of their friend who allegedly provided more than $1,000 for their travel. one of the men told a confidential informant if he was detect detected at the airport, they could kill police officer and use the officer's gun to shoot other law enforcement officers that arrived on scene. pamela brown, cnn, washington. a syrian rights activist

says even more christians have been abducted by isisa the terror group takes more towns and villages in northeastern syria. the assyrian rights network representative says close to 300 people have been kidnappeded and 5,000 have fled their homes. one of his own relatives have been kidnapped. ian lee has been following the developments on the story and joins us live from cairo with the latest. we should note that because of syria's years' long civil war and large parts of the country under isis control it is difficult to get a clear picture of what's happening there. help us out. what do we know about the fate of the asyrian christians kidnapped earlier? >> reporter: that's right. it is hard to get the specific details out of there. we get a lot of it there the rights groups that give us this instructions. we know the attack did take place in the eastern part of syria, along a string of village

running north and south up to the turkish border. in the southwest part there's a mountain range. that's where isis fighters were in control of the area. and they were able to push out a wide p.g. kurdish fighters as well as christian militias from the villages. we're told the fighters, the ypg and christian militias were able to push back and retake control of parts of the villages. but what we're hearing as well as that they have -- you know up 90 to hundreds of people who have been taken prisoner, we don't have a specific number you know. isis hasn't released that. but isis we know in the past has given christians a real simple choice -- convert, run, or die. so the fate of these christians remains unknown. >> all right. ian lee live in cairo this morning just approaching five minutes past 9:00 there. thanks.

rosemary. isis is extending its reach well beyond the middle east which is why u.s. and british forces are operating in chad now. they are trying to prevent the radical islamist group boko haram from teaming up with isis. arwa damon reports. >> reporter: nighttime, and nigerian special navy forces gather around a campfire. the drop in temperature a much-needed break from the stifling heat and intense training. for the nigerian troop and their chadian counterparts this annual exercise flint lock, is a chance to train alongside american and british elite forces. and now is more important than ever. >> no one can do it alone. >> reporter: colonel george steebs a commaner in west africa. >> few have the resources to bring together to be successful. that's why we stress the regional and bringing it

together. >> reporter: though chad and nigeria are at war with an extremist group intent on establishing its own islamic state in africa. boko haram already has ties to al qaeda and the islamic manage reco. logistics and training. but also it increasingly appears that boko haram is trying to model itself after isis. declaring its support but not yet its allegiance. and the u.s. wants to prevent the murky ties from further solidifying. >> obviously a near they would all kind of coalesce and kind of get -- right now if they're separate divide and conquer would be an easier approach to do that. that's why i again focus on a regional approach to help isolate it and to prevent that from happening. >> reporter: a scenario that would potentially create even more widespread brutality than has already been witnessed in recent years. preventing that means focusing on the regional approach. building relationships here is key.

>> the threat can be centrally taking care of it a smaller level. obviously it benefits us all. why will we take care it in the united states if we could have taken care of it outside of the united states? >> reporter: jarwa damon, cnn. we're also following developments out of afghanistan. the taliban has now claimed responsibility for an explosion outside the rannan embassy in -- iranian embassy in kabul. we see smoke pouring out of a police vehicle there. a spokesman says a suicidebarrassment blew up a car after crashing into another vehicle. at least one person was killed, and another was injured. just ahead, you are watching "cnn newsroom." isis has brought in millions of dollars by selling oil on the black market. that's not the only way they make money. we'll take a closer look at the terror group's finances ahead. drones spotted hovering over paris two nights in a row.

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ukraine could have its gas supply from russia off in a few days. they say they haven't received payment and may be forced to recti. the streets of ukraine were relatively calm after a sign that a cease-fire could be holding. there are reports that russian separatists are eyeing their next target in mariupol. we have more live. diana, it is calmer in eastern

ukraine, and that is of course good news. what do you know of reports of pro-russian rebels maying planning to take mariupol? >> reporter: well it's certainly a lot of people's speculation. they've been speculating about that possibility for many months. mariupol makes an obvious target because it's this important port on the sea. and if pro-russian rebels were to take it there would effectively be a land corridor from the russian border all the way through to crimea. that will involve taking a huge amount of territory. and mariupol itself is a completely different proposition. a much bigger city than anything that the pro-russian rebels have taken to date. that doesn't stop people on the ground worrying that it might happen. let's take a look. pro-russian rebels pull their armor back from the front. it's not following protest colo. they haven't said what's going where. but it's a start. france on wednesday said it will

