on this edition for saturday, january 18th, how president obama's announcement about intelligence gathering is doing overseas. and india's mission to mars. a source of national pride and controversy. >> go to mars. now i have to go to mars. my people down here in this country have drinking water on every street. and more about who was behind the security breaches behind the nation's retail chains. next on "pbs newshour weekend." >> "pbs newshour weekend" is made possible by lewis coleman.

joyce b. hale. the wallach family, in memory of ira d. wallach. the cheryl and philip milstein family. bernard and irene schwartz. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america. designing customized, individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support is provided by and by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from tisch studios in new york, hari sreenivasan. >> good evening. thanks for joining us. the winter olympics in russia are only three weeks away and there's been another violent clash between russian security forces and militants. authorities said they killed seven of the militants in a shoot-out today. they said those killed were responsible for a grenade and car bomb attack outside a restaurant yesterday that

injured at least 16 people including several policemen. the incident occurred in the mostly muslim region of dagestan. and late last month, more than 30 people were killed in boll get grad. and the death count continues to rise in the aftermath of that attack in kabul, afghanistan, yesterday. police there now believe 21 people including two americans and two canadians were killed after a bomber blew himself up outside the entrance to the restaurant frequented by foreigners. then two gunmen burst inside. three worked for the united nations. and the taliban claimed responsibility. it said the attack was retaliation for a u.s. air strike that reportedly killed eight civilians. the main opposition group voted today to participate in peace talks with the assad regime to try to end the three-year civil war in syria. an estimated 130,000 people have been killed during the conflict. the decision by the syrian

national coalition to participate in the talks was reached during a meeting near istanbul. the talks are set to begin wednesday in switzerland. a team of international inspectors arrived in iran today and will visit two uranium enrichment facilities. the visit comes as the nuclear deal between iran and the major western powers including the united states goes into effect monday. under terms of the deal, iran has agreed to limit uranium enrichment that can lead the on the creation of the nuclear bomb. in exchange, some economic sanctions will be eased. and a new constitution has been ann put into effect. morsi and his supporters from the outlawed muslim brotherhood boycotted the vote which international observers say occurred in an environment diskourping dissent. word from the associated press that before retirement, pope benedict xvi defrocked

priests for sexually abusing children. that represents a sharp increase over previous years due to the vatican's decision to double the statute of limitations on sex crimes. around the world, fires are burning out of control in southern australia where temperatures have topped 100 degrees for the past several days. high winds are complicating the bring the blazes under control. they're the worst there in five years. here in the u.s., that fire burning in southern california has grown to more than 1,800 acres, but authorities now say it is at least 30% contained. and they're hoping to make more progress because of improving weather conditions. there are only light winds in the area today and the humidity is expected to rise by this evening. more than 1,100 firefighters are battling the blaze said to have been started by an illegal campfire. boeing is being sued by more than 80 passengers aboard that airliner that crashed in san francisco last july. the lawsuit alleges that some equipment on the boeing 777 was improperly installed or

defective. according to the suit, that meant the plan's pilots did not get ample warning that it was flying do slowly as it prepared to land. three people were killed, including one run over by a fire truck after it crash landed. a federal judge has struck down a 20011 north carolina law that required doctors show and describe ultrasound images to women before an abortion. the ruling was made public yesterday afternoon. in it u.s. district judge katherine eagle said the state is not authorized to compel a doctor to deliver an ideological message of carrying a pregnancy to term. it was brought to suit by planned parenthood and the center for reproductive rights.

