Press digest

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

The Times says that Gonzi has said no to Cameron on a proposed EU Budget freeze.

The Malta Independent reports that details on a new EU mechanism for financial stability will be made known early next year. Like the other newspapers, it also reports on the government appeal of the Karin Grech judgement.

In-Nazzjon says more charges may be filed against former Inspector David Gatt. It also reports how sub-zero temperatures have hit Rome.

l-orizzont carries comments that it was absurd to say that a collision between a boat and a yacht off Marsamxett could not be avoided.

The overseas press

As this Saturday marks start of a three-week long Christmas celebration, travel plans for millions of Britons are threatened during the weekend's bitter Arctic freeze. The Daily Express, which claims this December is the coldest for 100 years, says several UK airports have been affected, train services were cancelled and some 2,000 schools in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland remained closed due to heavy snowfalls. The Daily Mail forecasts the inclement weather would last for at least another month and today, 25cm are possible in Wales and southern England.

Ansa reports the Siberian air current affecting much of Europe has chilled the length of Italy from Milan to Rome and Naples. Outside the capital, snowfall had residents, travellers and airport operators admiring the strange sight of Fiumicino, Rome's international airport, dusted in white. The famed tourist island of Capri in the Bay of Naples also saw a sprinkling of snow that melted all to fast for the local kids.

London’s The Independent profiles the man believed to have handed secret documents to the WikiLeaks website. It says Bradley Manning, the 23-year-old former army intelligence analyst, has been in solitary confinement for seven months and faces 52 more years in custody. He is charged with leaking a US military video showing a 2007 attack by Apache helicopters that killed 17 people in Iraq. His only hope of easying his ordeal, says the paper, is to give the US authorities testimony against Julian Assange that would allow them to seek his estradition from the UK

The Christian Science Monitor says an unofficial US envoy visiting North Korea has warned that the situation on the peninsula is a "tinderbox". The envoy, Bill Richardson, made the comments after talks with officials in Pyongyang, whom he asked to exercise "extreme restraint". He said he had urged them to let South Korea go ahead with planned live-firing exercises on an island which was shelled by the North last month. Pyongyang has been threatening to strike back if the drill goes ahead.

El Universal says Mexican authorities are interrogating prison guards suspected of allowing more than 140 Mexican prisoners to escaped from a jail near the US border. Many of the prisoners are serving sentences for drugs trafficking. Police and troops have launched a major operation to catch the fugitives.

Dawn reports nearly 60 people have been killed in a series of attacks by US drones in the past 24 hours in Pakistan's Khyber tribal district. Security officials said all the dead in the attacks were militants – a claim that could not be independently confirmed.

Le Monde quotes French President Nicolas Sarkozy threatening Ivory Coast incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo to either cede power to opposition leader Alassane Ouattara by "the end of the week" or face EU sanctions. Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has also called for African nations to remove Mr Gbagbo by force if necessary.

Venezuela's El Globo says the parliament has granted President Hugo Chavez wider powers for 18 months to deal with the aftermath of last month's floods, in which about 40 people died and 140,000 were left homeless. His critics say the move will turn the country into a dictatorship.

The Standard quotes Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe saying he would nationalise all US and UK companies operating in the country unless Western sanctions were removed. He told his Zanu-PF party's annual conference it was time to fight the sanctions imposed on him and party leaders.

The Sun reports that a couple of 14-year-old schoolkids have become Britain's youngest parents. Baby-faced April Webster gave birth to son Jamie after getting pregnant when she and the child's dad Nathan Fishbourne were both just 13. April is quoted as saying she was going to be a great mum. At the moment their four-week-old child Jamie is living with April and her parents.

The New Musical Express says American musician and painter Don Van Vliet, best known by the stage name Captain Beefheart, has died aged 69 from complications from multiple sclerosis. Considered as one of the most original recording artists of his time, Van Vliet rose to fame in the 1960s with a unique style of blues-inspired rock & roll, later devoting himself to art.