The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Sunday Times focuses on a call by women for a sex industry crackdown after a court case revealed how Russian women were treated as slaves. The newspaper also features an interview with Simon Busuttil, who says his role as delegate of the prime minister in no gimmick.
The Malta Independent says Malta could save €577m per year if it stamps out tax evasion. It also reports that overburdened social workers fear the effect of budget cuts.
MaltaToday observes that while it was revealed last week that €158m were paid to BWSC for the power station extension, but not one cent of the loan for the 1989 Delimara plant has been paid back so far.
Il-Mument says a second handyman at Mosta council has cost €80,000. He is allegedly a canvasser of the mayor. It also reports that civic centres are being opened in Ghajnsielem and Siggiewi.
It-Torca says a brass plate company is being formed to absorb debts. It also says that the new foreign residents’ scheme is a failure, with only two applications approved in six months.
KullHadd says former prisons director Sandro Gatt is carrying out an investigation instead of being investigated. He is heading the investigation into the New Year’s Day double homicide after having been in charge of the prison at the time of the Bickle drug trafficking case.
Illum says Mediterranean Offshore Bunkering has been slapped with a $2 million warrant of prohibitory injunction on its Marsa plant because of contamination fears.
The overseas press
Radio Free Europe reports that the first votes have been cast in Russian’s presidential elections, which many expect to see Prime Minister Vladimir Putin win in the first round with some 60 percent of the vote. People on the Chukotka and Kamchatka peninsulas were the first top vote because of the time difference. Putin faces four opponents as he seeks to serve a third term as president. The vote takes place against a backdrop of mounting public protests sparked by alleged mass fraud in December's parliamentary elections.
Early returns from Friday’s Iranian election suggest conservative rivals of President Ahmadinejad were clearly in the lead. The Iranian state-owned Press TV reported that, out of 189 winners declared, at least 97 were conservative opponents of the president. Also elected were six liberal-leaning candidates opposed to him. The remaining 86 seats were split between the president's supporters and centrists. Iran's semi-official Mehr news agency reported tghat in a particular embarrassment, Parvin Ahmadinejad, the president’s younger sister, was defeated by a conservative in their hometown of Garmsar.
A new poll by The Sunday Business shows that 60 per cent of Ireland’ electorate would support the European Fiscal Treaty in a referendum but a sizable number of people would oppose it. A quarter of voters still have not made up their minds on how they will vote. The poll also shows that Sinn Féin has become the second most popular party, edging in front of Fianna Fáil for the first time.
Polskie Radio reports at least six people have been killed and some 60 injured as two trains crashed head-on in southern Poland. The collision took place between two trains travelling on the same track, one from Warsaw to Krakow and the other travelling to the capital from the south-eastern city of Przemysl. Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk and senior ministers went on site.
USA Today says authorities in several Midwestern states were searching for survivors and clearing damage after a string of powerful storms and tornadoes left at least 37 people dead. The states of Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Georgia and Alabama were all hit by the intense winds which flattened homes, lifted rooftops and downed electricity cables. An unknown number of people were missing after communication lines were damaged
Corriere della Sera reports that survivors of the Costa Concordia cruise liner tragedy voiced anger at the ship's captain at a key court hearing. Captain Francesco Schettino and eight others, including three executives from ship owner Costa Crociere, are under investigation for the January 13 disaster which claimed 32 lives. Schettino, who is under house arrest at his home near Naples, did not attend because his lawyer said he was concerned for his safety. The hearing ordered experts to conduct analysis of data from the ship's black box and other equipment onboard and said these findings would be presented at the next scheduled pre-trial hearing on July 21.
According to France 24, the bodies of two Western journalists killed in Syria – American war reporter Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlick – have left Damascus en route to Paris via Amman. The body of Marie Colvin was expected to be flown on to her native United States on Monday or Tuesday, according to a representative of her newspaper, The Sunday Times.
The Catholic Church in the UK is on a collision course with British Prime Minister David Cameron over the government’s plans to legalise gay marriage. The leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, says in an article in The Sunday Telegraph that proposals to allow same-sex unions are “madness” and a “grotesque subversion of a universally-accepted human right”. He accuses ministers of trying to “redefine reality” and change long-standing laws and traditions “at the behest of a small minority of activists”. The cardinal’s intervention, was the strongest criticism yet from any church figure of the plans, which are due to be unveiled this month by Lynne Featherstone, the equalities minister.
The Mail on Sunday says headstones at the Benghazi War Cemetery have been torn down and crucifixes smashed with hammers by a mob of extremists, some carrying guns and dressed in combat fatigues. More than 1,000 soldiers and airmen who lost their lives in the desert wars of Montgomery and Rommel are buried at the site in Eastern Libya. Relatives of those buried at the cemetery, which is maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, last night reacted with disgust. The desecration was also condemned by Montgomery’s grandson Henry Montgomery, who called it ‘very sad’.
The Belfast Telegraph reports that thieves have stolen the preserved heart of Dublin's patron saint from the city's Christ Church cathedral. The 12th century heart of Saint Laurence O' Toole was taken from Saint Lauds Chapel within the cathedral. The saint's preserved heart was kept in a wooden heart-shaped container sealed within a small iron barred box. The theft was the latest in a spate of holy relic raids to hit the Irish Republic,