The following are the top items in the Maltese and overseas press today:
The Times leads with the fire at Pender Gardens yesterday afternoon and the rescue of a woman trapped by flames in a fire at her house in Sliema in the morning.
The Malta Independent says the political leaders faced off on television last night as the EP electoral campaign approaches its conclusion.
MaltaToday says charges are flying as the electoral campaign winds down. Its focus is on charges by David Casa on the VAT refunds on registration tax, the charges made against PN president Victor Scerri over development in Bahrija, and how Edward Scicluna was targeted by an anonymous letter-writer.
l-orizzont says the Prime Minister is escaping responsibility for his government's actions.
In-Nazzjon says Toly is investing €13 million on a new factory. It also says eight Labour MPs and two EP candidates did not declare their interest in the PL lawsuit for the reimbursement of VAT on vehicle registration.
The Press in Britain
One story dominates almost all of the British nationals' front pages: the resignations of three ministers and two MPs all on the same day.
The Independent says the resignations hi-jacked Gordon Brown's planned Cabinet reshuffle.
The five resignations leave the Daily Express asking how long the Prime Minister himself will remain in office.
The Guardian profiles the five Labour figures, with a comment calling for the party to oust Mr Brown.
The Daily Mail also focuses on Home Minister Jacqui Smith's departure, and also devotes half of its front page to the couple who committed suicide together after their child's tragic death.
The Times suggests Jacqui Smith had quit to spend more time at her second home.
The Daily Telegraph describes Labour as a party on the verge of a 'nervous breakdown', adding that the departing MPs "milked the system to the end".
The Sun reinterprets a children's favourite for the story, presenting Alistair Darling and the departing Home Secretary as 'Blunderbird' puppets.
And the Daily Mirror captures the mood by declaring a 'Meltbrown' in the Cabinet.
The Daily Star reports the doomed Air France flight 447 was sucked into a weather whirlpool called the Black Cauldron.
Metro reports a sea captain in his ninth decade led a gang in attempting to smuggle more than £35m of cannabis into Britain in a rusty tugboat, the.
And elsewhere...
O Globo quotes Brazilian Defence Minister Nelson Jobim confirming that a three-mile path of wreckage found in the Atlantic is that the Air France jet which crashed in the ocean. The aircraft had run into stormy weather with strong turbulence around four hours into the ll-hour flight which had left Rio for Paris.
France has called on Brussels to relax the Maastricht stability pact criteria over mounting budget deficits. French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde told Financial Times Deutschland that EU countries ought to reconsider applying the bloc's rules on fiscal spending.
The Irish Independent quotes official figures showing there has been a 166 per cent increase in the number of people losing their jobs in Ireland in the last 12 months. Figures show there were almost 36,000 job losses in the first five months of 2009
North Korea's Kim Jong Il has officially named his 26-year-old son, Kim Jong Un, as the next leader. South Korea's Hankook Ilbo newspaper reported that the son already is being hailed as "Commander Kim". The anointment comes at a time of mounting tensions over North Korea's rocket launch and the nuclear test.
The Jakarta Post says 20 people have died in Indonesia after drinking traditional arak palm wine that was spiked with methanol.
Chumhuriyet announces that police in southern Turkey have detained a man suspected of killing eight members of his family, including three children.
Suddhessen Morgen says a court in Kassel has allowed three Holocaust survivors who worked in Jewish ghettos to claim old-age pensions. The ruling paves the way for thousands of Nazi victims to demand similar compensation.
Az-Zaman reports a member of the gang that kidnapped and murdered aid worker Margaret Hassan has been jailed for life.
Globe & Mail says at least 61 prospectors have been found dead in an abandoned gold mine in South Africa.
Afghan Daily reports six family members, including two children, have been killed in an explosion close to a US military base just outside the capital Kabul.
A British woman to be tried in Laos for heroin trafficking secretly impregnated herself with the sperm of another prisoner in an effort to escape the death penalty. The government newspaper, The Vientiane Times, quoted police as saying Orobator told authorities she secretly obtained sperm from a fellow prisoner to impregnate herself to avoid the death penalty.
announces that US Police have arrested a 51-year-old woman they accuse of leading an armed robbery gang involving her 12- and 14-year-old sons. Many of their young victims were physically assaulted.