She said she was elected “with a mandate to change this”, adding: “We delivered on energy bills.”
“I recognise, though, given the situation, I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party,” she added.
Advertisement
“I have therefore spoken to His Majesty the King to notify him that I am resigning as leader of the Conservative Party.
“This morning, I met the chairman of the 1922 committee, Sir Graham Brady. We’ve agreed that there will be a leadership election to be completed within the next week.”
Ms Truss will remain as prime minister until her successor has been chosen.
Sir Graham said the committee expects to conclude a leadership election by Friday 28 October with a new PM in place in time for the 31 October fiscal statement.
He said Tory members are expected to be able to vote but the candidates could be whittled down to just one.
A senior Tory source suggested MPs will have to put their nominations in by Monday.
Ms Truss’s resignation came just a little over 24 hours after she told MPs she was a “fighter, not a quitter”.
Who will be the next PM?
There has been much speculation about who could replace Ms Truss, with new chancellor Jeremy Hunt one of the main names being suggested.
However, Sky News’ deputy political editor Sam Coates said he has been told Mr Hunt will not stand.
Other Tory MPs being suggested as running are Penny Mordaunt, Rishi Sunak, Kemi Badenoch, and even ex-PM Boris Johnson.
Former leadership candidate Tom Tugendhat has ruled himself out.
Sky News understands Commons leader Ms Mordaunt and Justice Secretary Brandon Lewis are taking soundings from Tory MPs over whether to put their hats in the ring.
Loyal Johnson supporter Tory MP James Duddridge tweeted his support for the former PM, who is currently on holiday in the Caribbean.
“I hope you enjoyed your holiday boss,” he said.
“Time to come back. Few issues at the office that need addressing. #bringbackboris.”
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer called for a general election “now” as he said the British public “must have a chance at a fresh start”.
He added: “The Tories cannot respond to their latest shambles by yet again simply clicking their fingers and shuffling the people at the top without the consent of the British people.
“They do not have a mandate to put the country through yet another experiment; Britain is not their personal fiefdom to run how they wish.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
1:06
Labour leader calls for general election now
The start of Truss’s downfall
Ms Truss’ downfall began when her former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announced his mini-budget on 23 September, which prompted weeks of economic turmoil and eventually led to him being sacked last Friday.
Mr Hunt, who voted for Rishi Sunak during the leadership campaign, then took over as chancellor and U-turned on the majority of the unfunded mini-budget tax cuts on Monday – further undercutting Ms Truss’s authority.
On Wednesday afternoon, her home secretary, Suella Braverman, then quit after saying she had breached security rules by sending a policy message to a colleague over her personal email by mistake.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
1:49
PM: ‘I’m a fighter, not a quitter’
It only got worse on Wednesday evening after confusion over whether Labour’s opposition day vote on fracking was actually a confidence vote in the government or not – which resulted in allegations of physical “manhandling” of Tory MPs by colleagues.
Some Tory MPs had publicly called for Ms Truss’s resignation before that but in the hours before she quit, a flurry of Tory MPs revealed they wanted her to go.
Conservative Party rules prevent a leader from facing a confidence vote in the first 12 months of their tenure.
But it is understood that after a significant number of MPs wrote to Sir Graham Brady, chair of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs, calling for her to go, a decision was made that she could not stay.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said it carried out a “precise strike” on Hezbollah’s “central headquarters”, which it claimed was “embedded under residential buildings in the heart of the Dahieh in Beirut”.
The first wave of attacks shook windows across the city and sent thick clouds of smoke billowing into the air.
While Israel stressed it had been a “precise” strike, preliminary figures from Lebanon’s health ministry confirmed at least six other people were killed and 91 were wounded.
Israel said Nasrallah was the intended target and initially there were claims he had survived.
However, after several hours of confusion, his death was confirmed by Israel.
Advertisement
“Hassan Nasrallah will no longer be able to terrorise the world,” the IDF said.
Hours later, a defiant Hezbollah confirmed Nasrallah’s death but vowed their fight with Israel would continue after confirming they had fired upon sites in northern Israel.
“The leadership of Hezbollah pledges to the highest, holiest, and most precious martyr in our path full of sacrifices and martyrs to continue its jihad in confronting the enemy, supporting Gaza and Palestine, and defending Lebanon and its steadfast and honourable people,” they said.
