Fauci Invokes Fifth Amendment During Senate COVID-19 Hearing

This is the evening edition of the One News Page Global Briefing, for Friday, the thirty-first of July, twenty twenty-six. Here is what matters now.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former top U S health official, repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination during a Senate hearing on the COVID-nineteen pandemic, refusing to answer questions under oath about the virus's origins and the U S response. The appearance was part of a long-running clash with Republicans led by Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who has accused Fauci of funding research that triggered the pandemic and lying to Congress, charges Fauci denies. Senator Paul is moving to hold Fauci in contempt of Congress over the refusal, and other Republicans have voiced anger and threatened contempt proceedings. The hearing followed Paul's release of a trove of Fauci's pandemic-era diary entries, setting up a confrontation in which Fauci invoked the Fifth Amendment and provided no substantive answers on the disputed origins of the coronavirus or the government's pandemic management.

Meanwhile, in Europe, up to sixty thousand people crossed into the Spanish North African enclave of Ceuta from Morocco in a matter of hours, overwhelming local resources and prompting the territory's leader to call for a national emergency and military support. About forty-eight thousand of those who entered had returned to Morocco within a day, while nearly three dozen people died in the episode. The sudden influx created a political crisis for Spain's pro-immigration government in Madrid and fueled tensions over migration policy.

Elsewhere in the region, renowned Nepali mountaineer Nirmal Purja, a former British Special Forces member who set a world record in twenty nineteen by climbing all fourteen of the world's peaks above eight thousand metres in one hundred and eighty-nine days, is among ten climbers missing after an avalanche on Broad Peak in northern Pakistan. Purja was leading an expedition of ten that included climbers from Nepal, the United States, Pakistan, Oman and China. A search effort has been mobilised, but no confirmed rescues had been reported.

In Washington, Todd Blanche's nomination to be U S Attorney General is stalled in the Senate after at least two Republican senators withheld support, delaying a vote partly over a disputed Justice Department settlement involving Trump allies. President Donald Trump said he has no objection to withdrawing the nomination and may hold it until January, when he has suggested the political arithmetic in the Senate would be more favourable. The resistance has put at risk the confirmation that Blanche, who has drawn scrutiny for his loyalty to Trump, had sought.

In the United States, authorities are investigating whether Iranian actors carried out a cyberattack that affected technology at more than thirty community water systems across Minnesota this week. Investigators cautioned that the assessment is preliminary and said there were no indications that any water supply had been rendered unsafe to drink.

Meanwhile, in Cyprus, Rashad Sultanov, a forty-four-year-old dual British-Azerbaijani national from Islington, north London, has been arrested on suspicion of conducting hostile surveillance against R A F Akrotiri and passing information to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Metropolitan Police said. The air base on the Mediterranean island is a hub for British military operations across the Middle East.

In Britain, Axel Rudakubana, who is serving a life sentence for murdering three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance event in Southport in July twenty twenty-four, has been charged with multiple assaults on staff at H M P Belmarsh between May and October twenty twenty-five, police said. Rudakubana, now nineteen, was seventeen when he carried out the knife attack. He also faces a charge of possessing a weapon in prison.

In business news, B P has launched a formal process to sell its North Sea oil and gas business, a move that would end roughly six decades of production in the region. The company announced the sale effort on Friday as part of a broader effort by its new chief executive to simplify operations and cut debt.

Also in the U S New York officials sued prediction-market platform Kalshi on Friday, calling it an illegal, unlicensed gambling operation and asking a court to halt its operations and force the company to forfeit its profits. The suit joins a growing number of state actions against Kalshi and other prediction markets, which have faced pushback from federal regulators.

In sports broadcasting, C B S Sports has placed lead N F L analyst Tony Romo on leave until further notice after the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback was arrested in Wisconsin last week on suspicion of operating a vehicle while intoxicated. The network has promoted former defensive end J J Watt to the lead broadcast booth in Romo's absence.

In Turkey, a thirty-four-year-old Scottish father from Maesteg, James, died in hospital on Sunday after an alleged assault earlier in July, his family said. Relatives described him as a devoted father whose kindness and loyalty touched countless lives.

That was the evening edition of the One News Page Global Briefing. Read the complete briefing and explore its supporting coverage at One News Page.