Press digest

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

The Times leads with comments by the Chief Justice that the pay of judges and magistrates are too low. The newspaper gives prominence to the acquittal of Amanda Knox and also says that 11 applications for divorce were submitted yesterday.

The Malta Independent also leads with the acquittal of Amanda Knox.

In-Nazzjon reports how the Prime Minister had suggested that the US deploy a hospital ship to Malta to help injured Libyans. It also reports how a man was fined €11,000 and jailed for two years for killing his dog.

l-orizzont gives prominence to the forthcoming GWU Congress and says that the GWU has a place for everyone. The union yesterday accepted the membership of some 400 small entrepreneurs.

The overseas press:

There have been strong reactions from Italian, British and American media to the acquittal on appeal of US citizen Amanda Knox and Italian Raffaele Sollecito of the murder of UK student Meredith Kercher in 2007.

The Los Angeles Times reports Amanda Knox was released from prison on Monday night, just two hours after an appeals court overturned her murder conviction. Corrado Maria Daclon, the secretary-general of a foundation that has championed Knox's cause, told the Associated Press that Knox just “wanted to go home, reconnect with her family, take possession of her life and win back her happiness”.

Italy’s La Repubblica says outside the courtroom, the crowd exploded in anger after the verdict, shouting "Shame! Bastards!" to the judges and lawyers. More than 1,000 people, mostly youths, shouted their rage. But from the American TV trucks parked in front of the building there were cries of joy.

According to The Guardian, the "many faces of Amanda" were not all media hype, or overheated lawyers' rhetoric. Part of the continuing fascination of the affair would be to see which one is the true one. Padre Saulo Scarabattoli, the chaplain at Capanne prison, where she has spent the last four years, says prison may even have made her more enigmatic.

The Daily Mail focuses Meredith Kercher's family, saying the agony would now only continue after last night's dramatic court decision leaving them still wondering how exactly their “lovely, lovely girl” came to be so horrifically killed. Adding to their pain, the family has told how their simple search for justice has been overshadowed by the circus surrounding Amanda Knox and her appeal.

The Seattle Times argues that Kercher's family has every right to want justice for their slain beloved daughter and sister. The family was not satisfied that there was only one person involved in the killing, local drifter Rudy Guede who admitted to being at the cottage the night of the murder and whose DNA was found all over Kercher's room, on her clothes and body.

Forbes says Knox was not guilty of the charges against her. She was tried largely in the tabloids and the court of public opinion. Her case was badly mangled by Italy's police and the trial was more of a show trial than anything, with headlines declaring her a sex-crazed monster and impugning her reputation with no facts to support them. However, she would spend the rest of her life facing down rumours of her guilt and a tarnished reputation.

In other news…

The BBC reported early this morning that eurozone finance ministers have delayed a decision on giving Greece the next instalment of bailout cash. It came after Greece said it would not meet this year's deficit cutting target, sparking a sharp sell-off in stock markets. However Eurogroup chairman Jean-Claude Juncker said Greece would not be allowed to default on its debts. The next €8-billion-tranche of cash needs to be released by mid-November. The finance ministers, meeting in Luxembourg, also appeared to have reached a deal to let Finland receive collateral as security for its contribution towards the European Financial Stability Fund. The Finns had threatened to block further bailouts to Greece unless it received this special arrangement.

Associated Press quotes Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker saying early this morning that Slovakia's parliament would likely approve changes to the eurozone's bailout fund. He said the country's finance minister had indicated that there would be “a positive vote”. The leader of the junior party in Slovakia's governing coalition has threatened to bloc changes to the EFSF that would give the fund new powers and increase its lending capacity. Changes to the fund have to be approved by all 17 eurozone member-states.

The Wall Street Journal says protests against Wall Street have spread across the US as demonstrators marched on Federal Reserve banks and camped out in parks from Los Angeles to Portland, Maine, in a show of anger over the wobbly economy and what they see as corporate greed. In Manhattan, hundreds of protesters dressed as corporate zombies in white face paint lurched past the New York Stock Exchange clutching fistfuls of fake money. In Chicago, demonstrators pounded drums in the city's financial district. Others pitched tents or waved protest signs at passing cars in Boston, St. Louis and Kansas City.

Xinhua news agency reports that eight fighters of Libya' s ruling National Transitional Council were killed and 39 others were wounded in Sirte on Monday as firce battles continued. An NTC infantry squad was surrounded by pro-Gaddafi soldiers, who resorted to mortars in the exchange of fire. Meanwhile, NATO aircraft continued their strike mission over Sirte, where battles have been dragging on for weeks. The NTC previously confirmed that one of Gaddafi's sons Muatassim was holed up in Sirte.

CNN says the emergency room doctor who declared Michael Jackson dead testified in the involuntary manslaughter trial of Dr. Conrad Murray that there was no way doctors could have revived the pop icon after he arrived at the hospital. Dr Richelle Cooper said Murray never told her that he had given Jackson the surgical anesthetic propofol before he stopped breathing, but she confirmed it would not have made a difference if he had because Jackson "had died long before".

Meanwhile, The Los Angeles Times reports that cardiologist Thao Nguyen, who was part of the 14-member team that tried to revive Jackson, said  she had never heard of the surgical anesthetic that killed Jackson being used in a home setting. She said propofol, poses a severe danger to a patient's respiratory system and is used only in an operating room staffed with nurses, doctors, and heart and lung monitors. It does not have an antidote, Nguyen told jurors.