Alongside claiming to have killed Nasrallah, the IDF said it had killed a number of other commanders, including Ali Karaki, the commander of the southern front.
The country’s military said the strike was carried out while Hezbollah leadership met at their underground headquarters in Dahieh.
In the aftermath of the most recent attacks, an Israeli military spokesperson declined to comment on whether US-made Mark 84 heavy bombs were used in the strike against Nasrallah.
“The strike was conducted while Hezbollah’s senior chain of command were operating from the headquarters and advancing terrorist activities against the citizens of the State of Israel,” Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said in a media briefing.
He continued: “We hope this will change Hezbollah’s actions.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
6:17
Hezbollah leader killed says IDF
He added the number of civilian casualties was unclear but blamed Hezbollah for positioning itself in residential areas.
“We’ve seen Hezbollah carry out attacks against us for a year. It’s safe to assume that they are going to continue carrying out their attacks against us or try to,” he said.
Meanwhile, Iran said it was in constant contact with Hezbollah and other allies to determine its “next step”, but Reuters reported the country’s supreme leader was transferred to a secure location in light of the latest attack.
Speaking after the attack, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called on Muslims “to stand by the people of Lebanon and the proud Hezbollah” and said: “The fate of this region will be determined by the forces of resistance, with Hezbollah at the forefront,” state media reported.
Nasrallah’s death will be a blow to Hezbollah as it continues to reel from a campaign of escalating Israeli attacks.
Nasrallah is latest Hezbollah leader to fall
While Nasrallah’s death is certainly the most high-profile of recent attacks, it continues a trend of Israel targeting Hezbollah’s leadership structure.
Also on Saturday, in the early hours of the morning, the commander of the group’s missile unit and his deputy were killed in another Israeli attack in southern Lebanon.
Spreaker
This content is provided by Spreaker, which may be using cookies and other technologies.
To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.
You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Spreaker cookies or to allow those cookies just once.
You can change your settings at any time via the Privacy Options.
Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Spreaker cookies.
To view this content you can use the button below to allow Spreaker cookies for this session only.
A Swiss teenage cyclist with “a bright future ahead of her” has died a day after suffering a serious head injury at the world championships.
Muriel Furrer crashed while competing on rain-slicked roads in the junior women’s road race in her home country.
The 18-year-old rider fell heavily on Thursday in a forest area south of the city of Zurich and was airlifted to hospital by helicopter, reportedly in a critical condition.
Race organisers announced on Friday she had died.
They said in a statement: “Muriel Furrer sadly passed away today at Zurich University Hospital.”
The UCI governing body for world cycling paid tribute to her in a statement on its website, entitled “The cycling world mourns the loss of Muriel Furrer”.
It read: “It is with great sadness that the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) and the Organising Committee of the 2024 UCI Road and Para-cycling Road World Championships today learned the tragic news of the death of young Swiss cyclist Muriel Furrer.
“With the passing of Muriel Furrer, the international cycling community loses a rider with a bright future ahead of her. We offer sincere condolences to Muriel Furrer’s family, friends and her Federation Swiss Cycling.”
Swiss Cycling said in a post on X: “Our hearts are broken, we have no words. It is with a heavy heart and infinite sadness that we have to say goodbye to Muriel Furrer today.
“We are losing a warm-hearted and wonderful young woman who always had a smile on her face. There is no understanding, only pain and sadness.”
X
This content is provided by X, which may be using cookies and other technologies.
To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.
You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable X cookies or to allow those cookies just once.
You can change your settings at any time via the Privacy Options.
Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to X cookies.
To view this content you can use the button below to allow X cookies for this session only.
Furrer is the second Swiss cyclist to die in just over a year after crashing on home roads.
At the Tour de Suisse in June 2023, Gino Mader went off the road and down a ravine during a descent. The 26-year-old died from his injuries the next day.
“Obviously it is another tragic death,” Mr Senn said. “There are a lot of similarities, similar feelings. Today is about Muriel.”
Over the past 18 years Nasrallah has grown Hezbollah in his image, expanding its forces, building its infrastructure and significantly expanding its arsenal.
He wasn’t just the leader of Hezbollah, he was a global figurehead of anti-Israel resistance.
More on Hezbollah
Related Topics:
With Iran’s help, Hezbollah became one of the best armed non-state militaries in the world.
