The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
The Sunday Times of Malta says classroom dust is causing asthma among students.
MaltaToday says the new American university due to be built in Marsascala submitted courses before the development application. It also says premises for Malta's Shanghai consulate were acquired last year.
The Malta Independent says the government has failed to specify how Manuel Mallia's wife became a Maltese citizen.
Il-Mument says the €2m property bought for the Maltese consulate in Shanghai is tailor-made for the energy minister's wife, close to a school and top quality shops.
It-Torca reports that Anthony Debono, the husband of former minister Giovanna Debono, was interrogated at police headquarters on Tuesday.
Illum says the American university will feature a number of spots facilities. It also says low wages are attracting foreign workers.
KullHadd It also says
The overseas press
Iraqi sources have told the BBC that Islamic State militants have killed hundreds of captives from the Yazidi minority community in Mosul, in the north of the country. The sources said up to 300 victims were put to death. Iraqi vice-president Osama al Nujaifi called the massacre “horrible and barbaric” while the Yazidi Progress Party called it “a heinous crime” and urged the Iraqi forces to liberate the Yazidis still in the hands of the Isis.
Radio Nigeria says the first group of nearly 300 Nigerian girls and women rescued from Boko Haram militants have arrived to the safety of a refugee camp in the country's northeast.
According to The New York Times, the UN has urged the Nepalese government to relax customs controls which, it says, are holding up the distribution of vital relief supplies for survivors of last week’s earthquake.
The Jerusalem Post says the Israeli Counter-Terrorism Bureau has warned Israelis and Jews to avoid visiting Tunisia following “updated information” on terror plots, with an emphasis on the Lag Baomer holiday which takes place on Thursday.
AP reports suspected chlorine gas attacks by Syrian government helicopters injured some 40 people and killed a child in the country’s northwest. Videos shared by the Syrian Civil Defence activist group showed medics and residents rushing children to a local hospital as they coughed, some gasping for air, in Saraqeb, a town in Idlib province.
Euronews says three illegal immigrants drowned and 31 others were rescued after a trawler bound for Europe capsised near the Egyptian city of Idku. The passengers, believed to be from Syria, Eritrea, Sudan and Egypt, were later arrested by coastguards. In a separate incident on Saturday, a French navy patrol ship pulled 217 people from three small boats that had run into difficulty in waters off Libya. Two suspected people smugglers had been arrested and handed over to Italian authorities, along with the rescued migrants. Meanwhile, Italy's Coast Guard reported helping a group of some 200 people aboard rubber dinghies spotted drifting south of Sicily on Friday. The migrants from sub-Saharan Africa were taken to Lampedusa on yesterday morning.
USA Today says some 10,000 protesters gathered again in Baltimore to denounce police brutality and demand justice for Freddie Gray, the Afro-American who died of the lethal injuries after his arrest. In the aftermath of the arrest and the indictment of six police officers – all released on bail – the protesters gathered at the place where Graty was arrested.
AGI quotes an OECD report which shows that 70 per cent of the unemployed in Ireland, Greece and Slovakia are long-term unemployed, or have not worked for a year or more. Italy is in te fourth place with between 45 and 60 per cent. At the other side of the stick is South Korea, where the phenomenon of long-term unemployment is almost non-existent.
Gulf Times says peace talks will be held in Qatar today and tomorrow between a delegation of the Afghan government and “emissaries” of the Taliban. The conference has been organised by the Pugwash peace movement. Both sides expressed optimism for success and the Qatari Foreign Ministry said that Doha hosting reconciliation talks would try to ensure the Afghan people “security, peace and stability”.
Meanwhile, Afghan Post reports 49 Afghan men, including 19 police officers, have gone on trial after a young woman was beaten to death and burned last March. The 28-year-old woman was accused of burning the Koran, although witnesses say she did not. Her death led to widespread protests against the treatment of women.
Tass announces the death in Munich of the Russian ballet dancer Maya Plisetskaya, widely regarded as one of the greatest ballerinas of the 20th century. She was 89. She danced at the Bolshoi for more than 50 years and was regarded as the one “capable of transforming the dance into a form of poetry in motion”.