toughen sanctions on russia if pro-russian rebels target this city mariupol. feared next in line if the cease-fire fails and there's fill fighting in a -- there's still fighting in a nearby village. the shelling is 15 kilometers that direction. this area has been shelled in the past scores killed just around the arounder -- around the corner a few weeks ago. you see some of the straifing on this building. in this block of flats, there isn't much to protect you yawn a concrete wall and glass. we were here in september. then this family were asking advice where best to hide from incoming fire. we're surprised to find them still here. most other families have left. seven guard in their stair -- stand in their stairwell. "when the shelling's not that loud, it's okay," she says. "when it gets louder i get

scared for my grandma and grandpa because they won't leave." the grandmother shows me her icon of the virgin mary. one in every room. "i don't know what will happen next," she says "but so far we've been safe." that's how this war has worn people down in the east living as best they can, fearing they have nowhere else to go. "who would take us europe?" this lady says, "they don't need us over there, what jobs would we need to get? we only know russian and ukrainian." mariupol would be hard to take. a city of half a million crucial to ukraine's economy. kiev has massively upped its defensive positions around the city. and things are calming down. the number of cease-fire violations casualties down over the past days. "this war can't last forever,"

this man says. "they'll shoot out all the shells and then there will be peace." a prospect that can't come soon enough for ukraine'ser to. ed east. -- ukraine'stor. tormented east. we have had lulls before and then the fighting picked up again. it's difficult to predict when may happen. it would appear now with the ukrainian currency, the area in free fall and more threats on the gas situation for ukraine with russia saying that unless ukraine makes more advanced payments it won't get the good that it needs, this war is shifting from the military to the economic front. rosemary? >> yeah. we are watching both fronts. diana magnay reporting from mariupol in eastern ukraine. many thanks. the spokesman for russian president vladimir putin spoke to our own christiane amanpour, denying accusations that

moscow's backing rebels. he shed light on future relations between russia and the u.s. listen to this. >> let me ask you finally to reflect on the status of your relations with the west. i ask you this because a couple of years ago when last interviewed you you talked about america being an important partner of russia that america and russia working together of important for you know solving many of the world's difficult and intractable problems. you know this going back a decade or so when president putin of first president, there was close cooperation on a variety of issues. do you believe that president putin hopes to return to that kind of status or has he given up on that for good now? >> well quite unexpectedly let's be frank. quite unexpectedly lots of water has passed under the bridge since that time.

[ laughter ] we have witnessed tremendous changes in the global environment, in international relationships. we have witnessed a tremendous clash of interests, interests in the heart of europe and ukraine. >> now for those of you watching cnn international, you can watch the rest of that interview with dimitri petrov spokesman and right-hand man to vladimir putin on "amanpour" tonight at 6:00 in hong kong 7 dplk tokyo. a scary man for a man in new hampshire when he gets buried in snow. the dramatic story coming up. >> noticed the snow rushing off the metal roof and just ended up kind of in the avalanche effect.

hampshire when he gets buried in after a second straight night of drone sightings in paris, authorities there are on high alert. >> cnn's samuel burke hit the city streets to see if he could do a bit of drone spotting of his own. >> reporter: police out on the streets of paris to see if it's been a third consecutive night of those mysterious drones hovering above the city parisians on edge after the drones were spotted over some of the most important sights to this country. this is a city that's still

reeling from the terrorist attacks. and it leaves some parisians wondering what the worst case scenario is for the drones. explosives possibly surveying targets. though french authorities are downplaying those fears, that said they're stepping up enforcement of the long-standing ban of drones in the city arresting three al jazeera journalists who they allege were using drones within city limits. joerz says they were filming a story about this mystery. now french authorities say this has been a wake-up call to them not just because of what's happening now but the ever-increasing capacity of what are essentially over-the-counter drones. samuel burke, cnn, paris. >> a new term, over-the-counter drones. several states across the southeastern u.s. are under winter storm warnings in the latest round of nasty weather. >> mississippi several cities have declared curfews because of the unusual moon of snow and ice there. >> in maine, heavy snowfall caused a massive pileup of more