you might have heard about changes to the intelligence gathering procedures and we want to see how that announcement is playing overseas, particularly among the allies. as you will recall some of them including angela merkel were targeted by the spy operations. we're joined from washington by jeff dire from "the financial times." i guess the initial reaction from president obama's speech, what are you hearing? >> it seems to be a cautious welcome. it's a welcome because this is the first time that the president has really addressed some of the concerns that a lot of people in europe and latin america had by the way that the nsa was collecting data on ordinary citizens. this slightly bizarre parallel conversation going on in the u.s., the politicians have been focused on whether or not american's rights have been violated or not. that's their constitutional responsibility. but i gave the impression that it was almost a free-for-all. their e-mails and their text

messages were just fair game. by addressing some the concerns in the speech that was the first time the president had done that. but it's a cautious welcome because there was little detail or substance in there. a lot will be fleshed out in the weeks or months ahead. and people will focus on the issue will be watch fork the actual specifics of what the white house outlines for them. >> now, what are the feelings in germany? i mean, they sort of seem to take it much worse because their prime minister was -- or their chancellor was bugged or tapped. i mean, did they see the relationship between the united states and germany affected adversely because of this? >> some of that was a country in europe, that it got the most attention where the tempers are raised the most. there's the political level, this is not a basis for the u.s. to have a much deeper conversation with chancellor merkel to discuss what the nsa does and how it will change going forward.

this will give the u.s. a chance to start to try and calm things down and repair some of the damage of the relationship. then that's a popular level as well. a lot of people, a lot of public opinion that have been outraged by this. i think some people listened to the speech will be pleased by it. but there's a whole section of the population who is basically offended by the idea of this mass collection and will not be persuaded because the president is putting a few more safeguard here and there. they'll think it's the core underlying collection of the data that is the issue and those people are not persuaded by the speech. >> what about president obama's standing, what's happened to his popularity or favorability ratings in europe? >> more broadly, his popularity has fallen quite a bit. he got a hero's welcome before he became president in places of europe, but before the nsa scandal i would seemed that the things like drones are very controversial in parts of europe. so that's one of the underlying difficulties he has. because one of the core bits of the speech is essentially a

claim by president obama to say trust me and i understand this is an issue. i'm going to get it under control. that sort of pitch about trust me might have worked in europe three or four years ago. but has much less resonance now given he has much less popularity and influence than he did. >> finally one of the things he stressed yesterday, so much for the criticism, a lot of the countries use our intel to keep their people safe. >> absolutely. there's very much a double game going on here. there's genuine outrage, but some of them are playing an angle too. they want the u.s. to spy personally on them less, but give them more information, more heads up about what the nsa is finding out. so there's absolutely -- they're playing an angle here, but you know it's not complete hypocrisy. there's anger on these issues as well. >> all right. thanks so much. >> my pleasure.

and now to our signature segment. this evening, space exploration from an unexpected place. while sending rockets to outer space might bring to mind nasa or russia or china, the indian space program has been building and launching satellites since the 1970s. but india's most current endeavor is much more ambitious. i reported on the indian mission to mars. >> liftoff. >> in early november, india launched a 320 ton rocket on a mission to mars. if all goes accordin to plan, the indian spacecraft will travel 485 million miles over more than ten months and go into the orbit around mars in seventh. the u.s., former soviet union

and the european space agency are the only ones who have accomplished this feat. >> it is a challenge at best. >> dr. radhakrishnan is the director at the indian space research organization. he was looking on when the mars craft in hindi launched. the probe will be studying the atmosphere of mars and looking for traces of methane which could be a sign of previous life. >> not a lot is known about mars, but there are several issues that are yet to be understood. and understood precisely. >> the mission to mars is a source of immense national pride in india, but it might signal a new asian space race and it's triggered a debate about exploring another planet when so many indians struggle for basic necessities. though it has been in existence for nearly 50 years the very fact that india has a space program is unknown to much of the world. but since its inception, india has not only launch a mission to

mars, but sent a probe to the moon and has built and launched 70 satellites to do everything from measuring water resources to enabling mobile communications in rural india. radhakrishnan says at its heart the space program is meant to improve life for india's 1.2 billion people. one is to predict where and when storms will hit land, so people in the storm's path can be taken to safety. in 1999, when a massive storm hit india's east coast, more than 10,000 people died. but a few months ago when another powerful storm hit the same area, only 21 people died. nearly a million people had been evacuated after early warning data from indian satellites. >> the proper use of the observations is to the farmer, and at the other levels. >> how does understanding the atmosphere of mars or whether there was methane help the farmer or the fishermen in

