The following are the top stories in the national and international press today.
Times of Malta says a court heard yesterday that the death of a vegetable hawker from a heart attack while having sex with a prostitute led to the discovery of a brothel in a Gżira flat. In another story it quotes BirdLife saying that the government’s plans to postpone the local elections is “tampering with democracy to appease the hunting lobby”.
The Malta Independent says overcrowding at Mater Dei has reached unprecedented levels with makeshift wards and beds lining the corridors.
In-Nazzjon quotes PN spokesman Jason Azzopardi saying that the payment of €4.2 million by the Land Department to Cities Entertainment to take back the site known as the Premier Café in Valletta stank of corruption.
L-Orizzont says that, according to Eurostat, unemployment in Malta was, at 5.7%, the third lowest in the Eurozone.
International news
Le Soir reports EU leaders gather for an extraordinary summit in Brussels later today to discuss the situation in Ukraine and several top appointments. Several EU foreign ministers have accused Russia of invading eastern Ukraine and said Moscow should be punished with more sanctions, including a ban on the imports of Russian caviar, vodka and diamonds.
Meanwhile, RIA Novosty says Russian President Vladimir Putin has declared Russia had no plans for “large-scale conflicts” but reminded the world that he presided over a nuclear-armed state. His comments came a day after President Obama warned of the mounting costs to Russians as their government deepens its involvement in eastern Ukraine.
Russia has warned gas supplies to Europe were at “high risk” of disruption as Ukraine tensions mount. Pravda says that at a joint press conference with EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger yesterday, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said there was “a high risk” that Gazprom gas for Europe would be “illegally taken by Ukraine for its own use”.
According to Kyiv Post, Ukraine has called for full membership in NATO, its strongest plea yet for Western military help, after accusing Russia of sending in armoured columns that drive back its forces on behalf of pro-Moscow rebels. At least 2,593 people were killed in eastern Ukraine since fighting flared up in mid-April, a senior UN official said.
The Times reports British Prime Minister David Cameron has announced new laws to crack down on terror suspects as he warned that extremism in Iraq and Syria posed a greater danger to Britain than al-Qaida. As the terrorist threat to the UK was raised from substantial to severe, Cameron said legislation would be introduced so it was easier to seize jihadists’ passports.
Afrik de l’Ouest says Senegal has become the fifth country to be touched by the world’s worst Ebola outbreak. Meanwhile riots break out in neighbouring Guinea’s remote southeast where infection rates are rising fast.
The civil war in Syria has forced three million people out of the country, including more than a million who fled in the past year. Zaman quotes the UN refugee agency saying this has created a crisis that required the biggest operation in its 64-year history. More than half of all those uprooted are children, it said.
Euronews says Amnesty International has warned “undesirables” were still going missing in Syria and were often taken to secret government prisons throughout the country. On the eve of the International Day of the Disappeared, AI said the phenomenon continues unchecked despite a UN Security Council last February demanding an end to these and other human rights violations.
CNN reports the United States has imposed sanctions on more than 25 individuals and businesses linked with Iran. The US suspects them of having helped Tehran expand its nuclear programme – or evade existing sanctions.
New Straits Times says Malaysia Airlines is set to cut 6,000 jobs, approximately 30 per cent of its workforce, as part of a $1.9 billion recovery plan. The measures were being implemented in the wake of the two recent air disasters. The company, which had also been considering whether or not to bring in changes to avoid being identified with the plane that vanished into thin air and the one shot down in Ukraine, announced €73 million net losses on Thursday. The company will also be delisted from the Malaysian stock exchange and is looking for a new CEO.
According to Fuji TV, two more people have been executed in Japan, where there are 127 people on death row and where 11 have been executed since the return to power of the Conservatives in December 2012. The two men were each convicted of multiple murder, the first a member of a Japanese mafia clan, the second a taxi driver who in 2001 opened fire in a bank, killing five people. Japan is one of the few industrialised countries still to have capital punishment.