It is now decapitated and in disarray.
Advertisement
During the past decades Israel has also been at work, steadily gathering intelligence on Nasrallah and Hezbollah, building a vast database of information, an effort which arguably distracted them from better understanding the intentions of Hamas.
The intelligence successes of the past days have helped restore Israel’s reputation after the stunning failures on October 7.
Iran and Hezbollah must choose
This is a pivotal moment.
Iran and Hezbollah must now decide how to respond: fight, or backdown.
The strike also killed Ali Karaqi, commander of Hezbollah’s southern front and labelled as the second most wanted by the IDF.
It is still unclear who else died in the strike, but given the location and the presence of top officials, it seems likely that other senior figures would have been eliminated too.
Nasrallah will be replaced.
The assassination of enemy leaders can prove to be a short-term victory because they are often succeeded by someone more formidable than before, as witnessed by the killing of the former Hezbollah leader Abbas al Moussawi in 1992.
He was succeeded by Nasrallah.
The working assumption is that the group will respond with barrages of missiles into Israel, probably targeting Tel Aviv.
But Hezbollah’s command structure has been severely degraded by Israel.
Nasrallah had become isolated as the IDF had steadily killed commanders over a fortnight of scything airstrikes on their compounds in Beirut and elsewhere.
It will probably take time to co-ordinate a response and it will probably be done with Iranian guidance.
Nasrallah might be dead, but Hezbollah isn’t
Hezbollah is badly wounded, not just as a paramilitary force but in the eyes of the Lebanese people, many of whom are angry their country is now facing another period of devastating violence.
This might be a moment for more moderate voices within Lebanon, including the national armed forces, to step in.
As the war escalated over recent weeks, noticeable divisions emerged between Tehran and Nasrallah.
He remained an important ally, however, a trusted advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader, and this will come as a personal blow to him.
Having resisted the opportunity to get involved so far, Iran might decide the time has come to take the gloves off and deploy what is left of the thousands of missiles they’ve provided Hezbollah with.
Alternatively, after such a difficult ten days, Tehran might conclude that this round of fighting needs to end and pull back with its main proxy still in some shape to rebuild and fight another day.
With such momentum behind Israel, Iran will also be concerned about its own fate and that of its smaller proxies in Iraq and Syria.
Ultimately, the reason for Hezbollah’s existence – to act as insurance against an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities – hasn’t changed, but if Tehran calculates its proxies can no longer act as that shield it might try to accelerate its nuclear programme.
Could a ground invasion follow?
The Israeli government has choices of its own: order a ground invasion of southern Lebanon or continue with an air campaign that has delivered such dramatic successes.
There will be strong and compelling voices in Netanyahu’s cabinet urging him to take advantage of the situation and send troops in, but Hezbollah is not defeated, thousands of its soldiers remain and they are likely hiding in the vast tunnel network under the hills across the border.
Even a limited ground invasion risks large loss of life, on both sides, and the potential Israel will be lured into something more prolonged than it intended.
Nasrallah’s death might change the dynamic in Gaza too.
Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, has clung on and rejected ceasefire attempts in the hope that Hezbollah and Iran would go to war with Israel, dragging its enemy into a multi-front and unwinnable conflict.
That might still happen, but just as Nasrallah became isolated, so too is Sinwar.
The much trumpeted “unity of arenas” has failed to join up.
The Middle East might often look chaotic to outsiders, but there are unspoken rules generally acknowledged and followed by belligerents.
For years Hezbollah and Israel acted within the unwritten but understood parameters of a shadow war.
Then, eleven months ago on 8 October, Hezbollah attacked Israel out of solidarity with Hamas.
Nasrallah tied Lebanon’s fate to Hamas, insisting that Hezbollah would only stop when the fighting ended in Gaza.
Follow Sky News on WhatsApp
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
The rules shifted as the crossfire escalated, but it remained broadly contained within boundaries understood by both sides.
Until two weeks ago, 17 September, when thousands of pagers started exploding across Beirut and Lebanon.
It is possible Nasrallah had concluded that Israel was war-weary, and he overestimated the domestic and international pressure Netanyahu was under to end the fighting.
He might have believed that Netanyahu had neither the will nor the support to open up another front.
He, like so many of us, maybe assumed US influence on Israel would prevail.