The following are the top stories in the Maltese newspapers today.

The Times of Malta says delays to a Libya ferry rescue cost €782,000.

The Malta Independent says Malta has slid to fifth place in the lowest unemployment stakes.

In-Nazzjon says the effective period of residency in the citizenship scheme has to be clarified

l-orizzont previews the white paper on local wardens, due to be published today.

The overseas press

Ansa reports heavy rains continue to lash central and northern Italy, causing flash flooding, landslides, disruption to transport and the evacuation of over 1,000 people. In Rome alone, emergency services received some 3,000 calls, as people were forced to climb into the roofs of their homes and cars in some areas as up to 130 millimetres of rain fell in a matter of hours. Northern neighbourhoods in the Italian capital were flooded and authorities were monitoring the Tiber river, at risk of overflowing. In Tuscany, 1,000 people were evacuated in the province of Pisa and the city itself was partly flooded. In Florence, the river Arno was reported to be at a 20-year high and in Venice, exceptionally high tides submerged half the city during the night.

Metro says snow has been falling across high ground throughout the UK, particularly across Wales, Scotland and northern England, with further hail storms and thunder predicted. Temperatures are expected to drop to around freezing. The Met Office has warned of icy stretches on roads and the potential for travel disruption. Meanwhile the Environment Agency has issued more than 140 flood alerts and 10 more serious flood warnings in the south-west, which mean flooding is expected and immediate action is required. In January, the south-east and central southern England had a record 175.2mm (6.9in) of rainfall. This has beaten the previous record of 158.2mm for the same parts of England set in 1988.

Deutsche Welle says US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavroff have discussed the lack of progress in the Syria peace talks taking place in Geneva. They met at a security conference in Munich where Kerry urged his Russian counterpart to push the Syria government to speed up handing over its chemical weapons stockpile.

In Geneva, the week of closed-door negotiations ended with the opposing sides continuing to spar over who is to blame for the bloody conflict that has claimed 130,000 lives. Tribune de Genève quotes UN mediator Lakhdar Brahimi, who orchestrated the first meeting between the two sides since the conflict erupted in March 2011, saying he aimed to host a second round of talks starting on February 10. No ceasefire was agreed as the talks wound up Friday, talks on a transitional government never began, and a deal to allow aid into besieged rebel-held areas of the central city of Homs went nowhere.

Ukraine TV says police investigators have left the clinic in Kiev where the protest leader Dmytro Bulatov is being treated without having been able to question him. Bulatov, 35, is in intensive care recovering from injuries he says he received when he was kidnapped and tortured. Police guards continue to be posted outside but hospital staff were preventing them from gaining access to him. Meanwhile, a senior Ukrainian opposition leader has called for the West to give more support to help solve his country's political crisis. Arseniy Yatsenyuk said Ukraine needed “a Marshall Plan, not martial law”, referring to the post-World War Two US aid programme for Europe.

The Times says British Prime Minister David Cameron says he remains determined to hold a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union. Speaking during a UK-France summit, Cameron repeated his pledge to renegotiate the UK’s position in the EU. President François Hollande said the UK was entitled to hold a referendum about its place in Europe, adding that demands for EU treaty changes by 2017, as a prelude to a referendum on the UK's membership, were “not a priority for the time being”.

Amanda Knox is refusing to return to Italy after judges reinstated her murder conviction for the death of British student Meredith Kercher. Knox was sentenced to 28 years and six months and her former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito was jailed for 25 years. He was held by Italian police at around 1am today and had his passport seized after reportedly taking a short trip to Austria. Miss Kercher's family have called on Knox to be extradited from the US, but she insisted: “I will never go willingly back.”

The BBC reports the head of the Anglican Church in Uganda, Archbishop Stanley Ntagali, has rebuked the archbishops of Canterbury and of York over a letter that they wrote in which they reminded Christians not to victimised gays and lesbians. The letter was sent to the presidents of Nigeria and Uganda, two countries that have introduced anti-gay legislation, and to all presiding archbishops of the Anglican Church.

Toronto Star says Canada has urged President Obama to make a timely decision on the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline after the US State Department release another environmental impact study of the project, raising no major objections. The 1,900 km-long pipeline will carry oil from Alberta in west Canada to Nebraska.

Seattle Post Intelligencer says a woman has been found guilty of manslaughter in connection with the illicit silicone buttocks injections that prosecutors say killed a Georgia woman in 2012. Natasha Stewart was found guilty of culpable negligence manslaughter in the death of 37-year-old Karima Gordon. She faces up to 40 years in prison. The prosecution said Stewart, an adult entertainer also known as Pebbelz Da Model, took $200 for a referral to the alleged injector and falsely represented that the injector was a nurse.

 

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