The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
The Sunday Times of Malta reports that Mark Gaffarena has filed an injunction to protect his profit. He wants to prevent the remaining part-owners of a property in Valletta from selling to the government instead of to him.
It-Torca says one of Tonio Fenech’s ‘spies’ in the civil service had leaked information on talks between the National Statistics Office and Eurostat. The newspaper also says the university paid Fr Joe Borg more than €50,000 in a year.
Il-Mument says Parliamentary Secretary Michael Falzon has ignored a call from the prime minister to resign in the wake of the Valletta property expropriation scandal.
MaltaToday says that according to its survey, public trust in Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has been dented but remains strong. He is leading Opposition leader Simon Busuttil by 13 points, down two points from March.
The Malta Independent on Sunday, like many of the other newspapers, carries pictures of yesterday’s protest to safeguard the environment, held in Valletta yesterday. It also reports that changes in the University of Malta are envisages in a White Paper . The changes are expected to include greater autonomy.
Illum reports that a centre for children with drug problems is to be set up.
The overseas press
Thousands of people have taken to the streets in several European cities, in a show of solidarity with migrants seeking refuge in Europe and against austerity measures in debt-ridden Greece.
In Berlin, a large number of demonstrators participated in a protest held on World Refugee Day. Berliner Zeitung reports protesters chanted, “No frontiers, no nations, stop deportation” and “Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here”. Some of the protesters also held up flags of Greece and posters bearings slogans supporting Athens, as a critical June 30 deadline in debt talks looms.
In Paris, Journal du Dimanche says protesters including undocumented migrants, rallied behind a banner that read: “Greece, France, Europe: austerity kills, democracy is dying, let’s resist”. In the south-east, activists gathered in Menton near the Italian border, in solidarity with hundreds of migrants stuck in Italy after France refused to allow them in.
Rome’s Il Tempo reports scores of protesters braved the rain and gathered under the slogan, “Stop the massacre now”. Organisers were quoted saying, “We are here to save our Europe, which includes immigrants, refugees and Greece. Europe must belong to everyone, not just to the Germans and the banks”.
According to El Periodico, in the Spanish city of Valencia, Amnesty International activists took part in a performance on a beach to commemorate World Refugee Day, holding signs “I flee from gender violence” and “I flee from war”.
However, in the Slovakian capital Bratislava, at least 140 people were arrested after violence broke out at an anti-immigration rally attended by thousands of people. Novy Cas says the rally was organised by an anti-Islam group called Stop the Islamisation of Europe. Some protesters tore up an EU flag and launched tear gas at the police.
In a column for Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis promised that Greece was prepared to move, although he gave no details. He said German Chancellor Angela Merkel faced a “stark choice” over whether to accept an agreement at tomorrow’s summit, adding: “The choice, I am very much afraid, is hers.”
Meanwhile, Ta Mea reports Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras met his negotiating team in Athens and was expected to speak to European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker by phone to try to break the deadlock before the emergency summit.
Sky News announces thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of London to air their anger over austerity. Waving placards and posters, they gathered outside the Bank of England as they made their way from the city’s financial district to Parliament Square in Westminster. There is frustration over measures aimed at resolving a government deficit, which ballooned after Britain rescued trouble banks during the 2008 financial crisis.
The damage caused to the European Union by the sanctions it imposed against Russia because of the Ukrainian crisis “could touch $100 billion”, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the Economic Forum in St Petersburg. Sputnik says he slammed the EU’s extension of sanctions as “blackmail” and vowed it would not be pressured into returning the peninsula to Ukraine.
Ansa reports Italian prosecutors are seeking to indict 297 people and the Bank of China in connection with a massive money-laundering investigation reported by The Associated Press earlier this month. The suspects, mostly Chinese migrants living in Italy, include four senior managers of the Chinese state bank’s branch in Milan.
With hundreds of millions of euros being deviated through fraud or irregularities, EU expenses should be more controlled or at least spent more effectively. Since member states are not always leading controls properly, the EC Vice-President Kristalina Georgieva told Euronetplus that the bloc needs a European prosecutor. “We discover fraud and nothing is being done”, she confirmed.
VOA News announces the FBI is investigating a hate-filled 2,500-word manifesto purportedly written by the suspected Charleston gunman, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, who on Wednesday night gunned down nine members of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal congregation. The website linked to Roof contained photos of him holding a burning American flag and standing on one. In other images, he was holding a Confederate flag, considered a divisive symbol by civil rights leaders and others.
A shocking analysis by Britain’s National Crime Agency reveals that about one in 35 adult males poses a potential risk of being a child abuser or of seeking out child sex images online. As many as 250,000 men may be sexually attracted to children under 12, according to the findings disclosed exclusively to The Mail on Sunday.