Scotland’s former first minister Alex Salmond has told Sky News that SNP leadership hopeful Humza Yousaf skipped a key vote on gay marriage due to “religious pressure”.
The Alba Party leader said Mr Yousaf seems to have a “different recollection” over the events surrounding the historic 2014 vote after the Scottish health secretary denied deliberately setting up a diary clash weeks in advance.
However, appearing on Beth Rigby Interviews on Thursday, Mr Salmond said he was notified of Mr Yousaf’s meeting “10 days or so before the vote”.
Image: Humza Yousaf pictured taking part in the SNP leadership hustings in Cumbernauld on Wednesday night
‘That’s my recollection’
Mr Salmond, who was leader of the SNP and Scotland at the time of the final vote, told Ms Rigby: “I’ve been very reluctant to get involved in this because it is an internal SNP leadership battle.
“I really don’t have a dog in this race, and anything I say, you know, people will say ‘he’s only saying that because he’s leader of Alba’.
“My memory is that I was contacted 10 days or so before the vote, when the vote was known, and told that Humza was arranging a ministerial appointment.”
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When pressed further on whether Mr Yousaf skipped the vote due to “religious pressure”, Mr Salmond stated: “That’s my recollection.”
Image: Beth Rigby interviewed Alex Salmond on Thursday afternoon
After fellow candidate Kate Forbes received backlash over her equal marriage views, Mr Yousaf was questioned over his absence from the historical vote in 2014 and asked if he too would have voted against it.
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SNP leadership candidate Humza Yousaf said he does not believe gay sex is a sin.
Mr Yousaf gave his support to an earlier vote but missed the final one.
In an interview with Sky News, Mr Yousaf said his abstention was being “dragged up” for political reasons by “people who are supporting other candidates”.
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Kate Forbes has come under fire for her views on equal marriage and having children out of wedlock
He stated that gay sex was not a sin and told Sophie Ridge on Sunday: “I believe that people’s marriage, if they are gay and they are married, that their marriage is no more inferior, or worth less, than my marriage as a heterosexual individual.”
Mr Yousaf has also voiced his support of the Scottish government’s controversial Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill, which was subsequently blocked by the UK government.
Image: Kate Forbes, Ash Regan and Humza Yousaf are all in the running to be the next SNP leader and first minister
‘If I was there I would have voted for it’
When asked about his absence from the 2014 vote, Mr Yousaf said he missed it over the case of a Scottish citizen on death row in Pakistan.
He claimed: “There was a series of meetings taking place between myself and the Pakistani government to get this individual back home. One of those meetings was during the stage three vote.
“Let me be unequivocal about it – if I was there I would have voted for it. That was well known at the time.”
The politician stressed that Mr Yousaf did not need to ask for permission to miss the vote as it was a conscience vote.
Asked what reason was given, Mr Salmond responded: “I didn’t discuss the thing at great length. The assumption was there was pressure.”
He stated it was “no secret” that a lot of religions were “canvassing” politicians over the vote at the time.
Image: Former SNP leader Alex Salmond with Humza Yousaf during the first day of parliamentary business at the Scottish Parliament in 2011
Speaking about Mr Yousaf’s denial, Mr Salmond said: “His memory may be different from mine, let’s put it that way.
“He seems to have a different recollection from what I do or what Alex Neil has, so be it.”
Connor Gillies, Sky News’ Scotland correspondent, questioned Mr Yousaf over Mr Salmond’s claim during the MSP’s campaign visit to Dalkeith in Midlothian later in the afternoon.
Mr Yousaf denied it.
He said: “It is the most predictable political intervention, I have to say.”
Mr Yousaf highlighted that a number of MSPs raised concerns about equal marriage and the bill at the time, but he was not one of them.
He stated: “Time and time again I’ve told you my account, I’ve told you why the meeting was necessary, and people can see my track record.”
Refuting Mr Salmond’s claim, Mr Yousaf said: “Well I have to say, my recollection is very different to Alex Salmond’s recollection. Alex Salmond is also, I think by any objective measure, he has of course backed other candidates in this race.”
When told Mr Salmond has not backed any of the other candidates, Mr Yousaf said the former first minister had “made it pretty clear” that he does not want to see him as leader of the SNP.
When questioned over whether Mr Salmond was “not telling the truth”, Mr Yousaf stated: “My recollection is different to Alex’s. I’m not going to sling mud.”
He added: “Alex Salmond will say what Alex Salmond has said. Alex Neil will say what they say. I will continue to give you my recollection of what happened, the account of what happened.”
Beth Rigby Interviews is live at 9pm every Thursday on Sky News
A large-scale Russian attack through the night into Sunday injured at least 11 in Kyiv and killed three people in towns surrounding the capital.
There were attacks elsewhere as well, including drone strikes in Mykolaiv, where a residential building was hit.
Image: An apartment building destroyed after a Russian attack in Mykolaiv. Pic: State Emergency Service of Ukraine
‘Massive’ attack
In Kyiv, the city’s administration warned “the night will be difficult”, as people were urged to remain in shelters.
The city’s mayor Vitaliy Klitschko described it as a “massive” attack.
He said: “Explosions in the city. Air defence forces are working. The capital is under attack by enemy UAVs. Do not neglect your safety! Stay in shelters!”
It came after at least 15 people were injured in attacks the night prior.
Russia claimed it also faced a Ukrainian drone attack on Sunday, and that it intercepted and destroyed around 100 of them near Moscow and across Russia’s central and southern regions.
