Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by lincoln financial committed to helping you take charge of your financial future. And by the alfred p. Sloan foundation. Supporting science, technology, and improved Economic Performance and Financial Literacy in the 21st century. Supported by the rockefeller foundation. Promoting the wellbeing of humanity around the world by building resilience and inclusive economies. More at rockefellerfoundation. Org Carnegie Corporation of new york. Supporting innovations in education, democratic engagement, and the advancement of International Peace and security. At carnegie. Org. And with the ongoing support of these institutions and individuals. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Woodruff the long, bloody battle for syrias largest city is finally over, with the fall of aleppo. The syrian army announced tonight its now in full control of the eastern half of the city, where rebels had ruled for four years. The last rebel fighters and civilians left aleppo today, moving through heavy snow and wind before the military declared victory. translated by virtue of the pious blood of our martyrs, we declare the return of security and safety to the city of aleppo. This is a crushing blow against the terror project and its backers. It is the starting point of a new phase to drive out terror from all the lands of the syrian arab republic. Woodruff at least 34,000 people streamed out of aleppo since last week. It marks the biggest victory of the civil war so far for president bashar alassad. Sreenivasan in the days other news, a Memorial Ceremony in moscow honored andrei karlov, russias slain ambassador to turkey who was gunned down monday. The killer shouted slogans about the plight of aleppo. President Vladimir Putin was among the mourners who paid respects today at the Russian Foreign ministry building. He promised retribution for karlovs assassination. Woodruff still no sign tonight of the tunisian man wanted in mondays massacre in berlin, germany. A manhunt is under way for the killer who plowed a truck into a crowded Christmas Market, killing 12. Rohit kachroo of independent television news, reports from berlin. Reporter hes in hiding on his 24th birthday, but anis amri is embarrassing german intelligence. Today, we learned they had intercepted old messages in which he offered to become a suicide bomber. Bomber. Police raided homes across germany, and yet still no sign. Attempts to arrest him for a fourth and perhaps final time this year have been complicated by his 36hour head start. Though officers did question several people, four taken away in dortmant. He left his i. D. Card. He left his dna, too. Chancellor merkel said the suspect is with high probability the perpetrator. In the driving cabin, fingerprints were found and there is additional evidence that supports this. Investigator have traveled to tunisia where anis amris heartbroken family say h he must be innocent. If my brother is listening to me, i want to tell him to surrender, even for our families. We will be relieved. We dont do such things. Everyone knows our reputation here. At the Christmas Market in berlin, a sort of normality returned, except this isnt normal. Concrete blocks were put up as the shutters went up for the First Time Since monday night. Woodruff well take a closer look at questions about German Security measures, later in the program. Sreenivasan the u. N. Security council has put off a vote on condemning israels settlementbuilding, indefinitely. Egypt pulled back its proposed resolution today, after israel strongly objected. Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu also pressed the United States to use its veto. President elect trump issued his own statement, saying peace will only come through direct negotiations. Not through the imposition of terms by the united nations. Woodruff the president elect tweeted today about two major defense issues as well. He said the u. S. Must greatly expand its Nuclear Weapons capability, until, in his words, the world comes to its senses. And he asked boeing for the price of buying more f18 super hornet fighters. He cited what he called the tremendous cost of lockheed martins f35. Also today Kellyanne Conway was named white house counselor, and sean spicer was named White House Press secretary. Well return later to the prospects for press relations with the trump white house. Sreenivasan state lawmakers in North Carolina were back home today, after an effort to repeal the socalled bathroom law ended in stalemate. The law bars Legal Protections based on sexual orientation. And, it requires that transgender people use bathrooms conforming with their sex at birth. Opponents of the law are expected to raise repeal again, next year. Woodruff officials in southern japan are going to destroy another 120,000 chickens, in a spreading bird flu outbreak. Todays announcement came just days after 200,000 birds were gassed at a farm in northern japan. South korea has culled 20 million birds since it reported an outbreak last month. Sreenivasan just days before christmas, its nearly warm enough at the north pole to melt ice, thanks to a surge of warm air. Air temperatures there were 32 degrees today, when its typically 20 below. Worldwide, this year is set to be the warmest on record. The arctic region is warming at twice the global average. Woodruff and another sluggish day on wall street the Dow Jones Industrial average lost 23 points to close below 19,919. The nasdaq fell 24 points, and the s p 500 slipped four. Sreenivasan still to come on the newshour evidence the Russian Military hacked the democratic party. As a manhunt continues across europe, a look at