than 70 cars. the interstate will shut down for five hours while the wreckage was cleared. more than 1,-500 flights have been canceled in and out of the u.s. according to flight aware, but not all of those are weather related. the most effective airports are in the south. this of a scary story. a man just trying to clear snow from his roofened up buried and trapped for more than three hours. >> drew mullens says the snow collapsed on top of him, trapping him on his back. fortunately, his wife found him and called the firefighters to dig him out. >> i was thinking about my wife and my daughter and thinking that i'm not going out this way. you know i'm glad that i'm here. glad that i'm here. >> wow. it took at least nine firefighters to dig him out. we're thankful they did. >> wow. that's an unbelievable story. we have pedram javaheri

here. we top talk about parts of alabama where there's been a lot of snow. what's the situation there? we haven't seen a lot here. >> certainly the city of atlanta was able to get out of the vast majority of the snow for all of it coming in across -- >> we caught a little yesterday. one of theed models said zero inches -- >> coming to stay in the hotel, right? >> reporter: absolutely. better safe than sorry for some. this image on social media. eric brown from athens alabama sharing with us an igloo they built -- >> my big head in the way. there you go. >> pretty impressive sight across alabama. up to ten inches has come down in northern alabama. certainly historic by their records when it comes to what they've seen the past 24 hours. mississippi into tennessee northern georgia, as well seeing heavy snow showers. notice watches and warnings being concentrated toward the mid-atlantic states as some snow showers left in the forecast. radar imagery looks as such, really beginning to quiet across the south. nashville a few flurries northern areas of georgia a few

flurries. won't be surprised if we get a couple more flakes in the region. atlanta, way too warm. 36 degrees, just going north of the city on the order of 20 or so miles, five to six inches on the ground in the northern suburbs of the city. here's what's in the forecast over the next 24 hours. northern north carolina southern virginia could still see impressive snowfall. in fact charlotte's douglass national airport, 500 flights canceled preemptively heading into thursday. the forecast across some cities in the south looks as such with residual snow showers by the afternoon hours. just about everyone gets to be too warm for any of that to stick if it did fall in your neighbor. here we go across the southern hemisphere of sao paolo. this time yesterday we were touching on how sao paolo has seen historic drought. 80 years as far as the longest drought -- since they've seen a drought this bad. want to show what happened since yesterday. impressive rainfall on the order of 100 millimeters in one hour has come down. one person lost his life cross this region you but the flooding literally taking over the streets there.

cars trapped in the water. and again, you get too much rainfall in a short time period the end result becomes something like this. there is more rain in the forecast across that region. and again, good news in the way of rainfall coming in to play. unfortunately it comes in too fast across this region as well. take a look at this image. got to share this image with you. getting you out of the cold doom and gloom weather across the eastern united states. this is just a couple of hours ago. our technical director for this very program who left the southern united states is in maui hawaii as we speak. he sent the photograph. rubbing it in, indeed. 7 degrees. about 25 celsius out -- 76 degrees. about 25 celsius out there. a few minutes' drive from the wailea area in hawaii. how about that? >> that's where we'll like to be. >> but the hotel here out of cnn center is where we will be. >> just as good. just as good. >> with all that san and salt.

no snow. okay. i won't rub it in. >> yes. >> okay. thank you very much. we do want to actually go to the brit awards because everybody -- >> we saw this -- >> everyone's talking about this. of course it's madonna who stole the show with that dreadful fall. >> take a look. ♪ >> and you see it right there. madonna wearing a cape is yanked down a flight of stairs in the middle of that performance. >> that's why i leave my cape at home. fortunately -- >> no you don't. >> the 56-year-old was able to get back up moments later and finish her song. this proves that she was singing live as well. she posted this to her instagram account, "my cape of tied too tight. thanks for your good wish. i'm fine." >> the reaction on twitter of immediate. cher tweeted, "this is something we all dread. image, give you -- madge, i give you props. you are a champ for finishing

your song." >> another not as nice "ambulance for granny please," he wrote. >> nasty. boy george shot back at the trolls and he said this "that was a hard fall but she got on with it. all these comments about being old -- so lame!" i agree. ridiculous. >> when the live performance goes wrong, you node keep going. >> do you know how many times i dropped this clicker? it happens. >> so painful when you do it. >> it is. you've got to get down, pick it up drink away. >> keep going. >> all right. thanks. all right. this is "cnn newsroom." still to come this hour, prince william embarks on a week-long visit to japan and china. we'll fine out which spots he'll be visiting along the way. back in a moment.

