Malta and international press digest

The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:

The Times leads with the announcement by the European Commission that is allocating €112m to Malta in a multi-year programme to help the island deal with illegal migration. It also reports the death of a Maltese truck driver in France and the resumption of street protests in Greece.

The Malta Independent says the economic expectations of the Maltese people have taken a slide. It also reports growing protests in Malta over the Working Time Directive.

l-orizzont says there are manouvres at Maltapost against the GWU. Both the GWU and the UHM earlier this week claimed to represent the majority of workers at the postal company.

In-Nazzjon also gives prominence to the Maltese driver’s death near Lens in France and the EU Borders Fund grant to Malta.

The Press in Britain…

The Financial Times leads with the pound Sterling’s drop to within 5p of parity with the euro as it fell to a fresh record low against the single currency for the ninth successive day.

The Daily Telegraph reports that taxpayers' money will be lent directly to struggling businesses under a radical plan to help them through the recession.

Daily Star claims British taxpayers may have to stump up £1bn to bail out Jaguar Land Rover.

The Daily Express says banks have been accused of penalising careful savers by cutting rates by 4 percent.

The Sun reports Prime Minister Gordon Brown and the Archbishop of Canterbury were locked in an unholy punch-up over the credit crunch.

According to The Daily Mail, the BBC has been fined £95,000 over faked phone-in competitions on pre-recorded radio programmes.

The Herald says more than 500,000 householders in the UK will fall into arrears with their mortgage payments next year.

The Scotsman reports a teacher's career was in tatters after he was convicted of assaulting two of his students after a prolonged campaign of abuse.

And elsewhere…

Aftonbladet says Nobel Prize jurors who accepted all-expenses-paid trips to China in 2006 and 2008 to discuss the awards are being investigated on suspicion of bribery. The investigation was prompted by a Swedish Radio report. If charged and convicted, the jurors would face fines or up to two years in prison.

The International Herald Tribune reports that an international tribunal on the 1994 Rwanda genocide has convicted three former senior Rwandan army officials to life imprisonment. The UN court found the three guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. Troops and a Hutu militia killed 800,000 people, mostly minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

Corriere della Sera says a Milan court has imposed a 10-year jail sentence on Calisto Tanzi, the founder of the Italian dairy products giant Parmalat which collapsed five years ago with €14 billion missing. Parmalat's collapse in 2003 wiped out the savings of 130,000 people in Italy. The dairy giant once employed 36,000 people in 30 countries.

The Washington Times reports that US Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked for an updated proposal for closing Guantanamo, the United State's special prison for suspects in its "war on terror".

Berliner Morgenpost says Germany's lower house of parliament has approved a revised version of a controversial anti-terror bill that was rejected by the upper house last month.

Kathemerini says riot police have clashed with rock-throwing demonstrators in central Athens, in the 13th day of violence since a fatal police shooting of a 15-year-old boy. Protesters broke away from a peaceful rally and hurled rocks and petrol bombs at police and buildings near the Greek parliament. Police responded with tear gas and flash grenades and also stopped an effort to burn down the city's main Christmas tree, which was replaced this week after being torched in riots.

Al-Quds al-Arabi reports that the UN Relief and Works Agency has been forced to suspend deliveries to 750,000 Palestinians in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip because wheat supplies scheduled to arrive in the Gaza Strip earlier this month did not enter the coastal territory as planned.

The New York Times quotes figures released by the World Health Organization showing the cholera death toll in Zimbabwe has risen above 1,100, an increase of 133 in just two days. The number of cases has risen above 20,000 since the start of the outbreak in August.

De Standaard reports Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme is facing growing pressure to step down after the country's top court accused his government of pressuring judges to back the dismantling of Fortis bank. The president of the supreme court made the accusation in a letter to the speaker of parliament, but he did not mention Leterme by name.