Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Sunday 18 Feb 2018

1. Corbyn told to change path on Brexit to save NHS

Jeremy Corbyn is facing renewed pressure to alter Labour’s position on Brexit after former leader Neil Kinnock backed halting Britain’s EU exit. Speaking to The Observer, Kinnock said: "We should stop Brexit to save the NHS" or at least "mitigate the damage" by staying within the single market. Shadow cabinet members are expected to join calls for the UK to remain in the single market and customs union.

2. Minister slams 'deeply disturbing' state of British jails

Two-thirds of British prisons are providing inmates with inadequate conditions or unacceptable treatment, an investigation by The Observer has found, with two in five jails deemed to be unacceptably unsafe. Prisons minister Rory Stewart described the condition of some penal institutions as "deeply disturbing" with "increasing levels of violence committed by prisoners, and horrifying rates of self-harm".

3. Trump attacks FBI over Florida shooting failings

Donald Trump has criticised the FBI for missing warning signs for the school shooting in Florida. The US President tweeted that the agency was "spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign". Meanwhile, students who survived the shooting are calling for tighter legislation on gun control and pointing out that the president received financial support from the National Rifle Association during his election campaign.

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4. Emma Watson leads stars signing anti-harassment letter

The actress Emma Watson has donated £1m to a new campaign aimed at helping those affected by harassment. The Harry Potter star’s donation comes as nearly 200 female British and Irish stars have signed an open letter in The Observer, calling for an end to sexual harassment at work. Emma Thompson and Keira Knightley among the stars to sign the letter.

5. Human-sheep hybrids could lead to diabetes cure

The world's first human-sheep hybrids have been created by scientists. In a major step towards growing an unlimited supply of human organs for transplants and providing a cure for Type 1 diabetes, a team at Stanford University successfully grew embryos inside a surrogate which had both sheep and human cells. Britain is currently facing a transplant shortage crisis.

6. New Ukip leader believes Islam is a 'death cult'

Ukip members voted yesterday to sack Henry Bolton, who was the party’s fourth leader in 18 months. The move came after controversy over racist messages sent by his partner. Replacing him is new interim leader Gerard Batten, who said last year that non-Muslims should have a "perfectly rational fear" of Islam, which he described as a "death cult".

7. Campaign calls for half the planet to be a nature reserve

As much as 50% of the planet should be turned into a nature reserve as populations of all kinds of wildlife decline at alarming speed. "That may seem a lot – if you think the world is a just a place for humans to exploit," said Nature Need Half campaigner Harvey Locke. "But if you recognise the world as one that we share with wildlife, letting it have half of the Earth does not seem that much."

8. 'Inappropriate' Brendan Cox steps down from charities

The widower of the murdered MP Jo Cox has quit two charities he set up in her memory after allegations of sexual assault. Although Brendan Cox denies assaulting a woman in her 30s at Harvard University in 2015, he has admitted to "inappropriate" behaviour while working for Save the Children. "I do acknowledge and understand that during my time at Save the Children I made mistakes," he said.

9. Netanyahu slams Poland over 'Jewish perpetrators' claim

Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rebuked his Polish counterpart for saying that Jews were among the perpetrators of the Holocaust. Speaking after a new Polish law made it illegal to accuse the Polish nation or state of complicity in Nazi crimes, Morawiecki had said there were "Polish perpetrators - as there were Jewish perpetrators, as there were Russian perpetrators, as there were Ukrainian.... not only German perpetrators".

10. Fire at Tibetan Buddhism's most important shrine

A fire has broken out at the Jokhang Monastery in Lhasa, which is the most important shrine in Tibetan Buddhism. State media in China said the blaze started late on Saturday and was quickly extinguished, with no casualties reported. The Jokhang monastery is more than 1,000 years old and is listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site.