in our house, we do just about everything online. and our old internet just wasn't cutting it. so i switched us from u-verse to xfinity. they have the fastest, most reliable internet. which is perfect for me, because i think everything should just work. works? works. works! works? works. works. a warm welcome back to viewers in the u.s. and around the world. i'm errol barnett. >> i'm rosemary church. we want to update you on our top stories now. >> cnn has just learned a turkish military vehicles of the target of the suicide attack in kabul. the vehicle was hit outside the iranian embassy next to the

turkish embassy. iran's foreign ministry condemned the attack but says no iranian staff were hurt. the explosion killed at least one person and injured another. the taliban is claiming responsibility. the world health organization says 99 new ebola cases were confirmed in west africa down from the week before. most of them were in sierra leone which has 63. that marks an end to a steep decline in cases there. three men in new york face terror charges for plans to hijack a jetliner and join isis. one of the men even talked about assassinating u.s. president barack obama. two of the suspects plan to fly to turkey on wednesday. authorities say the third man helped organize and finance the operation. the human rights activist who says isis has taken 150 assyrian christians hostage in syrias says he fears the hostages are in mortal damage. asomea edward, founder of the

assyrian human rights network, says he expects a message from isis soon threatening those prisoners. the recent drop in oil prices has cut into one of isis' main sources of funding. but it's not just black market oil sales that finance the terror group. >> senior correspondent from lion. >> reporter: oil, trafficking, trading antiquities, all allegedly sources of isis funding. how much are they making? they're believed to be the best resourced terror organization in the world. after months of coalition air strikes, how isis' revenue streams holding up? oil was their main source of funding. and in the summer of 2014 isis made between $2 million and $3 million a day through the sale of smuggled oil. the major refineries have been high-value targets for coalition strikes. activists on the ground tell us isis is increasingly reliant on

primitive refineries that are smaller and easier for them to run like this one east of the city. sources inside iraq say that revenue from selling smuggled oil is down from two $250,000 and half a million dollars of. >> as the air strikes begin late september, isis began diversifying into selling off syria's priceless heritage. >> in the spring and summer of 2014 isis' involvement in looted antiquities was simply to tax the activities of existing sort of looters, people who were on the ground essentially looting these sites. they would come along and take a share of profits. by the end of the summer and into the fall and winter of 2014 they were doing it for themselves. if you're going to be investing your own money into something, there must be a -- a sizable return for you. otherwise, you wouldn't be doing it. >> reporter: the u.s. treasury says foreign donations continue

to be a smaller revenue source yet important. used to ferry fighters and bring them in from the middle east and north africa into iraq and syria. much of the foreign donations alleged to flow in from the united states. isis acts like a mafia, confiscatesing the land of accused government collaborators, charging protect money, ransoming hostages to an estimated tune of $20 million in 2014. bank robbery/bank seizures estimated to bring in $500 million setting up aterry checkpoints. all these generate revenue. the claims of organ trafficking though have net to be substantiated. revenue from taxes can be as high as 20%, most residents told us. but the activist group is being slaughtered silencely saying they tax for provision of basic services like water and electricity. they gouge the population in the areas under their control.

all this is reliant on the crucial routes between raqqa and mosul and a clear route to turkey through international markets. this is believed to be via the border gate. while isis may be better funded than any terror group before it it's also the first terror group to tampa to operate as a fighting force and as a civilian administration with six million people living in a territory the size of neighboring jordan. in addition to the tens of thousands of fighters it has to clothe and feed. its outlays are substantial. and the loss of their oil revenue has to hurt. cnn, london. a former jihadi activist who is still in contact with extremists in the middle east says the world may be underestimating the ambitions of isis in libya. >> ar man dean once infiltrated al qaeda and began working as an

