The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
The Times leads with evidence in court yesterday of how Tancred Tabone was paid $20,000 in cash in a hotel. The cash came from oil procurement commissions. It also reports that hunters are close to backing Labour.
The Malta Independent leads with yesterday’s debate, saying the need for change or lack thereof was the running theme.
l-orizzont says George Farrugia has belied the PN, saying the directors of Intershore had no knowledge of the oil commissions.
In-Nazzjon refers to yesterday’s debate on Xarabank and quotes the prime minister saying the PN remained the best guarantee of jobs for young people.
The overseas press
L.Osservatore Romano reports Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Dean of the College of Cardinals has summoned the prelates to meet in general congregations starting on Monday to discuss the problems facing the Church and set a date for the start of the conclave to elect Pope Benedict's successor. The new popewill be chosen by 115 cardinal-electors (those younger than 80 years old) through ballots held in the Vatican's Sistine Chapel. A two-thirds-plus-one vote majority is required.
According to Ansa, signs promoting the candidacy of Ghana's Cardinal Peter Turkson for pope have begun popping up all over Rome in an apparent spoof. The signs, which read “Vote Turkson”, are styled after Italian political campaign posters. Campaigning for pope is strictly forbidden by conclave rules.
Meanwhile, Avvenire quotes Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi saying that Benedict XVI spent his first day as "Papa Emeritus" serenely. He watched the news on TV, played the piano and walked the halls of the palace at Castel Gandolfo. The Holy Father took with him some recordings and books on theology, spirituality and history. Fr Lombardi said that the former pope had “slept very well”.
Al Ahram reports that 100 Egyptian Coptic faithful, who live and work in Libya, were kidnapped and tortured in Benghazi. A Salafist Brigade broke into the church and took the people hostage, accusing them of proselytising. The prisoners had their heads shaved and crosses that some of them had tattooed on their bodies were removed with acid. Meanwhile, violence re-erupted outside a church in Kom Ombo, Upper Egypt on Friday when security forces used teargas to disperse protesters angry at a Muslim woman's alleged kidnap and forced conversion to Christianity. Christians make up around 10 percent of Egypt's population.
Adnkronos says anti-establishment comedian and political kingmaker Beppe Grillo has accused centre-left leader Pier Luigi Bersani and his party of acting like “vulgar predators” by trying to persuade some of his Five Star Movement's new senators to work with him. The Five Star movement, its elected officials, activists and voters were not for sale, Grillo wrote on his blog. Bersani's centre-left bloc has an outright majority in the lower house but lacks this in the senate, where Grillo has 54 senators.
In an interview with the left-leading La Repubblica Bersani insists he could become Italy's next leader without allying with Berlusconi's People of Freedom party, which has the largest number of senators (116) in the upper house. Bersani has drawn up an eight-point plan to govern in cooperation with Grillo's party, which which he hopes would convince Italy's president Giorgio Napolitano at a meeting next Wednesday.
VOA reports President Barack Obama has ordered $85 billion in budget cuts that could slow the US economy and slash jobs, after blaming Republicans for refusing to stop the “dumb” spending cuts. Obama complied with his legal obligations and initiated the automatic, across-the-board cuts in domestic and defence spending, following the failure of efforts to clinch a deal with Republicans on cutting the deficit.
According to Tribune de Genève, the United Nations refugee agency has called on nations to ensure the safety of the Iranian dissidents, resident at Camp Liberty in Iraq who this week received threats from a group claiming a deadly rocket attack there last month. The February 9 mortar attack killed seven people and wounded dozens. UNHCR urged the Iraqi government to do its utmost to safeguard the camp's population while the international community found a safe location for it outside Iraq.
Corriere della Sera reports that prosecutors in Milan on Friday demanded an appeals court uphold a four-year prison sentence handed to former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi for tax fraud linked to his business empire. On Thursday, prosecutors in the southern city of Naples also announced they were investigating Berlusconi on suspicion of paying a former Italian senator Sergio De Gregorio €3 million to switch parties in 2006. The move allegedly helped bring down the centre-left government of Romani Prodi, which had a wafer-thin Senate majority.
Mail & Guardian says eight South African police officers have been charged with murder for the death of a the 27-year-old taxi driver dragged by a police vehicle. South Africa’s police chief Gen Riah Phiyega said she shared “the extreme shock and outrage” over the video evidence of abuse of Macia by police officers and said his rights were “violated in the most extreme form”.
South China Morning Post reports China has executed four foreigners for killing 13 Chinese sailors in an attack on the Mekong River. The attack on the sailors highlighted drug smuggling and extortion rackets along the vital waterway and led to a major expansion of Chinese police powers in the region.
A man is presumed dead after a sinkhole opened up under his bedroom in the US state of Florida and "swallowed" him. CNN reports the incident happened overnight in a suburb of Tampa. His 36-year-old's brother heard screams and tried in vain to pull him out. Authorities called to the scene found the hole to be about 100 feet in diameter and were unable to make contact with the victim. A spokesperson for the fire authority said the hole was not man-made.