The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
Times of Malta says impeachment proceedings against Justice Farrugia Sacco have been shelved until a decision in a constitutional court case, but the judge is due to retire in August.
The Malta Independent reports that only 28% of appointments to government boards are women. It also says some people turned down proposals to tamper their smart meters.
L-orizzont reports on going-ons in the GRTU company GreenMT. It also says the GWU is to meet the government over ArrowPharm lay-offs.
In-Nazzjon says Eurostat has confirmed that unemployment in Malta has continued to grow.
The overseas press
President Obama has warned that there would be “costs” if there was Russia military intervention in Ukraine. VOA News says addressing “deep concern” about reported Russian military movements inside Ukraine, the US president said any violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity would be “deeply destabilising”. He commended Ukraine for showing restraint.
Ukrainian news agency Unian quotes the Permanent Representative of the Ukrainian President in Crimea, Sergei Kunitsin, saying 13 Russian Il-76 military aircraft, each carrying 150 paratroopers, had landed at Gvardiiski military airport near the capital of Crimea, Simferopol. Ukrainian interim president Aleksandr Turchynov has asked the President Putin to stop the “covert aggression” and withdraw his troops from Crimea. He said Russia was behaving as it did before sending troops into Georgia in 2008.
Fox News says the UN Security Council met on the crisis in Crimea, first in private and then for consultations behind closed doors to hear a briefing by Oscar Fernandez-Tarranco of the Department for Political Affairs and Ambassador to Kiev. Earlier, Ukraine’s UN ambassador accused Russia of “illegally” sending military helicopters and transport planes to Crimea and said Russian troops had taken up positions at the airport. The US ambassador to the UN called for an urgent mediation mission to the Ukraine while the Russian ambassador said any military movements were in line with Moscow’s existing agreements with Kiev.
For the first time since the Ukrainian crisis broke out and since Viktor Yanukovych left the country, Russian President Vladimir Putin has taken an official stance. RIA Novosti quotes a Kremlin announcement saying the president, through phone calls to the leaders of the UK, Germany and the EU, urged all parties to work to prevent further escalation in the Ukraine and return the situation to normality. He said Russia was to continue talks with Kiev on trade and economic relations and instructed the government to consult international partners, including the IMF, on sending financial and to Ukraine. He also wanted the issue to be discussed with the members of the G8.
Deposed Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych yesterday he had never ordered the police to shoot protesters. Baltic News reports that at a news conference in Rostov-on-Don, the former head of state once again affirmed that the responsibility for the violence lay with the protesters. Yanukovych then offered an apology to the Ukrainian people and all those who were suffering and have suffered, before stating that he would not participate in the “illegal” presidential elections on May 25.
In other news...
Il Tempo quotes Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi saying reducing Italy's “shocking” rate of unemployment must be the government's highest priority. He was commenting after the latest figures showed that unemployment in January had hit a record 12.9 per cent. National statistical agency Istat also reported that some 478,000 jobs were lost in Italy during 2013 – the worst year since the global financial crisis of 2008-2009, with an average annual jobless rate of 12.2 per cent last year.
USA Today says Google has urged a US appeals court to let it repost an anti-Islamic movie on YouTube, pending a re-hearing of the copyright case that got it removed. The 2012 appearance of “Innocence of Muslims” on Google's video-sharing site provoked deadly violence, but the current legal case against it relates only to the concerns of one of its stars. US actress Cindy Lee Garcia brought a lawsuit claiming she was tricked into appearing in the film, without realising its provocative anti-Muslim slant, and had received death threats as a result of it. Google said it has complied with the “unprecedented sweeping injunction” but argued that irreparable harm is being done to Constitutional rights of YouTube, Google, and the public.
Fairfax News reports a 22-year-old New Zealand brothel worker has won the sum of NZ$25,000 (€15,000) in damages for sexual harassment by a brothel owner, with sex workers hailing the decision as a landmark ruling that shows the country as a world leader in protecting their rights. The Human Rights Review Tribunal heard the brothel owner reportedly told the woman he could do what he liked with the women who worked for him. Over a three-month period, the man belittled and frightened the woman until she felt unsafe and on edge, became depressed and turned to alcohol. The ruling said, “Sex workers are as much entitled to protection from sexual harassment as those working in other occupations.”
Adnkronos quotes Mario Campanella, president of Peter Pan, a non-profit organization that deals with child abuse and exploitation of minors, saying that 20,000 Italian girls between 13 and 17 years have sex in exchange for gifts or money. He said the data came from a sample survey carried out between Naples and Rome. In Italy, the percentage between of child prostitution was 0.6 per cent, compared with between 0.8 and one per cent in Europe. Monitoring the situation in Catania, Padova, Bologna, Pescara , Bari and Salerno, the organisation found 600 girls aged between 14 and 17 who already had 20 different partners. Social worker and anti-paedophile author Don Fortunato Di Noto has obscured over 100,000 child pornography websites .