undercover agent for the u.k. government. now he heads up a business in dubai. >> reporter: you have said you believe that isis has great expansion plans in libya. tell us why you believe that. >> libya a failed state, but it has several against that makes isis extremely keen in having a presence there. it has huge amount of weaponry out of control of the government there. it has a human pool of recruits. human ones. at the same time it has huge amounts of coastline and able to receive money, equipment, to smuggle weapons out of and into. >> another interesting point dean made. he says a high-ranking isis official recently arrived in libya to rally the faithful there. now to this other story

we're watching. the build-up to the israeli prime minister's visit to washington next week is getting more tense. >> benjamin netanyahu will be at the cap will to where he's planning to speak against the west attempts to secure a nuclear deal with iran. israel views the nuclear program as a threat to its security. >> translator: from the agreement coming together it appears that they have given up on this commitment, and they are accepting with iran. gradually in a few years would develop the means to create material for the public sector of very many nuclear weapons. >> meanwhile, u.s. secretary of state john kerry is telling critics of a potential nuclear deal to wait and see what comes of the negotiations. >> his comments are seen by some as a swipe at mr. netanyahu's objections to the deal being negotiated with iran. >> i can't state this more

firmly. the policy is iran will not get a nuclear weapon. and anybody running around right now jumping into n to say well we don't like the deal, this or that doesn't know what the deal is. there is no deal yet. >> and some important background to this. republican house speaker john boehner invited mr. netanyahu to washington without consulting the white house. some u.s. democratic lawmakers plan to skip the prime minister's address next week because they say it will directly oppose diplomatic efforts are iran. the prime minister says he regrets the politically charged tone of the visit. now for some startling predictions on north's nuclear capabilities. which one high-ranking u.s. representative calls deeply concerning. brian todd explains the new intelligence. >> reporter: he's erratic, violent, and now an alarming new report that says kim jong-un's nuclear arsenal is growing at a

dangerous rate. >> they could end up with 100 nuclear weapons by the end of 2020. >> reporter: the information comes from the institute of science and national security headed by weapons inspector david al2009 and the u.s./korea institute. they believe north already has 10 to 15 nuclear bombs and is racing to build more. a senior u.s. official tells cnn this poses "a serious threat to the united states. " while u.s. intelligence isn't giving hard numbers on north korean nuclear weapons, the top army officer told wolf blitzer he's concerned. >> the thing we watch is the ballistic missile threat. that's what gives you capability if they ever happen to have the capability to have nuclear weapons as the ability to deliver those. ripe according to the latest -- >> reporter: according to the latest report kim jong-un already has the capability. >> in fact they can put a war head on a missile that can reach south korea and japan.

>> reporter: how close is north to placing a nuclear war head on a missile that can hit the united states? >> they've got to get a warhead small enough to fit in this part of the reentry vehicle if they want to increase the range. they may have to miniaturize it further. >> reporter: it's a mystery how long it will take kim to do that. north korea's been developing its secret nuclear program for decades, starting with the assistance of a notorious mercenary. who's the culprit? who helped them? >> for the gas centrifuge problem, they had immense help from pakistan and associates. i doubt if they amy have a centrifuge program today if they hadn't gotten the incredibly important starter kit. >> reporter: the father of pakistan's nuclear program, believed to have sole nuclear secrets to north korea, iran libya. the concern now -- 100 nuclear bombs in the hands of this unpredictable leader who the fbi says launched a devastating cyberattack inside the u.s. >> he's violent he's brutal. he's ruthless. what i'm worried about is not

nuclear detonation but him selling nuclear weapons to countries like iran and syria and then these weapons making their way to the hands of the terrorists. >> reporter: could america have prevented north korea's build-up of nuclear weapons? david albright says the white house hasn't taken the same forceful action it took with north korea than it did with iran. hasn't pressured them with tough enough sanctions to force them to negotiate in a meaningful way. a white house official counters telling us they've imposed some of the most biting sanctions in the world against north korea. that the obama administration is holding kim's regime to its promise to get rid of nuclear weapons. and that it will deter and defend against this threat. brian todd, cnn, washington. prince william heads to asia for a week-long trip to asia and china. a grownbreaking visit to both countries. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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and that it will deter and

prince william, the doug of cambridge, begins his week-long visit to japan and china today. >> he's visiting tokyo and will head to china on march 1st. and he's making the trip without kate and son, prince george. >> cnn's max foster's closely monitoring the prince's visit to asia. >> he joins with us more on what we can anticipate during the trip. talk about what prince william is hoping to achieve in the

