The last troops leave Iraq

What moved

The last US and coalition troops leave Iraq, 23 years after the invasion

On Wednesday 30 September the United States said it had withdrawn all of its troops from Iraq, ending a 12-year mission against the Islamic State group (PBS, carrying the Associated Press). The last of them left the air base at Erbil, in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of the north, and about 100 British personnel left with them (BBC). Iraq has 46.0 million people (World Bank, 2024).

US forces have left Iraq before. They invaded in 2003, numbered 170,000 at their height in 2007 by Al Jazeera's account and 169,000 by Anadolu's, and were withdrawn in 2011 (Al Jazeera; Anadolu). Three years later Iraq's government invited them back, after the Islamic State group had taken roughly a third of the country; the group lost its territory in Iraq in 2017 (NPR). Washington and Baghdad agreed in 2024 to wind the mission down. Our sources put the US military dead in Iraq at more than 4,400 (NPR) or more than 4,500 (The Japan Times). The difference looks like one of scope: Anadolu, citing Pentagon casualty records, gives 4,418 killed in the campaign of 2003 to 2011 and 123 deaths in the mission that began in 2014 (Anadolu). The Iraq Body Count project puts the number of Iraqi civilians killed at more than 200,000 (The Japan Times).

Our sources do not agree on how many troops were left to withdraw. NPR says about 1,500 US personnel had remained in the Kurdish region, and Middle East Eye says roughly 1,500 coalition troops were at the Erbil air base; Al Jazeera describes a few hundred remaining US soldiers, and the Associated Press says hundreds (NPR; Middle East Eye; Al Jazeera; PBS, carrying the Associated Press). We are not choosing among them.

Iraq's prime minister, Ali al-Zaidi, said at a ceremony on Wednesday that the country was entering a new phase, "defined by Iraq's sovereignty, the strength of its institutions, the readiness of its forces". By Middle East Eye's account he declared 1 October a national Sovereignty Day; the BBC and Al Jazeera report a four-day holiday, and NPR a two-day one (Al Jazeera; Middle East Eye; BBC; NPR). The Pentagon said it would "continue to provide targeted training and intelligence support" (Dawn). US Central Command said the coalition's headquarters would move to Jordan and that US operations against the group continue in Syria (NPR).

Three things are left open, and they are why this matters beyond the week.

The first is the Kurdish region. Its ministry for the Peshmerga forces counts more than 1,000 drone and ballistic missile attacks on the region since the United States and Israel went to war with Iran on 28 February, and the US air defences at Erbil are leaving with the troops (Al Jazeera). The region's prime minister, Masrour Barzani, told the Financial Times: "The threat is real – we are vulnerable, we are being attacked" (Middle East Eye).

The second is the Islamic State group itself. A recent UN report assessed that it has several hundred fighters left in Iraq, "able to carry out unsophisticated operations only" (BBC). Mohammed al-Jubouri, a retired Iraqi army general, said one of the worst outcomes would be the group getting hold of armed drones while Iraq is still short of air defences (France 24).

The third is the armed factions aligned with Iran, which have long given the US presence as their reason for keeping their weapons. Zaidi's government had set 30 September as their deadline to disarm. Middle East Eye and Al Jazeera report that the deadline was moved to June 2027; Dawn reports that the time limit was withdrawn (Middle East Eye; Dawn). One powerful faction, Kataeb Hezbollah, called the withdrawal "a start towards achieving full sovereignty" and warned that a government which does not serve its people "will be brought down by all possible means" (Dawn). Zaidi has told The New York Times that both the United States and the factions gave assurances that they would hold off from attacks for 90 days after the withdrawal (Al Jazeera). That is a promise with a date on it, and we are opening a thread to see whether it holds.

Ethiopia and Eritrea break off relations as the war in Tigray spreads

The previous issue led with the return of fighting between Ethiopia's federal government and the party that runs its northern region of Tigray. In the four days of this window the war widened and drew in the neighbours. Ethiopia has 132.1 million people and Eritrea 3.5 million (World Bank, 2024; World Bank, 2024).

On Thursday Ethiopia said it would close its embassy in Asmara, citing Eritrea's "direct and indirect acts of hostility and belligerence", and gave 10 Eritrean diplomats 48 hours to leave, saying they had threatened its national security (The EastAfrican). Eritrea replied that it had "no option but to reciprocate in kind and sever all diplomatic ties with Ethiopia". State media in both countries reported that Ethiopia also expelled an Egyptian diplomat and that Egypt expelled an Ethiopian one in return (Al Jazeera).

