(Adds PN, Justice Ministry statements)
Decisive action needs to be taken by the European Union on the unprecedented economic and financial situation the world is facing, Labour leader Joseph Muscat said this morning.
Speaking on One Radio, Dr Muscat said that the United States, which used to give financial advice to the world, saw its rating go down from AAA to AA+ and China was now advising the US.
The EU, he said, should take decisive action for although a number of emergency summits had been held, the union had yet managed to give a vision that was convincing to the markets.
Dr Muscat said Labour agreed that the utmost should be done for the euro zone to be saved. The problem was that it seemed that the only people satisfied with the results of summits being held were the attending prime ministers.
He said the Maltese government was not reading well the signs of the times and while the Finance Minister had said last month he was not concerned with the situation in Italy, the Prime Minister said the opposite only yesterday.
Earlier, Dr Muscat expressed shock at the release from prison of Charles Muscat, known as il-pips, after serving 15 of 25 years. Mr Muscat had been jailed for double murder.
He was let out of jail for good behaviour even though he is awaiting trial for allegedly being one of the minds in a major drug importation conspiracy. This jury had still not been held although the compilation was concluded 10 years ago.
The Labour leader said he could not understand how this could be allowed by Malta's judiciary system. It was worrying to him as a father, as a politician and as a citizen. It was also a matter of national security, he said.
JUSTICE MINISTRY STATEMENT
In a statement, the Justice Ministry said that Mr Muscat spent 16 years, 10 months and seven days in prison, exactly two thirds of his two sentences, which amounted to 25 years and eight months.
According to 1995 prison regulations, each prisoner is entitled to remission of a third of his sentence for good behaviour.
In fact, every prisoner is informed what his earliest date of release would be if he behaved well.
If a prisoner needs to be disciplined, the remission period is reduced but if the prisoner then behaved well for the following six months, the remission lost could be partially or wholly won back.
In the case of Mr Muscat, prison records showed that his latest disciplinary case was in December 2005, when he tested positive to drugs.
A number of days were reduced from his remission but, since for the following 25 months, he tested clean, he was re-rewarded his lost days.
As for the other case in which Mr Muscat is charged with conspiracy in a drug trafficking case, when the compilation of evidence was concluded in 2003, Mr Muscat was granted bail.
One case, was not related to the other in any way.
PN STATEMENT
In a statement, the PN said that it was the wise decisions taken by the Nationalist government which prevented Malta from ending up in the precarious situation other countries had found themselves in.
To avoid economic collapse, these countries were having to take tough austerity measures at a time when Malta was investing in Mcast, stipends, a state of the art healty system and new jobs. Malta also had a low unemployment rate, compared to the other EU states.
Had Prime Minister Gonzi taken Dr Muscat's advice and not introduce the euro, and had he not addressed the pensions' challenge, Malta would now be in the same situation as these countries, the PN said.