NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Taoiseach Simon Harris, pictured today in Waterford. Fergal Phillips Fergal Phillips

• A cross-party row has started over election proposals to slash the 13.5% VAT rate for restaurant owners which has been at the centre of an ongoing crisis.
• Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has backed her integration spokesperson Claire Kerrane in a controversy over the Roscommon-Galway TD’s call to see deportation considered for any immigrant who commits a crime.
• An Irishman has been arrested in connection with the murder of 31-year-old American woman Mackenzie Michalski in Budapest.
• A “mob” brandishing weapons chased a man armed with a blood-stained baseball bat after violence broke out and spilt across four busy streets in Dublin city-centre, a court has heard.
• Senator Timmy Dooley has hit out at the “criminal thugs” that he said defaced his billboards and removed some of his election posters last night, while Labour candidate Evie Nevin’s face was cut out of her posters.
• An All Blacks supporter who got drunk and “buckled” the doors of a Dublin restaurant following Friday night’s rugby match has been spared jail.
• Irish band Fontaines D.C. and Belfast rapper Jordan Adetunji have been honoured with nominations for Grammy Awards.
• Micheál Martin has said that it is “not a surprise” that the US has raised concerns with Ireland’s Occupied Territories Bill but said that the intervention will not stop Ireland from passing the legislation.

INTERNATIONAL

Protesters gather outside the Parliament in Westminster in support of Sea Shepherd founder and anti-whaling activist Paul Watson. Watson, a US and Canadian citizen, was arrested in Greenland and is facing charges in Japan of accomplice to assault and ship trespass, which could see him getting a 15-year prison sentence. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

#UNITED STATES: US prosecutors announced charges yesterday in an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate former president Donald Trump and a prominent Iranian-American journalist.

#UKRAINE: One person died and 13 were wounded by a Russian drone attack on the Ukrainian port city of Odesa overnight.

#WILDFIRE: A wildfire in southern California, in the United States, has destroyed 132 structures, mostly homes, over the last two days according to fire officials.

#FAMINE REVIEW COMMITTEE: There is an “imminent and substantial likelihood of famine” across the Gaza Strip, according to the UN’s famine review committee.

PARTING SHOT

Election posters in Dublin earlier today. Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie / © RollingNews.ie

IT IS DAY one of the general election campaign, after Taoiseach Simon Harris had his long-awaited trip to Áras an Uachtaráin yesterday to dissolve the Dáil. 

Politicians were out in full force across the country today, canvassing voters as rows began between parties on various issues – including VAT rates and climate change.

So, how did parties kick off their campaigns? You can find out here.