india? >> it's the -- it's not going to help him immediately. >> but he says technology from the mars mission will help improve the satellites india has yet to launch which will directly benefit ordinary indian citizens. but beyond the tangible scientific benefits the feat of sending a rocket to mars has been a huge point of pride for india. as the mars spacecraft left earth's orbit, indians took to twitter to express their excitement. a point echoed by dr. radhakrishnan who says the mission has inspired the nation. >> people have awakened to see how the mars operations are progressing. so if you can plan it so many young minds, we need to take up the academy of science it's a big transformation for the country. for the future. >> and working for the space agency is prestigious. hundreds of thousands of engineers have applied for just a few hundred slots. the pride is also in part for how little india spends to

explore space. the mars mission costs 4.5 billion rupees or just over $70 million. compare that to the maven mission, a similar nasa probe that's en route to mars. that cost nearly 10 times as much. the savings were achieved in part because engineering labor is cheaper. the indian program recycles and adapts components like launch vehicles and builds far fewer models, relying heavily on computer testing. but spending any money on space exploration here is controversial. india is still a developing country where nearly a third of the population, about 400 million people, live on less than a $1.25 a day. brinda adige runs global concerns india focused on women and children here in the slum in the city of bangalore. she said she was sad when she first heard about the mars

mission. >> at one end of the spectrum, so much of money that is being spent to send a rocket out into outer space, when we know that here on earth in my country there are children dying every day because they have no food to eat. so many more spending their days and nights without electricity, no roads, no education. no protection for women and the girl child anywhere in this country. >> do you think that if they didn't spend the money on the satellite that they would spend the money on women and girl's issues? >> no, they would not. the priorities are certainly not looking at children, women, human beings who are a need -- who are in need of basic necessities just to live. >> so you're not against the science. just the priorities? >> yes. >> adige gathered a group of women from the slums who echoed the same concerns.

i asked the group that given the millions being spent on the mission to mars what kind of impact additional money could have in this neighborhood. they described a litany of issues including bad roads, lack of access to medical care, the high cost of education and complaints about sanitation issues like sewage runoff after the rains. and a lack of safe drinking water. one of these women who works as a cook in a nicer part of town took us to her mother-in-law's house and showed the contaminated water that comes out of her pipes. >> all of this water in the house smells terrible. >> it smelled rancid. this is the municipal water the family pays for from the city. they have to spend extra on trucked in clean drinking water. money they don't have. but dr. radhakrishnan defends the indian space program budget. in total about $1 billion a

year. >> on a global level, india's program is incredibly inexpensive. on a local level, it's still very hard for people to comprehend on the streets spending so much money going to a different planet. >> of course, you talk about the $1 billion that is spent annually if it's providing the benefits to the people. space is touching the lives of every man and woman in this country. >> radhakrishnan points out that the entire indian space program accounts for one-third of 1% of the nation's budget. those numbers may make it easier to justify what may be a larger goal. competing with another superpower. last month, china became the third country behind the u.s. and the former soviet union to land a rover on the moon. and china has successfully completed manned space flights. a feat several years away for india. but in going to mars, india

could best its neighbor. the competition is a fuel india is reluctant to admit. in november 2011, a joint chinese russian mars mission failed. >> is there political pressure to keep up with the next door neighbor, china? >> each country has their own priorities. their own vision for the space program. india has its vision, china has its vision. we have our vision. >> it doesn't matter what china does? >> they have their program. >> but it was right after china's failure that the prime minister here said, here's our priority. we're going to mars. >> see, in 2013 if an opportune time for a mission to mars. >> while the indian launch date did capitalize on when the distance between mars and the earth is shorter, to critics like adige this is simply a space race.