Each government accuses the other of hostility. Ethiopia's army chief, Field Marshal Birhanu Jula, says Eritrea, Sudan and Egypt are backing the armed groups fighting his troops; he gave no evidence. Sudan and Eritrea reject it; Egypt, without naming Ethiopia, called suggestions that it interferes in other countries baseless (Euronews). Eritrea says Ethiopia hosts, trains and arms Eritrean opposition groups and has designs on its Red Sea coast. Eritrea fought on the federal government's side in the war of 2020 to 2022, and was not a party to the agreement that ended it (Al Jazeera).

What is known from the ground is limited, and the sources say so. Phone and internet services to Tigray are cut, and the BBC says it is unable to report from the region. Hospital sources told it that at least 52 civilians were killed in three days of fighting around the town of Alamata, and Médecins Sans Frontières says more than 700 wounded people have been admitted to the hospitals it supports (BBC). Pro-government forces say they have taken the town (Euronews). A medic told the BBC that twelve people died in a single strike on Alamata's marketplace; a resident gave DW the figure of 11 and said he believed the attack was timed for the market's opening hours, an account DW could not verify (DW). The fighting has displaced around 150,000 people, by the estimate of the Afar Pastoralist Development Association (Euronews); a report carried by AllAfrica places that displacement in the Afar region, where Tigrayan forces and their allies have advanced (AllAfrica). Fighting has also reached the Amhara region: a tourist stranded in the town of Lalibela told the BBC of gunfire and artillery through the week, and the BBC says the clashes there involve the army and an Amhara militia allied with Tigrayan fighters (BBC). Explosions were heard in the capital, Addis Ababa, on Wednesday and Thursday (Al Jazeera); Western and regional officials in the city told Middle East Eye they were caused by a drone strike (Middle East Eye).

Other states are taking sides. The United Arab Emirates declared "full solidarity with the government and people" of Ethiopia; Qatar condemned the escalation against federal forces and called for respect for the peace agreement; the UN secretary-general said he was "gravely concerned" (Euronews). Middle East Eye's account of the risk is that a break between the two countries could carry the war to the Red Sea, at a time when Sudan and Yemen are both at war, and draw in Egypt, Turkey, Somalia and the Gulf states (Middle East Eye).

One refinement to what we printed last time. The previous issue gave a single estimate of the dead in the war of 2020 to 2022, some 600,000. DW gives the range: between 162,000 and 600,000, depending on the source (DW).

China and the United States publish the goods on which each proposes to cut tariffs

The previous issue held back the run-up to a summit between the two governments because the meeting had not yet happened. It has now. Xi Jinping's state visit to Washington ended on Friday (Euronews). One of its most concrete results was published on the Sunday and Monday that followed: two lists of goods (Al Jazeera). China has 1.41 billion people and the United States 340.0 million (World Bank, 2024; World Bank, 2024).

Each side named about $30 billion of the other's goods for lower tariffs. China's list has 1,619 kinds of US product, mostly food and farm goods, with coal, timber and medical equipment. The US list has 77 categories of Chinese goods, mostly household goods and toys. China's commerce ministry said more than 90% of the products would drop to the standard rates that apply to most trading partners (PBS, carrying the Associated Press; Euronews). Neither government has said how deep the cuts will be or when they begin (The Japan Times).

What is left off the lists says as much. Soybeans other than seed, the largest US farm export to China, are not on China's list (The Japan Times). Reuters noted that they still carry an additional tariff of 10%, and semiconductors, batteries and electric vehicles are not covered at all (The Guardian, citing Reuters on the soybean tariff). The wider trade truce between the two was extended by two months, to 10 January 2027 (The Express Tribune).

Our sources give different totals for the trade between them. Al Jazeera, citing the US Trade Representative, puts two-way trade at $495bn in 2025, down 25% from the year before; The Japan Times puts goods exchanged last year at $415 billion (Al Jazeera; The Japan Times). On either figure the $60 billion covered is a small part of it. Deborah Elms of the Hinrich Foundation told Al Jazeera: "both sides have largely listed goods that do not move the needle on overall trade flows". Han Lin of The Asia Group said: "It's managed stabilisation, not a trade reset" (The Guardian).

