Pressure mounts on Starmer’s government, as Labour rivals including recently resigned Wes Streeting circle.

Wes Streeting, the former British health secretary who resigned from the government this week, says he will run to replace Prime Minister Keir Starmer when the contest is triggered.

Starmer’s government has been on the edge, with the United Kingdom leader facing calls for resignation since his ruling Labour party suffered disastrous local elections.

Though Starmer has brushed aside growing criticism, a Labour contest to replace him looks all but inevitable in London.

While still not announcing he has kickstarted the formal leadership challenge process, Streeting confirmed on Saturday that he will vie to replace Starmer and become the centre-left Labour’s new leader.

Whoever leads the governing party, which has a big majority in the UK’s parliament, will by default become prime minister.

“We need a proper contest with the best candidates on the field, and I’ll be standing,” Streeting told a think tank event in London on Saturday. The former health secretary has urged Starmer to set a timetable for his departure.

In his address to the Labour supporters at a Progress group gathering, Streeting took a dig at the prime minister, saying Labour “arrived in government underprepared in too many areas and lacking clarity of vision and direction”, reported the UK’s Guardian newspaper.

On Thursday, Streeting resigned from the Labour government, saying he no longer had “confidence” in Starmer’s leadership. A day later, Streeting threw his weight behind Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham, who is seen as a top contender to replace Starmer as the Labour leader to lead the country.

“We need our best players on the pitch. There is no doubt that Andy Burnham is one of them,” Streeting wrote on X. “Andy is the best chance of winning, and that should override factional advantage or propping up one person.”

Starmer’s time in office has been dogged by controversy over the appointment of Jeffrey Epstein associate Peter Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to Washington, as well as frustrations with slow-moving domestic policy changes.

More than 80 MPs in the British parliament have urged him to quit, while four junior ministers have stepped down. Some Labour politicians appear to be rallying around Burnham.

On Thursday, Labour MP Josh Simons resigned from ⁠his seat in Makerfield to make way for Burnham to seek election to ‌parliament, which is necessary if he is to challenge Starmer for the party leadership. Labour has agreed to ⁠let Burnham seek a return to parliament.

The Makerfield by-election is to be held next month at the earliest – a local contest that could end up defining who leads the UK after Starmer.

If Burnham is elected to the parliament, he would need to gather support from 81 Labour MPs, or 20 percent of the party in parliament, to launch a challenge against Starmer.

Another potential challenger, Angela Rayner, said on Thursday that tax authorities had cleared her of wrongdoing following an investigation into her tax affairs, seen as a hurdle to her leadership bid.

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Internal Fatah leadership elections take place amid questions of who will eventually succeed the 90-year-old leader.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has cast his ballot in internal Fatah leadership elections held at the presidential headquarters in Ramallah.

The leaders were elected for the movement’s Central Committee and Revolutionary Council at the Ahmad Shuqairi Hall on Saturday.

After casting his vote, President Abbas pressed to ensure the success of the democratic process that he said would reflect the unity of the movement and its commitment to renewing its leadership institutions, the Wafa news agency reported.

The congress is Fatah’s highest decision-making body. The ongoing election is taking place at one of the most volatile junctures in Palestinian history amid Israel’s genocidal war.

This eighth congress was originally due in 2021 but has been delayed for five years. The previous meeting, the seventh congress, took place in 2016.

Nearly 2,580 members are participating across four locations – Ramallah, Gaza, Cairo, and Beirut – to overcome the geographical fragmentation of the movement.

“This year is the year of democracy. We held an important conference for the Fatah youth, followed by the holding of local elections last April,” Abbas said.

“Today is the Eighth Conference of Fatah, and we are preparing for the elections of the National Council in November, as well as the general and presidential elections, starting with the drafting of the constitution, the political parties law, and the general elections law,” the 90-year-old leader continued.

The result of the Eighth General Conference of Fatah is scheduled to be announced on Saturday evening local time.

The question of who will eventually succeed Abbas looms large over the conference. Analysts see the congress as a move to weaken democratic mechanisms and install a circle of loyalists in key positions to manage the transition.

Earlier in the week, the veteran leader noted the decades-long Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, saying the gathering “on our homeland’s soil confirms our determination to continue on the democratic path”.

Late on Thursday, Abbas was unanimously re-elected as the leader of the Fatah movement.

The Fatah leadership has been criticised for prioritising loyalty over democratic debate by “flooding” the congress with more than 2,500 members, many of whom are senior officials in the Palestinian Authority (PA) security and civil services.

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Africa CDC concerned that outbreak of Bundibugyo strain could spread rapidly due to intense population movement.

At least 80 deaths have been reported in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) new Ebola disease outbreak, authorities said, as health workers race to intensify screening and contact tracing to contain the disease.

Nearly 250 suspected cases of the highly contagious haemorrhagic fever have been recorded in eastern DRC, according to the health ministry, with one death also reported in neighbouring Uganda. This has raised concerns that the disease could spread to neighbouring countries.

“The Bundibugyo strain has no vaccine, no specific treatment,” DRC’s Health Minister Samuel-Roger Kamba said on Saturday.

“This strain has a very high lethality rate, which can reach 50 percent.”

The outbreak, the country’s seventeenth, was confirmed on Friday in the northeastern province of Ituri, which borders Uganda and South Sudan. At the time, 65 suspected deaths had been confirmed; the toll was raised to 80 on Saturday.

According to Kamba, the suspected patient zero was a nurse who reported to a health facility in the provincial capital, Bunia, on April 24, with symptoms suggesting Ebola.

The disease has so far been confirmed in three health zones in Ituri, including Bunia, and the areas of Rwampara and Mongwalu, where the outbreak is concentrated.

Only 13 blood samples have been tested at the National Institute of Biomedical Research; eight tested positive for the Bundibugyo strain. The remaining five could not be analysed due to insufficient sample volume, the health minister said.

The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) has raised concerns that the outbreak could spread rapidly, citing several factors, including the high population density of towns in Ituri and the close proximity of the affected areas to Uganda and South Sudan.

The agency also warned of the high volume of cross-border travel to and from the affected region, as well as the logistical challenges of containing the further spread of Ebola.

Medical aid groups, including Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), are responding to the outbreak.

“The number of cases and deaths we are seeing in such a short timeframe, combined with the spread across several health zones and now across the border, is extremely concerning,” said Trish Newport, MSF emergency programme manager.

Jagan Chapagain, secretary-general of the IFRC, said, “The evolving epidemiological situation, and the risk of cross‑border spread, underscore the need for timely, coordinated and sustained action. Engaging with communities and building trust is essential to ensure people seek care early and help stop the epidemic in its tracks.”

Ebola was first identified in 1976. Three strains of the disease are responsible for the majority of outbreaks in Africa, although a vaccine exists only for the Zaire strain.

Without treatment, up to 90 percent of cases can be fatal.

The Bundibugyo strain, which is responsible for the current outbreak, was not identified until 2006.

Tens of thousands of people in Africa have contracted Ebola since it was first identified 50 years ago, while about 15,000 people have died.

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