course of his first visit to japan and why this is being considered groundbreaking. >> reporter: well this is his first tripoli japan. there's a fascination with british royals. even though they've got their own royal family there. so that's one thing. but it's about building ties between the youck and japan. he'll be involved in government-organized events to try to boost trade between the countries. this is also about promoting his own interests, as well. there are some points this tour which are delicate. he's currently just arrived. he's going to be going to a tea house. he'll be served green tea by a grandmaster. not the normal after tea. that's a traditional welcome in japan. and then on saturday he's actually going to go up to fukushima prefecture where of course they had the nuclear disaster. and he's going to go there with a prime minister. and he's going to go to a school playground and meet local food. that's giving a positive message of the recovery of the area.

certainly something that the prime minister wants to highlight, and it's an opportunity for him to do it on a global stage with prince william there. but there are some people locally who are still suffering, feel like the area hasn't recovered properly. and it sends a false message about that. we have to say how prince william handles that when he gets there. whether he chooses to highlight some of the problems there as well as some of the things that have gone well. as this often is this tight balancing act that the royals often have to travel. they're with politicians, but they have to stay neutral throughout. that's rather delicate. then when he goes on to china. he -- the cause closest to his heart is the consumption of illegal wildlife pods. he want to stop poaching in africa. but a lot of the consumption of pods happens in chinatude remedies seen as healing there but have been prove wrong by science. he wants to tackle that without offending the chinese. this is a long-term plan for him. i think this is the first step in building a relationship with

china. so he can start to tackle the problem with him as opposed to saying there's a real problem here. >> both trips entail this delicate balancing operation particularly in china. that could be fraught with all types of problems if he goes too far on the consumption issue. >> absolutely. he's having a lot of private meetings with conservation leader and opinion former. out in public, it will be emphasizing the positive. for example, heally go to an elephant -- he'll go to an elephant reserve in southern china where they've had great success in bringing the asian elephant back to china. by emphasizing the positive and working with chinese communities rather than against them i think that's how he's hoping to build up change over time. he worked closely with yao ming in tackling shark fin soup in china. that was a successful campaign saying there are no benefits to

shark fin soup. you shouldn't be eating it and that worked rather than telling people it's a really bad thing to do and you're affecting the world in a nasty way by consuming the soup. it's sending the message home that it doesn't always make sense for you either. >> he's quite the diplomat. we'll continue to watch. max foster is monitoring the arrival of prince william. he should arrive for his four-day trip in japan and then after that he is on to china with asia very much in the spotlight. many thanks. fox news host bill o'reilly is defending himself again against accusations that he embellished or straight-out lied about some reporting in the '70s and '80s. he was a correspondent for cbs news. >> he told a story about his photographer being injured while the crew was in argentina. multiple cbs staffers interviewed by cnbc say that man was -- by cnn say that man was never hurt. >> all hell breaks loose.

the people storm the casa rosata. the argentine troops shoot people down in the street. shoot them down. not like rubber bullets or gas. people are dying, all right. anyway i get my crew and grab my crew away. we're down a side street, shooting all this stuff. it's unbelievable. i mean people -- falling, ding ding ding. soldier runs down the street i'm there. photographer gets trampled all right. he's on the ground. i grab him and the camera drag him in through a doorway. the soldier comes up and is standing maybe ten feet away had the m-16 pointed at my head. i thought it was over. i said -- [ speaking foreign language ] >> saying journalists, don't shoot. >> he maintains that story is accurate. the photographer would not comment to cnn. >> we'll continue to watch that story. coming up some people on

the internet are going wild for exploding kittens. how this bizarre cub game turned into one of the biggest crowd funding projects ever. my name is daniel i have diabetic nerve pain. the pain felt like my feet were on fire. i had these very burning ... needle-like sensations. i knew i needed to see a doctor. my doctor said "let's try lyrica." lyrica has helped relieve my pain. it's known that... diabetes damages nerves. lyrica is fda-approved to treat diabetic nerve pain. lyrica is not for everyone. it may cause serious allergic reactions or suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worsening depression, or unusual changes in mood or behavior. or swelling, trouble breathing rash, hives, blisters, changes in eyesight including blurry vision, muscle pain with fever tired feeling, or skin sores from diabetes. common side effects are dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who have had a drug or alcohol