The effects reach third parties. S&P Global data cited by Euronews put the European Union's pork shipments to China at around 1.07 million tonnes in 2025, and Euronews notes that any cut for US producers could leave European ones, already under Chinese duties, at a price disadvantage (Euronews).

Morocco's king appoints the country's first woman prime minister

On Tuesday King Mohammed VI asked Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri, a 50-year-old lawyer and the mayor of Marrakesh, to form a government, after her Authenticity and Modernity Party came first in the parliamentary election of 23 September (France 24; Middle East Eye). Morocco has 38.1 million people (World Bank, 2024).

Her own words after meeting the king: "For the first time in our country's history, a woman is taking on the responsibility of leading the government" (Middle East Eye).

The arithmetic behind the appointment is less tidy than the headline. Her party won 97 of the 395 seats in the lower house, well short of the 198 needed for a majority, so her first task is a coalition (Al Jazeera). The party of the outgoing prime minister came second with 66 seats and a partner in the outgoing coalition third with 65. The Islamist-leaning Justice and Development Party rose to 54 seats from 13 and says it will stay in opposition (Middle East Eye). Its leader, Abdelilah Benkirane, called the winning party "tainted by fraud", without giving details (Dawn). Turnout fell to about 38% from around 50% five years ago (The EastAfrican). The Associated Press reports that one million of the 15.8 million registered voters chose the winning party (PBS, carrying the Associated Press).

Two limits on the office belong in any account of it. The king keeps broad powers over major policy, whoever leads the government (France 24). And her party was founded in 2008 by Fouad Ali El Himma, a childhood friend of the king and now one of his advisers, which is why critics have often called it "the king's party" (PBS, carrying the Associated Press; France 24; Middle East Eye). Since 2011 the constitution has required the king to choose the prime minister from the party that wins the most seats; before that he could name whom he liked (PBS, carrying the Associated Press).

Our sources disagree on a point of record. The Associated Press and the BBC call her the second woman to lead a government in the Arab world; Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye call her the third, counting two prime ministers of Tunisia, Najla Bouden and Sara Zaafarani (BBC; Al Jazeera). Al Jazeera gives dates for both, Bouden from October 2021 to August 2023 and Zaafarani from March 2025, which the count of two does not account for. They also spell her name differently: the Associated Press and the BBC write Fatima Zahra.

The BBC adds that in her political career she has rarely spoken publicly about women's rights (BBC). What she has spoken about is the discontent of the young, which several sources tie to this election: a mass crossing into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in July, and protests led by young Moroccans last year. In September 2025, as a party leader inside the governing coalition, she said of public policy towards the young: "So we did not succeed" (AllAfrica, carrying RFI).

Congo's Ebola outbreak passes 8,000 confirmed cases, and a man is killed after urging prevention on the radio

The Democratic Republic of Congo has 109.3 million people (World Bank, 2024). On Monday its health authorities reported 8,067 confirmed cases of Ebola and 3,901 deaths since the outbreak was declared on 15 May, a fatality rate of 48.4% (UN News; The EastAfrican).

It is the country's 17th outbreak (Al Jazeera) and the largest and deadliest of them. Only the West African epidemic of 2014 to 2016 was bigger, with more than 28,600 infections and more than 11,000 deaths (The Guardian). The strain is Bundibugyo, for which there is no approved vaccine or treatment (Al Jazeera). Cases are confirmed in 63 health zones across seven provinces, and the north-eastern province of Ituri accounts for 76.4% of them (The Express Tribune).

Where it is heading is described differently by different bodies. The African Union's health agency says the number of cases has levelled off after a rapid rise, though it still calls the outbreak "not under control". The World Health Organization has said it is "far from over", and warned last month that it was on track to surpass the West African epidemic (Al Jazeera; The Guardian). On the figures above, that epidemic was more than three times the size this one has reached. The Guardian reports that, on the African Union agency's data, this outbreak has "outpaced" it (The Guardian). The organization's latest report, as UN News summarises it, describes a gradual decline in Ituri since a peak in mid-August, though transmission there remains high, and a substantial rise in the neighbouring province of North Kivu, which reached a record level in mid-September and has fallen in the latest days reported (UN News).

