The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Times says Malta is awaiting the EU’s approval of its plans to help Air Malta. It also says that the new bus service will start in July.
The Malta Independent reports that Chris Said will resume his duties as Parliamentary Secretary today.
In-Nazzjon quotes the prime minister saying that jobs are at the heart of government policies.
l-orizzont says ministers are being given compensation of €80,000 every year. It also says that the GWU is seeking an urgent meeting on the future of Air Malta.
The overseas press
Le Monde reports that China's President Hu Jintao has signed billions of euros' worth of business deals during a state visit to France. They included spending €10 billion on 102 Airbus planes, as well as telecoms and nuclear deals. President Nicolas Sarkozy received his guest with full military honours but activists complained that China's human rights record was being ignored in the rush to sign lucrative contracts.
The Washington Times says Democratic Senator Patty Murray has won the close race for the US Senate seat in Washington state. The result leaves the Democrats with 51 seats in the 100-member Senate following Tuesday's mid-term polls. Republicans have 46 seats and two independents caucus with the Democrats. The Alaska vote is yet to be called.
Dagbladet reports that the Norwegian government has demanded an explanation from the United States after a television documentary said its embassy had conducted illegal surveillance of hundreds of Norwegian residents over the past decade. According to the TV2 News channel, the US embassy employees photographed people taking part in demonstrations and added their names and personal data to a special computer database.
Straits Times announces that Singapore Airlines has resumed flights on its Airbus A380 aircraft – the world's biggest passenger jet – which were grounded after one of the planes operated by Australia's Qantas Airways had to make an emergency landing. One of the jet engines failed after take-off from Singapore. Engine maker Rolls-Royce had recommended checks.
Granma reports a Cuban passenger plane with 68 people on board has crashed in the centre of the country. Twenty-eight foreigners were reported to be among the passengers. Their nationalities are unknown. There was no word on the cause of the crash or on any survivors. The aircraft, belonging to the state-run Aero Caribbean airline, was flying from the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba to the capital Havana when it went down.
Jakarta Post says at least 39 people have been killed in the latest eruption of Indonesia's Mount Merapi volcano, bringing the total number of deaths to 90. Dozens were being treated for burns and respiratory problems after a gas cloud hit villages with even greater force than the previous eruptions. An estimated 75,000 residents have been evacuated from the area.
Caribbean Net News says Haitians, already hit by a devastating earthquake and a cholera epidemic this year, were bracing for worse to come as a tropical storm approaching the Caribbean island threatens to turn into a hurricane. Tropical Storm Tomas was gathering strength and is heading towards Haiti and Jamaica, due to hit later today. The January earthquake killed more than 250,000 and made 1.3 million people homeless, whose life was made worse by a cholera outbreak last month which killed 337 people.
Athens Post says Greek police have detonated a suspicious parcel addressed to the French embassy in Athens. The latest suspicious mailing came days after several package bombs were discovered at embassies in the Greek capital in the run-up to local elections and in a climate of social tension against draconian austerity cuts imposed by the government to turn around the recession-hit economy following an unprecedented debt crisis.
Minnesota Globe reports that a US jury has ordered a woman to pay $1.5 million (€1.056 million) for illegally downloading 24 songs in a high-profile digital piracy case. Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a single mother of four, was found liable of copyright infringement for using KaZaA peer-to-peer file-sharing network to download the songs over the internet.
The family of the newly designated world's oldest person, American Eunice Sanborn, has told the Jackson Daily Progress she is in fact 115 – a year older than official records indicated. Mrs Sanborn was sprung into the spotlight, recognised as the oldest living individual, following the death of Eugenie Blanchard at age 114 in the French West Indies, based on a website that tracks living centenarians. Her family claims Mrs Sanborn of Jacksonville, Texas, turned 115 in July, although the US Census Bureau erroneously recorded her birth date as 1896 rather than 1895. She still lives at home with 24-hour care.