>> you have gone to mars, now i have to two to mars. you reach the moon, i must go and see whether there's water on the moon not. whether or not my people have drinking water on this country. the question arises to what end? >> to administrators like dr. radhakrishnan success with the mars mission is another step in helping the world see the red planet and india in a new way. find out what other countries have joined the international space race. visit news house.pbs.org. another story to follow up on tonight is the state of credit card security or lack of it. this following disclosures about major security breaches at target and neiman marcus. now a new details are emerging about who was behind it and how it was accomplished. for more we are joined from washington by mike riley from bloomberg news. it started to lay out the

details, how did these hackers get all of these credit card numbers? >> so they have got a pretty sophisticated piece of malware, the terminal that sits in front of the cash register that we all swipe our cards on. so the malware takes advantage of a quirk within that machine, all the information that comes off that card is sent from one memory chip to another. it's not encrypted in it and it's grabbed right this. >> who's writing the malware? >> it looks like eastern european gangs. some of the most sophisticated hackers in the world are eastern european or russians. they have a supply chain that you can buy pieces of malware so you're good enough as in this case what they did was bought an existing piece of malware. it's a good piece of malware to begin with. but then they customized it. they made it harder to find. then they figured out the scheme to get into target's computers

and stuck it on the system. the same gang or a group of different hackers using the same malware are targeting other retailers, so we haven't seen the end of this. >> soak kay. so what are they doing with the information once they have it? is it sold on the black market? >> yeah. there's an incredibly efficient supply stream that goes from, you know, the -- the theft to the actual sale. so a lot of these are sold in what's called forums. these are websites that you can get on and buy cards in bulk. but it's a pretty sophisticated system so you can actually buy cards based on the country of origin. you can buy cards based on the credit limit you want. in many cases the carder forums will guarantee they haven't been cancelled when you buy them. if you find out they have been cancelled they give you your money back. >> what's the threat to consumers? if the banks are on the hook for

this, besides the inconvenience of getting a new card, what can go wrong? >> yeah. i think this is -- from the consumer point of view, it really is a first of all an inconvenience issue. especially with target and neiman marcus. it happened around the holidays. once of the responses to the hack because it was so big and you had 40 million credit cards from one merchant taken, the card issuers tried to control their losses. which means they were limiting the amount of money you can purchase from one pos system. they were in some cases -- your card would get -- if they identify it has been used fraudulently they'd cancel it and then you had to wait a couple of days to get a new card. normally that's not much of an inconvenience though, but that could have been a big deal. especially if you want to buy a television set, you don't have enough limit on your card. >> all right. mike riley from bloomberg, thanks so much. >> sure.

this is "pbs newshour weekend" saturday. finally tonight, more about a story that newshour first reported last evening, about the death of a japanese war veteran who was ordered never to surrender. >> for nearly three decades he refused to surrender. the japanese soldier was convinced world war ii hadn't ended. but in 1974, in the jungle in the philippines where he had hit f -- hid for all those years his war was finally over. his ageing former commanding officer rescinding the orders he was given as a young soldier never to surrender. in his tattered army uniform he saluted the japanese flag and handing over his samurai sword. he was greeted by some as a hero on his return to japan. he never surrendered.

to him, it would have brought shame. and for a nation reflecting on the war experience, his conduct in the eyes of many brought with it a deep sense of pride. >> the japanese military by the time they -- the training is brutal. the training is very hierarchical. he was trained as an intelligence officer not to die. and the last order he was given as far as i understand was, you know, you will go there and you will not surrender. you will stay alive. and until you get the order countermanding this. >> one emerged from the jungle in 1950 and the other two died. one in 1972 in clashes with local troops. on order to return to the philippines he was granted a pardon there. although some never forgive him for the 30 people he killed. he died in tokyo, amed 91.

neil conroy, itn news. join us tomorrow on air and online. college students going after computer hackers. >> is it ever the case that you have a student discover something that nobody knew about in the middle of the se mountain wester? -- semester? >> that's actually a course remir requi requirement. >> i'm hari sreenivasan. thanks for watching.

"pbs newshour weekend" is made possible by lewis b. cullman and louise hirschfeld cullman. judy and josh westin. joyce hale, the wallach family, in memory of miriam and ira d. wallach, cheryl and philip milstein family. bernard and irene schwartz. rosalind p. walter. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america. designing customized, individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support is provided by and by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. be more.

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