germanys security measures. The latest on the president elects new team, and much more. Woodruff the c. I. A. And other u. S. Intelligence agencies have concluded russia was behind the hack of the Democratic National committee and other political organizations, but are yet to produce their evidence publicly. Today, the private Cyber Security company that first uncovered the d. N. C. Hack unveiled new details they claim confirm Russian MilitaryIntelligence Service was behind the computer breach. Here to explain all of this is dmitri alperovitch, the co founder of crowdstrike, the company that found the computer code. And thomas rid is a professor at Kings College london. His latest book is rise of the machines a cybernetic history. And we welcome both of you to the newshour. Dmitri alperovitch, let me start with you. What is this new information . This is an interesting case weve uncovered actually all the way in ukraine where ukraine artillerymen were targeted by fancy bear, the target of the d. N. C. , but this time they were targeting their cell phones to understand their location to the Russian Artillery forces can target them in the open battle. Woodruff this is Russian Military intelligence who got hold of information about the weapons, in essence, that the Ukrainian Military was using, and was able to change it through malware . Yes, essentially one ukraine officer built this app for his Android Phone that he gave out to his fellow officers to control the settings for the artillery pieces they were using, and the russians actually hacked that application, put their malware in it and the malware reported back the location of the person using the phone. Woodruff whats the connection between that and what happened to the Democratic National committee . It was the same variant of the same accomplishes code weve seen at the d. N. C. The phone version we saw at the d. N. C. Was personal computers but it was the same source used by the actor called fancy bear. You think who would be interested in target gitting artillerymen in ukraine and hacking the Democratic National committee, russia comes to find. But russianilitary has Operational Forces in the ukraine and would target. Woodruff cyberfingerprints . Essentially the dna of this accomplishes code that matches to the dna we saw at the d. N. C. Woodruff thomas rid, to you in london, as you read and understand this new information, what do you make of it and how do you see it . Well, the important piece, i think, is that were looking at only one piece in a larger puzzle which crowdstrike has discovered. One piece of a larger picture, and the picture is rich. We know how they choose their targets and we know thousands of their targets even by individual names. We know how they get in, move around, and take permission out, we know the infrastructure, the flight card they used to take the information out, and i think were approaching the point where the evidence is so rich that there are only two reasons not to accept it one, because you dont understand the Technical Details because you dont have to skills, or because you dont want to understand it for political reasons. Woodruff well, you do have the technical expertise. Does it hold up for you . Yes. You know, what i do is i look at specific cases and i drill down and zoom into the details of the picture and look at that detail. So we can often link specific cases like the one that dmitri was just describing to another case because the tool set that theyre using is the same, really like the tool of the burglar that breaks into one building and uses the same or a comparable tool in another building. So one thing that im, for instance, interested in and that i focused on is how they broke into the German Parliament and that we can link that to the d. N. C. And, indeed, we can also link those two cases, so the evidence is really strong that we have at this point. Point. Woodruff so the evidence is really strong. Are you saying there is just no doubt about it, at this point . Among people who studied the true forensic evidence, among people who do infinite response, the vast majority of the community and bear in mind this is an entire profession trained to do digital investigations most people in that profession really accept the evidence that we have, its really not controversial anymore that were looking at a major russian campaign. Keep in mind, this has been going on for many years. This particular act, we watched them for eight years, and in the last year they made quite a few mistakes that revealed themselves. Woodruff dmitri alperovitch, we pointed out earlier your company is the one who uncovered this in the first place, you were working for the Democratic National committee. Are you still doing work for them . Were protecting them going forward. The investigation is closed in terms of what happened there, but certainly weve seen the campaigns, political organizations have been targeted and they continue to hire us and use our technology to protect themselves. Woodruff i ask you that because if there is a question of conflict of interest, how do you answer that . This report was not about the d. N. C. This report was about information we uncovered about the russian locating the artillery units of the Ukrainian Army and targeting them. We said it looks exactly as the same evidence we already uncovered from the d. N. C. , linking the two together. Woodruff so if theres still someone out there like the president elect or others who support him to say we just dont believe this, we dont think its been proven, we havent seen the c. I. A. And the f. B. I. s information, whats your response to that . I think its legitimate to ask questions