African rituals play out. no surprise for a man who so easily bridged differences. robyn curnow, cnn, johannesburg, south africa. we ll have much more on nelson mandela, his life and his legacy, that s coming up later this hour. i want to go back to carol right now. truly amazing man. i ve often said it was probably the most powerful interview i ever did and i ve been doing this for a long time, when i sat down with nelson mandela in capetown in the presidential residence back in 1998 and i could just feel what he had done to prevent civil war, a blood bath, in south africa. it was really an amazing experience for me. it s amazing to me, you know, he always appeared so charming and so friendly, but i m sure his mind was a steel trap and behind the scenes he was much different because he was so politically savvy. could you see both sides to him when you interviewed him, wolf? he could not have been more
Snubs and rising disagreement over syria, the u.s. and russian president met face to face for the first time in three years on the sidelines of the g-20 summit in mexico. neither leader looked at each other while making cursory remarks after the meeting. the body language suggested the gaps in their position had not been bridgeed and the relationship may not have been reset. finally, as this president mentioned we discussed syria, where we agree that we need to see stop to violence, that is a political process has to be created. to prevent civil war. it wasn t exactly a bear hug. but it lasted two hours with the rising speckor of civil war in syria and reports that russia is preparing to send twonail ship and marine to the report of tartus as a backdrop. from my perspective, we have been able to find many commonalities pertaining to
Obama s statement. he bit his lip and stared down at the floor. it s our understanding they never caught each other s eyes. still the leaders claim to be on the same page on some things. we agree we need to see a cessation of the violence. that a political process has to be created. to prevent civil war and the kind of horrific depths that we have seen over the last several weeks. shepard: of course, the evidence shows a civil war is already well underway. syria s leader bashar assad has been coordinating a vicious crackdown on its own people for more than a year now. witnesses say its forces have killed thousands upon thousands of civilians. and russia has indeed been supporting the syrian regime. in fact last week the secretary of state hillary clinton said moscow had dramatically escalated the crisis by shipping russian attack helicopters to the syrians. it was later learned that those attack helicopters were
congressman arthur davis says he s voting for mitt romney this time around. he s going to tell us why. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. the cold war is long over, but a chill has settled in in the relations right now. the key shoous, moscow s support in the regime for syria. it may help fuel a brutal crackdown. president obama is addressing that issue headon at the g-20 summit in mexico. dan lothian is joining us right now. dan, what s the latest on this tension between the u.s. and russia? the two leaders met for about two hours. president obama saying the meeting was candid and thorough. i have to tell you, you take a look at the body language, and it gives you a sense of what the meeting was like. they did not sit close together. president obama was leaning towards president putin. president putin was leaning away. you didn t see any smiles at the end of the remarks. they had a quick handshake. sort of half a smile. president obama patting him briefly on