they didn t do it. the russian government says they didn t do it. a chemical attack in a town held by the syrian government. syrian officials have their own explanation that the rebels did it. that they poisoned and killed those children in such a horrific way to convince other countries to get their milita militaries involved in this civil war, fred planken is the only american reporter in damascus. reporter: i don t think anybody s buying that the rebels themselves were behind this. it s interesting because we were speaking about there last night and how this whole event unfolded. witnesses said that a syrian government helicopter flew over
the region. they do not want to see the north korean regime collapse. that is their worst case scenario for instability right on their doorstep. so while everyone s looking for stability, especially as we come up on the olympics in south korea after the new year, it may be that the u.s. and the chinese have a very different view of what that stability and what that diplomacy may look like in the coming weeks. brianna. cnn s barbara star. thank you. secretary of state tillerson stated flatly in his new york times op-ed today that russia has meddled in the u.s. election and that the u.s. has a poor relationship with russia. let s go live now to moscow and fred planken. i wonder what the reaction is like there, fred. reporter: well, it s a pretty harsh words coming from the russians, brianna. it was the spokeswoman for the foreign ministry, she came out
thought that russia and china were getting too influential on the world stage. the spokeswoman for the foreign ministry also saying that she believed that the language that secretary of state tillerson was using would not work with russia. she called it a language of coercion and of trying to use economic influence to use power against russia. there was one other thing that you wrote in that op-ed, where secretary of state tillerson said the one place that russia and the u.s. could cooperate was in syria and the future of syria. on that point we reached out to the kremlin and got in touch with a spokesman for vladimir putin and he told us as far as the russians are concerned, there is no cooperation between the u.s. and russia in syria. as you can see, some of the warm words we ve heard recently between president trump and vladimir putin doesn t look as though that s translating to policy differences when you look at the every day politics between the russia and the u.s., dana. it su
back with our world lead. a stern rebuke delivered from one to moscow. in a blistering new york times editorial, secretary of state rex tillerson aid quote, we have no illusions about the regime we are dealing with. the united states today has a poor relationship with a resurgent russia that has invaded it s neighbors in the last decade and undermined the sovereignty of western nations by meddling in our elections and others. i m going to get right to cnn s senior international correspondent, fred planken who is in moscow. and fred, the kremlin i m guessing didn t take kindly to tillerson s comments today. reporter: no, they certainly didn t. the russians in general really lashing out at the u.s. and secretary of state tillerson on various levels, dana. on the one hand they called the op-ed itself confrontational and even fake news and accused secretary of state tillerson of trying to drive a wedge between russia and china because he
the normal in these g20 protests. the president for his part, his motorcade whipped by all of it, he didn t see a thing, pamela. long night as fred pointed out as well. they have miles to go in their protest, jeff, live in hamburg, germany, thank you very much for that. so it s what everybody seems to be talking about, except the president, will he confront vladimir putin for ordering cyber attacks? the latest and how it could shape the world as we keep an eye on the protests that have turned violent in some areas. you re looking at live pictures right near the g20 in hamburg, germany, stay with us, we ll be back.