The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press
Times of Malta says the prime minister has confirmed that the new university will be split but both sides will be in the south. It also quotes minister Helena Dalli saying she will meet a Dutch student who was subject to a racist attack and apologise to him on behalf of the country.
The Malta Independent says PN deputy leader Beppe Fenech Adami is not sure if the Gaffarena family ever made donations to the PN.
In-Nazzjon reports that problems in the bus service continued yesterday.
l-orizzont says the police have been anonymously informed of the identity of a woman who carried out Wednesday's racist attack. The police said investigations are continuing. The newspaper also says tiles laid in It-Tokk in Gozo have had to be removed.
The overseas press
British Prime Minister David Cameron has indicated his government is paving the way for airstrikes on Islamic State terrorists in Syria in the wake of the Tunisian beach massacre that killed 38 tourists. Sky News quotes him saying there was a “strong case for us doing more in Syria” but said there needed to be “clear consensus for such action” among MPs – comments that suggest a Commons vote will be imminent.
Both the Daily Mirror and the Daily Star dedicate their front pages to pictures of the victims. They announce Britain will come to a standstill later this morning as a one minute’s silence that will be held in defiant tribute to those who died in the terror attack a week ago.
Tunisia has arrested 12 suspects over the gun assault on the popular beach resort of Sousse. Tunisia’s Minister Kamel Jendoubi told Radio Mosaique two other suspects were being sought in Libya.
In an interview on Ant1 TV, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has said the day after the referendum he will be in Brussels and “an agreement will be signed” within 48 hours. He said with a victory by the ‘no’ side, there would be a “sustainable solution” for Greece – “the stronger the ‘no’, the better the deal”. If the ‘yes’ vote wins, he vowed he would ensure the start of “procedures provided for by the Constitution” so that the IMF proposals would become law.
The Wall Street Journal says the IMF has admitted Greece needs up to £42 billion of extra funds over the next three years along with large-scale debt relief. Greek banks are down to their last €500 million – barely enough cash to last until the end of the weekend.
Euronews says opinion polls on the Greek referendum contradict each other: one gives the “yes” campaign a four-point lead and another gave the “no” camp a nine-point lead. The results came as yesterday, 246 professors of economics signed an open letter inviting people to vote ‘Yes’.
Börzen Zeitung reports European Parliament president Martin Schulz has said his faith in the Greek government had reached “rock bottom”. He said if its people vote ‘yes’ at this weekend’s referendum he expected an interim administration of technocrats to take charge.
Le Parisien says thousands of French demonstrators have urging Greeks to vote ‘no’ in Sunday’s bailout referendum. From Paris to Marseille to Montpellier, the scene was much the same as people took to the streets in a massive show of solidarity. Similar protests are scheduled to take place in Italy, Germany and other eurozone members today.
Voice of Nigeria reports Boko Haram extremists killed some 150 Muslims praying in mosques in a northeast Nigerian town during the holy month of Ramadan. The attack on Wednesday night on the town of Kukawa came the day after the Islamic extremist group attacked a village 35 kilometers away and killed another 48 men and boys.
Al Ahram says the Egyptian military has killed 23 extremists in dawn raids in northern Sinai – a day after Islamic militants attacked army positions in the restive peninsula and set off the bloodiest fighting in decades. A total of 1,500 security forces are being deployed to ramp up security in the country.
TGcom.it announces Italian police have arrested a suspected Senegalese people trafficker who skippered a rubber dingy carrying 111 passengers across the Strait of Sicily on Thursday, as more than 1,500 asylum-seekers arrived in Italy. Mamdouo Lo was the 67th alleged people trafficker to be arrested by Italian police this year. On Wednesday, an Italian court sentenced Tunisian people smuggler Khaled Bensalem to 18 years in prison for contributing to a 2013 shipwreck off Lampedusa that killed 366 people.
Ohio Post reveals an appeals court has sided with a woman who said her parking ticket should be overlooked because the village law was missing a comma. Andrea Cammelleri said she should not have been issued a citation in 2014 because the law lists several types of vehicles that cannot be parked longer than 24 hours, including a “motor vehicle camper”, with the comma missing between “vehicle” and “camper”. Ms Cammelleri said her pickup truck did not fit that definition. The village said the law’s meaning was clear in context, but Judge Robert Hendrickson said West Jefferson should amend the law if it wants it read differently.
Blick says the United States has asked Switzerland to extradite seven FIFA officials arrested in an investigation into a global bribery scandal at soccer’s governing body. The officials, including two then members of FIFA’s executive committee, have been in jail since being detained on US arrest warrants in a raid on a luxury Zurich hotel on May 27. The arrests took place two days before FIFA’s annual congress, throwing the organisation into turmoil.