Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Wednesday 11 Jul 2018

1. Thai cave rescue ‘just in time’

The pumps used to drain water from the Thai cave network where 12 boys and one adult were trapped for more than two weeks failed just hours after the last boy was rescued, with 100 divers and other workers still inside, it has emerged. The Wild Boars football team survived in the cave by drinking water dripping down the walls.

2. UK to send 440 more troops to Afghanistan

Britain will send another 440 troops to Afghanistan, to work in non-combat roles, taking the total deployment to 1,090, Theresa May will announce today at the Brussels Nato summit. Around half will deploy from the Welsh Guards in August, with the rest following in February 2019. A total of 16,000 Nato personnel are in Afghanistan.

3. Trump: I want to talk to my friend Boris

Donald Trump said last night that he wants to speak to his “friend” Boris Johnson while visiting the UK later this week. The US president also said that that Britain was in “turmoil” and that he thought speaking to Vladimir Putin would be easier than speaking to Theresa May. Trump arrives in London late on Thursday evening.

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4. Facebook issued with maximum £500,000 fine

Social network Facebook has been fined the maximum possible £500,000 by the UK’s Information Commissioner. Elizabeth Denham said the social network had failed to ensure that user data was deleted by its client Cambridge Analytica, whose parent company will also face legal action from Denham.

5. Superbug fears over emerging sex disease

British doctors are warning that a little-known sexually transmitted infection that often has no symptoms could become the next superbug if people are not vigilant. Mycoplasma genitalium, known as MG, is developing resistance to antibiotics. Possible symptoms include inflammation of the urethra and womb.

6. Novichok dose ‘could be active for 50 years’

Britain’s most senior counterterror policeman, Neil Basu, has warned that the dose of novichok which killed Wiltshire woman Dawn Sturgess could remain active for 50 years in a sealed container. Sturgess’s partner, Charlie Rowley, remains critically ill after the couple, from Amesbury, were exposed to the nerve agent, presumed to be from the batch used to poison former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in nearby Salisbury.

7. Love Island boyfriend found dead after funeral

The boyfriend of the late Love Island reality TV contestant Sophie Gradon has been found dead, days after her funeral. Gradon died on 20 June at the age of 32 at her parents’ home in Northumbria. In an emotional tribute on social media shortly before his own death, Aaron Armstrong, 25, wrote: “I will see u very soon my angel so keep are bed worm for me.”

8. Military burial for WW1 soldier at last

An Aberdeen sailor killed in a land battle in France during the First World War is to receive a full military burial, more than 100 years after his death. The remains of Able Seaman James Robertson, who was 27 when he died in April 1917, were found in Gavrelle in 2016. His nephew, 81-year-old Frank Treasurer, will attend the burial.

9. Sarah Palin ‘duped’ by Sacha Baron Cohen

Former governor of Alaska and US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin has complained of being “duped” by Borat actor Sacha Baron Cohen for his new series of TV interviews. In a Facebook post, Palin said that Cohen had “disguised himself as a disabled US veteran”. She continued: “I sat through a long interview full of Hollywoodism’s disrespect and sarcasm.”

10. Briefing: the 1922 Committee explained

Attention has turned this week to the 1922 Committee, a parliamentary group of Conservative backbenchers who will play a key role in deciding whether Theresa May remains prime minister.

May is facing a leadership crisis following the resignations of two senior cabinet members, Boris Johnson and David Davis, in protest against her plans for Brexit.

The 1922 Committee: what is it and why does it matter to Theresa May