North Kivu is where the killing happened. On Sunday, in the city of Butembo, Marie-Celestin Karondwa, a local official of the governing party, was beaten after appearing on a radio programme about preventing the disease; his house was set on fire and he died of his injuries. This is his party's account. It is not established who attacked him or why (The EastAfrican). It is one of a run of attacks on the response. The day before, a hand-washing checkpoint in the Beni territory nearby was attacked by armed men, who killed at least one person, according to a local civil society group (The EastAfrican). Two people working on the response were reportedly killed in Lubero on 27 and 28 September. On Tuesday evening a transit centre for patients burned down at a camp in Ituri that had sheltered some 19,000 displaced people and now lies abandoned (UN News). The UN's senior Ebola official in the country said that "when we lose a centre, that means we lose capacity".

Al Jazeera's reporting gives the reasons for the hostility: some residents dismiss the disease as a hoax, many believe it is a ruse for officials to take money, and in rebel-held areas decades of conflict have left people wary of the state and of outsiders. The head of the World Health Organization calls it "a catastrophic collision of disease and conflict" (Al Jazeera).

The cost is wider than the disease. An analysis by ACAPS, an independent humanitarian research group, found that between April and June people in four of the worst-hit areas of Ituri used seven basic health services 42% less than before, and that fewer than half as many children were vaccinated (The Japan Times). The share of contacts being traced has slipped to 79.2% from 83.4% (The Express Tribune). On money, the African Union's health agency says commitments announced around a meeting in New York have reached about $2.9 billion, and that they now have to be turned into disbursements; the figure comes from the agency's own statement (AllAfrica, carrying the agency's statement).

How this reached us. This story is here by an exception, and the exception is recorded on the scorecard. What reached our pool was the killing, carried by five newsrooms in three independent reports. It received a low mark, 5 out of a possible 12, because what was marked was the report of one death. The reports of the outbreak itself were split by our grouping software into several small groups, none of them large enough to be carried forward for marking. In the same four days forty-one newsrooms in our sources carried the story of a Flydubai flight diverted after an attack in its cockpit. Every count here is of our own sources. The gap is the kind this digest exists to show, and this time part of it was made by our own method.

The slow story

The people lost on the way: what this year's record shows

The International Organization for Migration keeps a record, incident by incident, of people who die or disappear while migrating towards another country. It publishes the incidents in a file anyone can download. Our watchlist reads that file before every issue, and it flagged the file this time for a plain reason: it now carries incidents for 2026, where at our last reading its latest year was 2025. What changed is the period the file covers, not a trend. We added the year up from the file.

From 1 January to 28 September 2026 the file records 4,616 people dead or missing in 1,357 incidents: 2,309 recorded dead and 2,307 missing and presumed dead. Of them, 191 are recorded as children (IOM Missing Migrants Project, incident file). Over the same dates the file records 5,636 for 2025 and 6,504 for 2024. The full-year totals are 8,755 for 2023, 9,202 for 2024 and 7,927 for 2025.

People recorded dead or missing, 1 January to 28 September of each year. Source: our sums of the IOM incident file, retrieved on 2 October 2026. IOM's region names are kept as published. Three regions with fewer than 100 recorded in each of the three years are left out, so the columns do not add up to the totals above. These are sums of the file as it stood that day. They may not match totals IOM has published at other times, because incidents are added to the record as they come to light.

Two things stand out. The recorded total is 18% below the same dates of 2025 and 29% below those of 2024. And the Mediterranean went the other way: it accounts for 43% of this year's total, against 26% last year. Eastern Africa also rose. Drowning is the recorded cause in 56% of this year's cases. On the route across the eastern Mediterranean the file records 522 this year, against 287 and 133 in the two years before. On the route across the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea it records 579, almost exactly last year's 574 and far above the 131 of 2024. At the border between the United States and Mexico it records 88, against 479 two years ago.

Confidence. These are counts of what was recorded, and IOM is direct about the limits. It says its data are "a minimum estimate of the number of migrant deaths". It says they "tend to over-represent parts of the world where there is better media coverage and official reporting of deaths, such as Europe and the Mediterranean", and that some experts believe more migrants die crossing the Sahara than in the Mediterranean (IOM, methodology). The file records 122 dead or missing on the Sahara crossing this year against 419 by the same date last year. On IOM's own account that could be fewer deaths or fewer reports, and the file cannot say which. There is a second caution, and it is ours: the file records 205 for September so far, the lowest of any month this year, which suggests the latest weeks are not fully recorded. A year still being filled in will look better than years that have had time to be completed.

