The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Times features an interview with an injured Italian journalist who spoke of a massacre in Libya. The newspaper also reports on yesterday’s no-show by the judiciary at the Independence Day Mass.
The Malta Independent reports on Faculty of Law concern that law students are taking private lessons from a person who may not be specialised in particular aspects of the law.
l-orizzont reports on a steep increase in the price of diabetes sticks as soon as the importer was replaced. It also says that the PN is renewing its friendship with former Italian foreign minister Gianni de Michelis despite his involvement in Tangentopoli.
In-Nazzjon highlights comments by President Goerge Abela yesterday on the need for consensus in Malta on way to tackle world problems.
The overseas press
Reuters quotes Libya's interim rulers saying they had captured the whole of the Jufra area deep in the Sahara desert, finding chemical weapons, and largely taken control of Sabha. An NTC spokesman told reporters in Misrata that the depot was now under control of the revolutionaries. Gaddafi loyalists have been holding out in Jufra and Sabha along with the bigger strongholds of Bani Walid and Sirte. Seven NTC fighters were killed in an ambush by pro-Gaddafi soldiers inside Bani Walid and an NTC official said pro-Gaddafi forces there had killed at least 16 civilians there “in cold blood” in the last two days after suspecting they supported the revolution.
L’Echo reports that NATO, which took command of a military mission in March under a UN mandate to protect Libyan civilians, agreed at a meeting of ambassadors of its 28 member states in Brussels to extend the mission for three more months. Britain said its planes had struck at pro-Gaddafi troops in three areas and destroyed bases in Sirte and Bani Walid. The Syrian-based Arrai TV said NATO warships and planes had hit a hospital in Sirte on Wednesday, wounding a Ukrainian doctor and patients.
ABC News reports that the US Supreme Court has denied a last-minute stay of execution for Troy Davis after a delay to weigh arguments from his legal team and the state of Georgia over whether he deserved a stay. Five minutes after his scheduled death, Davis' supporters erupted in cheers, hugs and tears outside the jail in Jackson as they believed he had been saved from the death penalty. But Davis was granted only a temporary reprieve as the Supreme Court considered the decision. The warrant for Davis' execution is valid until September 28. Davis was convicted of the 1989 murder of a policeman and had his execution suspended four times over the course of his 22 years on death row. However, multiple legal appeals during have failed to prove his innocence.
Kathimerini reports that the Greek government announced fresh austerity measures after Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos insisted earlier in the day that his country had no plans to abandon the euro and would do everything in his power to stay in the eurozone. The government said it would cut pensions above €1,200 and lay off 30,000 public sector workers temporarily. Government workers’ wages would also be cut. The threshold on income-tax free allowances is to be lowered from €8,000 to €5,000. Meanwhile, Greece’s two largest labour unions have called for another general strike on October 19.
Migrants have clashed with police and residents in Lampedusa, prompting Italy to announce they would all be transferred and repatriated within 48 hours. Sky’s Italian TV channel screened footage showing riot police wielding clubs and beating the migrants, a day after migrants set their overcrowded holding centre on fire to protest Italy's policy of forced repatriations. Some 26,000 Tunisians and 28,000 people of other nationalities from Libya have arrived in Lampedusa this year since the beginning of the Arab revolts.
CNN says President Obama has told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas he would veto his bid for UN membership, as he tried to persuade him to drop the plans. But during a meeting with the US president, Abbas vowed to press ahead. Obama had told the UN General Assembly that a Palestinian state could only be achieved through talks with Israel. French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned a veto could spark another cycle of violence in the region. Diplomatic efforts for Palestinian UN membership have intensified, with Mr Abbas preparing to submit a written application to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in New York on Friday. Meanwhile, thousands of people have rallied in the West Bank in support of the move.
The Irish Enquirer says two paternity tests have shown that an Irish priest, featured in an RTÉ 'Prime Time Investigates' programme, was not the father of a Kenyan woman. The Dublin High Court has heard that Fr Kevin Reynolds, who claimed RTÉ accused him of raping a teenage girl in 1982 and fathering a child by her, had been restored to the priesthood since the results of the paternity tests became known.
Iceland is the best country in the world to be a woman, according to rankings compiled by US website Newsweek/The Daily Beast. Second place is Sweden and third Canada – the only non-European country in the top seven. The United States is eighth. Newsweek said that the African country of Chad was deemed the worst country to be a woman. The website said women in Chad almost no legal rights and most marriages are arranged when girls are 11 or 12. Afghanistan was deemed the second-worst country to be a woman: 90 per cent of females there were illiterate and 85 per cent of births happened with no medical assistance.
Bild says police in Austria have found the body of an 89-year old woman in her freezer and said her nephew had admitted placing her there. The unidentified suspect claimed his aunt died a natural death and that he had put her in the freezer instead of reporting her death so he could continue to collect her monthly care allowance. Police were still waiting for the results of a post-mortem examination to see if there was foul play involved in the death.