The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Times reports that Franco Debono has threatened the prime minister that he will not support the government unless the justice ministry is split in two now. It also reports how Eddie Fenech Adami was hospitalised yesterday.
The Malta Independent quotes teachers saying that the national curriculum needs to reflect classroom realities.
In-Nazzjon highlights the agreement reached between the Church and the Band Clubs Association for more orderly band marches.
l-orizzont says fishermen have warned they will hold more protests over the government’s fisheries policies.
The overseas press
El Pais reports that Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has selected well-known former deputy finance minister and investment banker, 51-year-old Luis de Guindos, to spearhead his government's efforts to pull the eurozone's fourth-largest economy out of its worst crisis in decades. Rajoy's cabinet formation comes just over a month after his conservative Popular Party won a landslide victory in general elections, making Spain the third ailing eurozone economy to see a change of government in recent months after administrations in Italy and Greece collapsed over their inability to push through economic overhauls demanded by the European Union and financial markets.
The Economic Times says Asian markets slipped this morning as traders questioned whether a European Central Bank move to pump cash into banks would be enough to unclog credit markets and ease the region's debt crisis. A total of 523 banks snapped up a record €489.2 billion following ECB’s announcement that it would provide three-year loans at rates as low as one percent. However, some market-watchers said the fact that so many institutions jumped in so quickly highlighted the precarious state that they were in. Losses were between 0.27 per cent in Seoul and 1.08 per cent in Shanghai.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has started his presidential campaign on an anti corruption and pro-business note. Interfax reported that while addressing a business congress in Moscow, Putin vowed to make Russia one of the world's top places for entrepreneurs in the next 10 years. He said he would work out and achieve “a road map that would contain concrete practical steps aimed at improving the business climate”. The programme would be dubbed the “national entrepreneurial initiative”.
Monitors from the Arab League arrive in Syria later today aimed at ending the violent crackdown on anti-government protests. The BBC says an advance party of Arab League observers, accompanied by members of the media, will arrive in Syria on Thursday to prepare for the arrival of the full delegation, which will have a one-month mandate that can be extended by another month if both sides agree. They will oversee Syria's compliance with the Arab League initiative, which calls for attacks to stop, troops to withdraw from the streets and detained protesters to be freed.
Meanwhile, in what The Washington Times describes as one of its strongest statements on Syria, the United States has said President Bashar al-Assad had lost all legitimacy and credibility. The White House said it was deeply concerned by reliable reports of civilian and army deserted being indiscriminately killed.
The Times of India quotes sources with close ties to Pyongyang and Beijing saying North Korea would shift to collective rule after the death of Kim Jong-il, although his untested young son would be at the head of the ruling coterie. The source added that the military, which was trying to develop a nuclear arsenal, has pledged allegiance to the untested Kim Jong-un, who takes over the family dynasty that has ruled North Korea since it was founded after World War Two. Both Kim Jong-il and his father Kim Il-sung were all-powerful, authoritarian rulers of the isolated state.
El Universal reports that the authorities in Mexico have disbanded an entire municipal police force as part of a campaign to rout out corruption and improve security in the face of drug-related violence. More than 900 officers in Vera Cruz’s Boca del Rio are losing their jobs.
Australia’s Herald Sun says a teenager has sentenced to 13 years in prison for killing an Indian student in Melbourne last year. The killing came amid a series of attacks on Indian students in the city causing widespread outrage in India.
The New York Times says an American court has sentenced a Chinese-born scientist to more than seven years’ imprisonment for stealing millions of dollars’ worth of trade secrets from two major US agro-business companies. Huang Kexue admitted in October that he stole secrets on a pesticide and a new food product and sent them to China and Germany.
Los Angeles Times boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr has been sent to jail for 90 days for domestic violence. His firmer girlfriend, Josie Harris, had claimed that the boxer hit her and threatened two of their children during an argument at her home in September 2010. Harris reportedly had upset Mayweather by telling him she was dating another man. Mayweather pleaded guilty to a reduced domestic-violence misdemeanour charge. The jail sentence complicates, and perhaps scraps, plans for a late-spring fight between Mayweather and Filipino superstar Manny Pacquiao.