The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Times reports how the Malta Football Association yesterday sacked the national team coach. It also reports that ratings agency Fitch has affirmed Malta’s A+ rating.
The Malta Independent says a grand plan to solve the euro crisis appears to be in doubt. Although EU heads of government are due to meet today, a meeting of foreign ministers has been called off.
MaltaToday Midweek says Franco Debono is still saying he will abstain in the vote calling for Austin Gatt’s resignation over the bus service.
In-Nazzjon’s main story says former RTK journalist Sabrina Agius was an instrument for the PL to make its voice heard.
l-orizzont leads with the Budget proposals made yesterday by the GWU, focusing on a need for an updated cost of living adjustment mechanism.
The overseas press
Corriere della Sera reports that the governing coalition in Italy has reached a limited agreement on the issue of pension reform – part of the package aimed at reducing the country’s massive deficit. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi travels to Brussels later today to present the plans, the details of which have not been released. The EU wants Italy to raise its standard pension age from 65 to 67, change the legal system to encourage investment and pass other reforms to improve growth. The Northern League, whose constituency is made up of workers in productive northern Italy, staunchly opposes raising the pension age but is believed to have accepted raising it in a staggered mode
Television Tunisiennes says the moderate Islamist party in Tunisia, Ennahda, has began coalition talks with two left-win secular parties. The electoral commission said Ennahda was well ahead in the vote for a new assembly that would write a constitution and appoint a caretaker government. However Ennahda, which has pledged to support multi-party democracy, was not expected to have an overall majority.
Al Jazeera reports that deposed Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, his slain son Mutassim and former Defense Minister Abu Bakr Younis were buried in secrecy and anonymity after a brief ceremony attended by a handful of people, including three relatives of the dead. They were laid to rest in an unmarked grave before dawn in the Libyan desert that was home to Bedouin tribal ancestors. Libya's National Transitional Council is under intense international pressure to investigate the circumstances of Gadhafi's death. The Associated Press quotes an NTC statement issued late Tuesday as saying its leaders "disapprove" of any prisoners being hurt or killed.
President Barack Obama has said the overthrow and death of Qaddafi was is a “strong message” to other dictators that “people long to be free”. In an interview on NBC’s “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno”, Obama said Gaddafi had the chance during the so-called Arab Spring uprisings across the Middle East and Africa “to finally let loose of his grip on power and to peacefully transition to democracy”.
Eurasia Net reports that the Turkish government has said that it would, after all, accept offers of foreign aid to help earthquake victims. Survivors and the opposition have criticised the government for failing to provide enough supplies. It had previously said it could cope on its own with the impact of the disaster. A number of countries, including Israel with which Turkey has strained relations, had offered assistance.
Meanwhile Huriyet says rescue efforts have been continuing as the toll, at the latest count, reached more than 450 dead and more than 1,500 injured. In one extraordinary episode, three generations of the same family – a two-week-old baby, her mother and grandmother – were pulled out alive from the rubble in the town of Ercis, which was worst hit in the disaster.
USA Today reports that the last of America’s most powerful Cold War era nuclear weapons have been dismantled in Texas. The B-53 bomb was 600 times more powerful than that dropped on Hiroshima at the end of the WWII. More modern and smaller weapons can now be produced and President Obama has said he wanted to reduce the country’s nuclear arsenal.
The Scotsman says gold is to be mined in Scotland for the first time in 500 years. The project, near Lock Lomand, has become commercially viable due to the increasing international price of gold.
France 24 quotes the latest Climate Change Vulnerability Index released this morning which shows that a third of humanity, mostly in Africa and South Asia, faced the biggest risks from climate change but rich nations in northern Europe would be least exposed. Bangladesh, India and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) were among 30 countries with “extreme" exposure to climate shift”. Five Southeast Asian nations – Indonesia, Myanmar, Vietnam, the Philippines and Cambodia – were also in the highest category, partly because of rising seas and increasing severe tropical storms.
ABC reports US rockers Aerosmith had to postpone their concert in Paraguay by a day after singer Steven Tyler fell in his hotel bathroom, hitting his face and breaking two teeth. The 62-year-old was expected to perform in today’s concert. Hundreds of fans already had lined up outside the Jockey Club hours before the show was to start, before it was called off.