Newspaper headlines: 'General election now' and 'allies abandon Johnson'

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By BBC News
Staff
Reuters

There are conflicting views on whether Boris Johnson's resignation as an MP will destabilise Rishi Sunak.

The Sunday Times says Mr Johnson's mutiny has fallen flat. It say sources close to him had claimed that up to six more Tory MPs would resign, but a number of his supporters quickly ruled themselves out of any plot.

The Sunday Telegraph and the Sunday Express say more MPs close to the former prime minister could stand down. Both papers report that a secret meeting between Mr Johnson and Mr Sunak, earlier this month, is at the centre of the row.

According to allies of the former prime minister, Mr Sunak agreed to approve Mr Johnson's entire honours list, but then removed some of his key allies and donors when the list was published on Friday. Downing Street denies that and says Mr Sunak simply adopted the names "approved" by the House of Lords Appointments Commission.

The Observer says anger at Boris Johnson is growing within the Conservative Party, and Mr Sunak is under pressure to bar him from standing as a Conservative candidate at the next election.

An unnamed member of the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, who used to support Mr Johnson, tells the paper that "the pantomime has to end". But in his article in the Mail on Sunday, the former Cabinet minister, Jacob Rees-Mogg, argues that Mr Johnson's dramatic resignation "puts him in pole position to return as Conservative leader if a vacancy should arise".

In an editorial, the Mail argues that British politics "has got too small for its own good" if it has no room for Boris Johnson. The paper says at the last election, he won a mandate stronger than any other Tory leader since Margaret Thatcher, but was then brought down by back-room machinations.

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Writing in the and Sunday People, the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer urges Mr Sunak to "find a backbone" and call an early general election. Sir Keir says Mr Sunak has no mandate, and no strength to stand up to what he calls "Tory berserkers" determined to drag the country down with them.

The Sunday Times reports that scientists in the Chinese city of Wuhan, working alongside the country's military, were combining the world's most deadly coronaviruses to create a mutant virus, just before the Covid pandemic began. US investigators have told the paper they believe the experiments led to the creation of Covid-19 and that it leaked into the city after a laboratory accident. China denies that.

Manchester City's footballers are pictured on the front pages as well as the back, celebrating their Champions League triumph, and the treble. "Three-mendous" reads a headline in the Sun on Sunday. Both the Mail and the Express call the team "history makers".

The Star or Sunday says the "elephant in the room" is the pending investigation into allegation of breaches of financial rules. But it says the team's manager, Pep Guardiola, is now a "footballing immortal", and a statue of him in Manchester will surely follow.