So the reading the figures support is narrow. Fewer deaths have been recorded this year than by this date in the last two. More have been recorded in the Mediterranean. Whether fewer people died is not established.

Still happening

Deaths in custody in Nigeria: one toll, two government inquiries, no cause yet

The previous issue said this story would be first in line. It did not reach this issue's ranking: during the window it was carried in our sources by Premium Times, a Nigerian newsroom, alone, which is below the floor a story normally has to pass. The other reports cited here were published before the window opened. It is here because the previous issue said it would be, and for no other reason. Nigeria has 232.7 million people (World Bank, 2024).

Thirty-seven people arrested as suspected illegal gold miners died after being held by the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps in Minna, the capital of Niger state (AFP). The agency said detainees were found dead in the early hours of 17 September (Premium Times). The BBC describes the agency as a federal body, outside the authority of the state's governor (BBC). The previous issue reported two tolls, 33 and 37, and said the figures disagreed. On our reading they do not: the BBC reports that 33 died in the cell and four more died later in hospital (BBC).

What killed them is not established. The agency at first attributed the deaths to a suspected outbreak of disease, and said that was not conclusive (Premium Times). An intelligence report seen by AFP suggested overcrowding and poor ventilation (AFP). The BBC describes the cell as roughly six metres by three, and says a survivor it interviewed was held there with more than 50 other prisoners (BBC). One survivor, aged 19, told Premium Times that officials sprayed a substance around the entrance of the men's cell, and that when the detainees called for the door to be opened the reply was that "we should all just die". A girl held in the women's cell said she heard the men ask what was being sprayed on them, and heard the answer that it was mosquito repellent. Premium Times adds its own caution: no forensic evidence has yet been made public that a chemical caused the deaths, and the testimonies it gathered do not by themselves establish the cause. A mother told it that her 14-year-old son was among the dead (Premium Times).

Two government inquiries are under way, one federal and one state. On the president's direction the interior minister inaugurated an independent committee of 10 members on 22 September, and it was given two weeks, which by our count runs to about 6 October (Premium Times). The governor of Niger state has inaugurated a judicial commission of nine members, with four weeks to report (Channels TV). The bar association in Minna has set up a committee of its own, with 13 members (Premium Times). The agency has said that 24 of its personnel are in custody in connection with the deaths (BBC); its head described this as "protective custody", to keep them available for questioning (Channels TV). Premium Times and Channels TV report that 20 officers were suspended, and Premium Times that the agency's commandant in the state was among them (Premium Times; Channels TV). The agency's head, visiting the bereaved families, said it would not shield any of its personnel found culpable (Channels TV). No finding from either inquiry appears in anything we read.

Premium Times also found some miners back in the affected mining areas, who told it they had few other ways to earn a living (Premium Times).

The hurricane the previous issue left at sea came ashore, twice

The previous issue reported Hurricane Polo at category 5 off Mexico's Pacific coast, in its account of what a strong El Niño is doing to the season. Mexico has 130.9 million people (World Bank, 2024).

Polo came ashore around midnight between Monday and Tuesday near the village of Las Barrancas in Baja California Sur, with maximum sustained winds of 175 km/h according to the US National Hurricane Center, crossed the peninsula and the Gulf of California, and made a second landfall near the port of Guaymas in Sonora as a category 1 storm before weakening further. Mexico's civil protection authorities reported some flooding and storm surge and no deaths or injuries. About 700 people had taken shelter in Baja California Sur, the state's governor said (BBC Mundo). He told AFP that infrastructure had suffered "little damage" (The Straits Times, carrying AFP). In Guaymas the surge came over the seafront, and fallen electricity poles cut power to one district (La Jornada).

Our sources describe its strength at landfall differently. Euronews and The Straits Times call it a category 3 storm; Reuters, carried by the Daily Maverick, and BBC Mundo call it category 2 (Euronews; The Straits Times, carrying AFP; BBC Mundo; Daily Maverick, carrying Reuters). Euronews, The Straits Times and BBC Mundo all give winds of up to 175 km/h, and BBC Mundo says winds of that speed correspond to category 2: on its account the storm approached the coast at category 3 and had weakened by the time it reached land. The disagreement is over the label, not the wind. Reuters notes that it struck a stretch of coast far less populated than the resort area at the southern tip of the peninsula.

