Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Saturday 5 Oct 2019

1. Cummings insists Britain will leave by October 31st

Dominic Cummings insisted last night that Britain would leave the European Union without a deal if Brussels refused to compromise. Boris Johnson’s most senior aide told government advisers: “Next week we are going to know how things turn out. If the EU says ‘no’ then we are not going to do what the last lot did and change our negotiating position. If we don’t get anything next week, we are gone.”

2. Campaign confirms that Bernie Sanders had a heart attack

Bernie Sanders had a heart attack, his campaign has confirmed. The 78-year-old senator and Democratic presidential candidate was at a campaign event in Nevada on Tuesday when he experienced chest discomfort. In a video posted to Twitter on Friday, Sanders said he was feeling “so much better” and thanked supporters for “the love and warm wishes you send me”. He has been released from the hospital.

3. Death toll soars in anti-government protests in Iraq

The death toll in anti-government protests in Iraq over the past four days has reached at least 60, according to reports. With clashes intensifying, the figure has more than doubled in the past 24 hours. The country’s top Shia cleric, Ayatollah Ali Sistani, issued a stark warning to both sides to end the violence “before it’s too late”.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

4. Democrat lawmakers demand White House documents

Democrats have demanded documents from the White House as their impeachment inquiry into president Donald Trump hots up. The documents in question concern a call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, when Trump pushed Zelensky to investigate his political rival, Joe Biden. Trump has denied any wrongdoing, accusing his political opponents of a “witch hunt”.

5. Prince Harry launches claim against tabloids on hacking

Prince Harry has launched legal proceedings against the owners of the Sun and the Daily Mirror over alleged phone hacking. The move, which follows Harry’s strongly worded attack on the British media’s treatment of his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, is an escalation of his battle with the British newspaper industry. It is thought that the legal action goes back to the phone-hacking scandal of the early 2000s.

6. Demands grow for criminal inquiry into police misconduct

There are fresh demands for a criminal inquiry into alleged misconduct by senior police officers after a report exposed the failures in Scotland Yard’s investigation into a fabricated Westminster paedophile ring. Sir Richard Henriques’s review concluded that the police had unlawfully and misled a judge to obtain warrants to search the homes of people wrongly accused of child murder, rape and torture.

7. Gay couple attacked with pepper spray on London street

A gay couple have been targeted with pepper spray in a suspected homophobic attack in London. The couple were waiting at a bus stop in Lambeth’s Brixton Road when the stranger doused them without warning. The assailant, who was with four friends, told them: “We don’t want your kind around here.” One of the men feared he had been permanently blinded.

8. Shock as Thai judge shoots himself in court

A Thai judge shot himself in court after complaints about interference in a case he was presiding over. Khanakorn Pianchana used a pistol to shoot himself in a provincial court in the city of Yala, in southern Thailand, after acquitting five men of murder and firearms charges due to lack of evidence. The Bangkok Post reported that his injuries were not life-threatening.

9. Jacob Rees-Mogg accused of antisemitic ‘dog whistle’

Boris Johnson is under pressure to sack Jacob Rees-Mogg after the Commons leader was accused of making comments “straight from the far right’s antisemitic playbook”. Rees-Mogg described Hungarian businessman George Soros as the “Remoaner funder-in-chief”. Critics said the decision to single out the Jewish businessman was antisemitic. Labour MP David Lammy said: “Jacob Rees-Mogg don’t think we can’t hear you feeding antisemitic conspiracy theorists with this thinly veiled dog whistle.”

10. Are Loyalists beginning to back a united Ireland?

Loyalists are being “pushed towards reunification,” says The Times. With Brexit looming, nearly four in 10 voters in Northern Ireland — including 5% who describe themselves as unionist — believe there should be a united Ireland. “Some people are calling for a vote on reunification,” said a unionist. “I think that’s a debate that needs to be had.”