Image: A municipality worker cleans up after a Russian drone strike on Kyiv. Pic: Reuters
Russia ‘dragging out the war’
Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine continued a prisoner exchange, marking a rare moment of cooperation in the war.
Amid the most recent attacks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy repeated his calls for sanctions on Russia.
Russia “fills each day with horror and murder” and is “simply dragging out the war”, he said.
Image: A resident looks at an apartment building that was damaged in a Russian drone strike. Pic: Reuters
“All of this demands a response – a strong response from the United States, from Europe, and from everyone in the world who wants this war to end,” Mr Zelenskyy added.
Every day “gives new grounds for sanctions against Russia”, he said, and each day without pressure proves the “war will continue”.
Ukraine, meanwhile, is ready for “any form of diplomacy that delivers real results”.
Nine of a doctor’s 10 children have been killed in an Israeli missile strike on their home in Gaza, which also left her surviving son badly injured and her husband in a critical condition.
Warning: This article contains details of child deaths
Alaa Al Najjar, a paediatrician at Al Tahrir Clinic in the Nasser Medical Complex, was at work during the attack on her home, south of the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, on Friday.
Graphic footage shared by the Hamas-run Palestinian Civil Defence shows the bodies of at least seven small children being pulled from the rubble.
Rescuers can be seen battling fires and searching through a collapsed building, shouting out when they locate a body, before bringing the children out one by one and wrapping their remains in body bags.
In the footage, Dr Al Najjar’s husband, Hamdi Al Najjar, who is also a doctor, is put on to a stretcher and then carried to an ambulance.
The oldest of their children was only 12 years old, according to Dr Muneer Alboursh, the director general of Gaza’s health ministry, which is run by Hamas.
Image: Nine children were killed in the strike. Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
“This is the reality our medical staff in Gaza endure. Words fall short in describing the pain,” he wrote in a social media post.
“In Gaza, it is not only healthcare workers who are targeted – Israel’s aggression goes further, wiping out entire families.”
Image: Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
British doctors describe ‘horrific’ and ‘unimaginable’ attack
Two British doctors working at Nasser Hospital described the attack as “horrific” and “unimaginable” for Dr Al Najjar.
Speaking in a video diary on Friday night, Dr Graeme Groom said his last patient of the day was Dr Al Najjar’s 11-year-old son, who was badly injured and “seemed much younger as we lifted him on to the operating table”.
Image: Hamdi Al Najjar, Dr Al Najjar’s husband who is also a doctor, was taken to hospital. Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
The strike “may or may not have been aimed at his father”, Dr Groom said, adding that the man had been left “very badly injured”.
Dr Victoria Rose said the family “lived opposite a petrol station, so I don’t know whether the bomb set off some massive fire”.
Image: Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
‘No political or military connections’
Dr Groom added: “It is unimaginable for that poor woman, both of them are doctors here.
“The father was a physician at Nasser Hospital. He had no political and no military connections. He doesn’t seem to be prominent on social media, and yet his poor wife is the only uninjured one, who has the prospect of losing her husband.”
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Nineteen of Gaza’s hospitals remain operational, all of them are overwhelmed with the number of patients and a lack of supplies
He said it was “a particularly sad day”, while Dr Rose added: “That is life in Gaza. That is the way it goes in Gaza.”
Sky News has approached the Israeli Defence Forces for comment.
Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza began when the militant group stormed across the border into Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and abducting 251 others.
Israel’s military response has flattened large areas of Gaza and killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count.
The head of the UN has said Israel has only authorised for Gaza what amounts to a “teaspoon” of aid after at least 60 people died in overnight airstrikes.
UN secretary general Antonio Guterres said on Friday the supplies approved so far “amounts to a teaspoon of aid when a flood of assistance is required,” adding “the needs are massive and the obstacles are staggering”.
He warned that more people will die unless there is “rapid, reliable, safe and sustained aid access”.
Image: A woman at the site of an Israeli strike in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
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Gaza: ‘Loads of children with huge burns’
Israel says around 300 aid trucks have been allowed through since it lifted an 11-week blockade on Monday, but according to Mr Guterres, only about a third have been transported to warehouses within Gaza due to insecurity.
The IDF said 107 vehicles carrying flour, food, medical equipment and drugs were allowed through on Thursday.
Many of Gaza’s two million residents are at high risk of famine, experts have warned.
Meanwhile, at least 60 people have been killed by Israeli airstrikes across Gaza overnight.
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Ten people died in the southern city of Khan Younis, and deaths were also reported in the central town of Deir al-Balah and the Jabaliya refugee camp in the north, according to the Nasser, Al-Aqsa and Al-Ahli hospitals where the bodies were brought.
Image: A body is carried out of rubble after an Israeli strike in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
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‘Almost everyone depends on aid’ in Gaza
The latest strikes came a day after two Israeli embassy workers were killed in Washington.
The suspect, named as 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez from Chicago, Illinois, told police he “did it for Gaza”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Sir Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron and Mark Carney of fuelling antisemitism following the shootings.
Mr Netanyahu also accused Sir Keir, Mr Macron and Mr Carney of siding with “mass murderers, rapists, baby killers and kidnappers”.
Image: Palestinians search for casualties in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
But UK government minister Luke Pollard told Sky News on Friday morning he “doesn’t recognise” Mr Netanyahu’s accusation.
Earlier this week, Mr Netanyahu said he was recalling negotiators from the Qatari capital, Doha, after a week of ceasefire talks failed to bring results. A working team will remain.
The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 251 others.
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The militants are still holding 58 captives, around a third of whom are believed to be alive, after most of the rest were returned in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
Israel’s offensive, which has destroyed large swaths of Gaza, has killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.