and this is the reason we want to produce more evidence to raise the level of confidence we have internally that this is russian intelligence called the g. R. U. I hope the report that comes out by president obama will be made public so everyone can make their own judgment. Woodruff thomas rid, what more would a skeptic need to see in order to erase all doubt . Of course, we can always see more evidence and look for more details, for instance on specific names of operators, and we know that, you know, some intelligence agencies in the United States seem to have that information. But lets keep something in mind. What this russian operation is trying to achieve at this point is to drive a wedge between the president elect, between the next administration and the intelligence community. So far, if you see that as part of the operation, they have been spectacularly successful. So releasing more evidence and then having critics possibly from the president elect say, well, thats not good enough, that is exactly the outcome they want because it introduces friction inside the security establishment in washington. Woodruff dmitri, is that what you see as well . I think its important to bring out the evidence. Some people have legitimate questions about this. Its important for the u. S. Government to tell us what they know because they have access to intelligence and methods were not privy to as a private security company. So i think its important to know what happened in the most consequential act weve seen. Woodruff we have no way of knowing what they will do. Well continue to watch it closely, dmitri alperovitch, professor thomas rid, we thank you both. Thank you. Sreenivasan anis amri, the man suspected of carrying out mondays attack on a berlin Christmas Market was well known to German Authorities. He was under surveillance for six months this year and was slated for deportation, but his home country of tunisia refused to accept him. Joining me now for more on how amri allegedly was allowed to pull off this attack is peter neumann, founder and director of the International Center for the study of radicalization and political violence. He joins us tonight from munich. Whats the latest in the investigation . Well, the latest is that they are still trying to track down where exactly he is right now, and they are conducting raids on different places that are connected to the jihadist scene. It is now known that he was part of a wired network of jihadists in germany, and they are raiding different places that they seem to be believing that they are connected to the scene. Sreenivasan tell me, how is it possible the German Authorities not just had this person on the radar but were scheduling him for deportation, how did it get this far . How did they miss the signs . So there are a couple of things. The first thing is capacity. There are around 550 jihadists in germany who are believed to be potential terrorists. In order to surveil a Single Person 24 hours a day, you need about 20 officials. Its not possible. So, you know, authorities need to make judgment calls all the time. Who do they consider to be acutely dangerous and who do they consider to be less dangerous and this one may have fallen through the net. The second is federalism. Police and Intelligence Services are essentially on a statebystate ba basis, and ths guy traveled from a lot of different states to different states and some of the information may have slipped through the cracks. Sreenivasan what about the possibility he was radicalized in an italian prison . Thats something one of his brothers said. Yes, he was in an italian prison about four years, and may well be he was radicalized there. He went further up north to germany afterwards. He shouldnt have been able to do that because he was claiming asylum in germany, and coming from italy, that claim should have been refused immediately. So basically, the whole system has failed. I think its all down to the fact that germany is not really used to being the target of terrorist attacks. Its a little bit like america before 9 11. Germans are quite naive still about terrorism. We havent been confronted with the kind of terrorist attacks other countries have been confronted with, and the whole system has not been geared up to confront this kind of threat. Sreenivasan post 9 11, the american system geared up, to use your phrase. How does germanys sensitive history with the surveillance state play into all of this . Thats a good point. After the end of the second world war, germans before reeducated to be against surveillance and be pacifists. They succeeded. That means that when being confronted with this kind of threat, a lot of reactions by politicians but also by society are very much against kind of confronting this threat head on. I very much hope that after this incident the pendulum doesnt swing entirely the other way, but that we are able to have a reasonable debate about what kind of measures are really necessary to confront this rather than staying one side or the other. Sreenivasan do you see changes happening in the interest of Public Safety thats swinging the pendulum . I think there is a lot of debate right now. A lot of people are very unhappy with how the authorities have dealt with this case. There is a sense of real outrage, and there is a sense that the system isnt working and that we really knead to think about how to make this work. I believe its necessary to basically have Something Like the 9 11 commission you had in america after 9 11 that basically goes through ive aaspect of government policy and says this works, this doesnt work, and how do we construct a comp hencive counterterrorism strategy . We dont