this is eastern turkey. van is the largest settlement in eastern turkey. at that time its peak it had about 700,000 people in it during the summer. beautiful like,ab

this is eastern turkey. van is the largest settlement in eastern turkey. at that time its peak it had about 700,000 people in it during the summer. beautiful like, absolutely gorgeous place to be. after the earthquake everybody who could leave, did. so what you have left are those that are either die-hards, the people that are the leaders of the community that want to rebuild, or people that couldn't leave. and that's really telling because when you look at these pictures you're going to see abdomen abject poverty. that's not really what it was before the earthquake so it went from bad to worse for these people. but what you saw time and time again is they were out and rebuilding and carrying on and i think that says a lot about people in general and that's the next take away, is that no matter if you look at van turkey, you go to china, you go to india or you go to the united states, go up to the dakotas, you go to missouri, you go to joplin, what you find is that people are more resilient than we give them credit for being. people will will come out in t

trained to form a defect of kurdistan but it stretches from northern iraq, northwestern syria, to eastern turkey. >> but it's not just the pkk that worries turkey. it is also concerned about allegations syrian troops have used chemical weapons. this year, nato sent six missile batteries to southern turkey to intercept any missiles that would stretch across the border. ankara wants more. it has repeatedly called for nato to send troops into syria to secure the stockpiles of chemical weapons. >> the biggest threat is either by the regime or some of the rebel groups, if these weapons are passing into the hands of the scripps, you may never know where they may end up or may day -- if these weapons end up in hands of these groups, you never know where they may end up. >> turkey is left grappling with the growing conflict. officials are frustrated that our four countries like the u.s. are not showing the same enthusiasm for an aggressive role to end the conflict in syria. their argument here is that a prolonged conflict may spread and there would be one of the first country to be affected. al jazeera

they say they want for 15 days from their bases in southern eastern turkey before arriving in northern iraq. as they rest, the group's commander warns of a new fight. the turkish government has to sit down and grant the kurds the rights and treat them as equal citizens. what is important is they have to free our leader. if that does not happen, we will not stop fighting. >> many of these fighters do not trust the current -- the turkish government. that is why many say they will not lay down their weapons. this is the closest we can get to the iraq-turkey border. turkey is about two hours walking from where i am now. these fighters have just arrived now in iraq he territory. they came with their weapons, and they will be stationed in their different paces in the kurdish region of northern iraq. >> as these rebels slowly disappear into the mountains to their secretive locations, the process of withdrawing the estimated 2500 fighters left in turkey could take months to complete. he's a field commander. he says the turkish government has to implement constitutional reforms to grant kurds m

she is a career diplomat who has served in several middle eastern hot spots, including syria and iraq, as well as kuwait and turkeyl faces a full senate confirmation. more fallout from those automatic success ter spending cuts. the defense secretary chuck hagel says most of the pentagon's 800,000 workers will have to take 11 days off without pay in july. broke the news town hall meeting in virginia. he says he tried everything to avoid the furloughs. he may still be able to shorten them. truth be told he has shortened them. the original estimate was for twice as much unpaid leave. the automatic spending cuts took effect in march after the white house and congress failed to cut a deal to prevent them. a -- well. >> iran is now the newly elected rotating chair of the united nations conference on disarmament. yes, iran. it's a move that the u.s. mission to the united nations is calling unfortunate and highly inappropriate. as you know doubt know, the united nations and the united states and the european union have all accused iran of trying to build nuclear weapons. iran claims its pursuing only for peaceful use of n