Pattern watch

• Iraq after the coalition. Opened this issue. The last US and coalition troops have left; the armed factions have not disarmed; both they and Washington are said to have promised to hold off from attacks for 90 days.
• Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Opened this issue. Past 8,000 confirmed cases, with attacks on the people responding to it.
• The trade truce between the United States and China. Opened this issue. Lists of goods for tariff cuts are published, without rates or dates; the wider truce now runs to 10 January 2027.
• Ethiopia and Tigray. From the previous issue. The war has widened: Ethiopia and Eritrea have broken off relations, and fighting has reached the Afar and Amhara regions; see above.
• The El Niño projection. From the previous issue. Hurricane Polo came ashore in Mexico with no deaths reported; see above. Nothing in this window tests the projection itself.
• South Sudan's first election. From the previous issue. Seen in headlines only, not read: South Sudan told the UN General Assembly that the vote will go ahead.
• Venezuela's transition. From the previous issue. Seen in headlines only, not read: releases of political prisoners, and pressure on the acting president to call elections.
• The Himalayan glacier risk. From the previous issue. Nothing new on the August disaster in what we read. An avalanche at a climbing base camp in Nepal was marked and not run; it is on the scorecard below.
• Deaths in custody in Nigeria. From the previous issue. Two government inquiries are running and the cause is not established; see above. The two tolls the previous issue reported were one count.
• Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb. From issue one. Seen in headlines only, not read: the United States turned down Iran's seven-day proposal on the Strait of Hormuz, and further talks are expected.
• Russia's political system after the war. From issue one. The previous issue said two developments would be looked at properly in this one. They were not: neither reached this issue's pool. Seen in headlines only, not read: the new parliament is choosing its speaker.
• Arctic militarisation. From issue one. Nothing read for this issue. Headlines show the security agreement signed last month was defended at the UN General Assembly.
• Displacement out of Yemen. From issue one. Not quiet. Seen in headlines only, not read: the UN reported large new displacement inside Yemen as fighting escalated. This thread has now gone three issues without being written up, which is a fact about us, not about Yemen.

What this issue does not contain, and why

SpaceX's Starship reached orbit for the first time and was marked higher than the Ebola story. It was not run: 32 newsrooms in our sources carried it, the flight affects few people directly for now, and we had nothing to add. The Flydubai flight was the most widely carried story in our pool and was not run for the same reason, and because the motive is still alleged, not established. An airstrike on a market in Myanmar's Rakhine state received the same total as the Ebola story and was passed over; the two could not both be written and the outbreak is the larger. Remarks made after the Washington summit about artificial intelligence and political prisoners were statements, not actions, and the summit's concrete result ran instead.

Several developments in the threads we follow were reported in our sources and did not reach the pool at all: in the Strait of Hormuz, in Venezuela and in Yemen. They are listed under Pattern watch as seen in headlines and not read. The section on attention gaps that alternates with the slow story is not yet built.

How this issue was made

Researched and written by an AI system working to a published rubric, with every source linked. This is the first issue on the twice-weekly pattern: it covers four days, Monday to Thursday, and was written on the Friday. The window is set by when our sources published, so a few of the events above happened on the weekend just before it and were reported inside it. Our sources are now fetched every three hours by a timer, so that a window is complete before anything is chosen from it. The window's 25,816 headlines were sorted into 16,648 clusters; 37 candidates were carried forward and merged to 32 stories, each marked by one AI and checked by a second that saw only the marks. Six were researched and written up, a seventh was read because the previous issue said it would be, and the slow story was written from IOM's data. Every candidate's marks are at the foot of this issue. Every figure above was fetched and read during this run; where sources disagree, we have said so and not chosen.

Three problems with how it was produced are visible in this issue, and the full list is on the how stories are chosen page. The largest outbreak of Ebola in Congo's history was split into groups too small to be marked, and reached the issue only through one man's killing. Headlines the software had attached to the wrong story were set aside by hand, and each is listed on the scorecard. And the second AI's notes, printed below, point out that every story in the pool received the top mark for how widely it was reported, so that mark separated nothing this time.

Since the previous issue was published we corrected the coverage counts printed in it, and then updated that correction. Both notes are printed at the foot of that issue.