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pretty good. come to transunion.com and get in the know. [bassist] two late nights in tucson. blew an amp.but good nights. sure,music's why we do this,but it's still our business. we spend days booking gigs then we've gotta put in the miles to get there. but it's not without its perks. like seeing our album sales go through the roof enough to finally start paying meg's little brother- i mean,our new tour manager-with real,actual money. we run on quickbooks.tha t's how we own it. we're about to show a fund-raising campaign like you've most likely never seen before. >> the card game "exploding kitten" has set records with its crowd funding game on kick-start

cher helps entrepreneurs fund projects. this project was fully funded in 20 minutes. raised $2 million in 24 hours and $3 million in three days. now with the campaign over, it's raised nearly $9 million and set a record for the most backed project ever. here's how the game works. you set our deck face down and take turn drawing until one of you draws the exploding kitten card. whoever explodes they're dead and out of the game. unless the player has the defuse card which can defuse it like using laser pointers and laser therapy. >> it's the brainchild of matthew inman from the oatmeal comics shane small and amman lee. i asked about the project's wild premise and its success. >> this of to be a weekend -- this was supposed to be a

weekend side project. something to to in between projects as we wrapped up the xbox and looked for something new to do. i thought we would fulfill all themselves rz in my garage with friends paying them in pizza and beer. and we've got a little bit -- gone a little over there expectation now. >> why do you think it went viral? why do you think it took off and is now the 30s biggest kick-starter campaign as far as money raised and the most successful as far as the number of backers you were able to attract? >> well there's a number of reasons. one of the biggest is of course the mad genius of the oatmeal. our third partner, matt inman, who draws and designs the oatmeal. he brought his audience with him to the game. and that's what got us started. that's what got a huge number of people in the door. once they arrived, they found a really good page good website, good game. that got them going. the third part and thing that launched us into the viral

stratus fear --istrates stratusphere we decided to give challenges and send people to the real world and take pictures and write songs and help us create the bits of the game that were missing. >> what advice will you give others who have a concept that's not fully fleshed out yet? they want to use kick-starter to do it but iran sure how? >> kick-starter is an excellent platform to launch a new idea. as long you realize kickstarter is a place to gain co-creators, not to raise money. >> some people could be called jealous of the amount of money you raised. why do you make the point? >> there's so many ways we could have raised money. we could have gone through the publishing route. there were lots of people

willing to give us money. what we realized, what we identified early on is the beauty of kick starter, the power of kick-starter is you get to put an incomplete product in front of people and say, we know this will be perfect if you help us make it that way. >> and that $200,000 team is almost a quarter of a million people who went on line gave you money so you could create this game. we wish you much success. and i hope that your kitten explode for a very long time. >> thank you very much. >> co-creator of this interesting card game. joining us from los angeles. >> a great idea. very collaborative indeed. wonderful. before we go we want to show you this record-breaking catch. dino ferrari hooked this giant catfish last week on the river in northern italy. weighed in at 127 kilos, that's 280 pounds. it was more than 2.5 meters long. that's eight feet nine inches.

>> it is the biggest catfish caught with a rod and reel. took ferrari 40 minutes to land and this is a wells catfish species native to europe. for all of you animal lovers out there, ferrari did let it go free. >> that's what he always does a sportsman, right. you have been watching "cnn newsroom." i'm rosemary church. >> i'm errol barnett. please stay with us. another hour of the world's biggest stories coming up. would you be willing to give up sharing your moments? sacrifice streaming all night long? is it okay to drop a connection, when you need it most? if you're not on the largest, most reliable network, what are you giving up? verizon.

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a real threat. the fbi arrests three metropolitan from new york for trying to join -- three men from new york for trying to join isis. straighten up. a major u.s. airline warns its pilots to to pay better attention after some dangerous mistakes. and ouch -- madonna falls off stage in london. we will explain what happened and how she's doing. welcome to our viewers in the united states and around the world, i'm rosemary church. >> i'm errol barnett. this is "cnn newsroom." we begin this hour in new york where three men are now in custody on terror charges over a list of isis-related plots. >> the fbi says the case is especially alarming because of the level of planning among would-be terrorists in the u.s. pamela brown has the details.