The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press:
The Times leads with complaints that PV panels are spoiling the Maltese skyline and a review of guidelines is being made.
The Malta Independent says Syrian rebels are fighting for Aleppo, the biggest city in Syria. It also quotes the prime minister saying the country wants to build on its achievements. Meanwhile, Joseph Muscat said the party is prepared for the general election.
In-Nazzjon quotes the prime minister saying that the government can now focus more on the people’s needs.
L-orizzont leads with insults reportedly made at John Dalli in some quarters.
The overseas press:
President Barack Obama has told families of victims and relatives of the people who were killed in the fatal Colorado gun attack, that America and most of the world were thinking of them. CNN reports shooting suspect James Holmes, 24, was being held in solitary confinement for his own safety. He was not co-operating. The police have found the Holmes’ PC after disabling the booby traps he planted in his flat. Investigators hoped the PC would help them understand why the young man went on a shooting rampage at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado, three days ago killing 12 people and wounding 58 others – nine of whom are still critical.
Thousands of Norwegians gathered on Sunday at sombre memorials to the 77 people killed a year ago by gunman Anders Behring Breivik to show his bloody rampage had done nothing to change their dedication to an open society. Dagbladet quotes Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg telling the crowds, carrying red and white roses at the vigil in central Oslo that the bomb and the shots intended to change Norway had failed to alter the country’s attitude to open society. Breivik detonated a bomb outside parliament that killed eight people, then shot dead 69 at the ruling Labour party's youth camp on Utøya island.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told Fox News his country would “have to act” if the Syrian regime collapsed and there was a risk that Syria’s chemical weapons and missiles could fall into the hands of militant groups. The deteriorating situation of President Bashar Assad’s regime is stoking Israeli fears that militants affiliated with Lebanon’s Hezbollah group or the al Qaida terror network could raid Syrian military arsenals for chemicals weapons or missiles that could strike Israel. Netanyahu said preventing Syria’s weapons from falling into the wrong hands was key to Israeli security.
al bawaba says that after a long siege and heavy shelling, the Syrian military, led by the feared elite unit headed by President al-Assad's younger brother, Maher, re-captured the strategic neighbourhood of Barzeh, in north-eastern Damascus. Members of the opposition said at least five young fighters were killed in summary executions were carried out by the army.
According o the BBC, British charity War Child says all parties involved in the Syrian conflict were targeting children, who are facing execution-style killings, serious injuries, abductions and rapes. The charity accused the warring parties of enlisting children to fight as soldiers and using them as human shields.
The International Monetary Fund wants to stop all economic aid to Greece. Der Spiegel writes that senior IMF figures have already informed EU authorities of their intention. As a consequence Greece would likely default in September. Currently, the troika of the IMF, EU and ECB was examining the way in which Athens was implementing the agreed reform programme, but according to the Hamburg -based magazine it seemed clear that the Greek government would not manage to reduce public debt to 120 per cent of GDP by 2020.
Germany's Vice Chancellor and Economy Minister Philipp Roesler has said Germany no longer feared the prospect of Greece exiting the euro. In an interview with state TV ARD, he said Greece's permanence in the euro zone was at risk, but the idea of that country leaving the euro had "lost its horror". Roesler said he was "more than sceptical" that Athens would manage to implement the required reforms. In that case, he said, Greece would become insolvent and, as a result, would be forced to exit the euro zone. Roesler praised the efforts made by Spain and Portugal to overcome the crisis, but he dismissed prospects of the ECB buying Spanish bonds. "Hands off the ECB!" he warned.
The Daily Express quotes a Tax Justice Network report revealing that the world's wealthiest people are harbouring £13 trillion (€16.7 trillion) in offshore tax havens. The report's author James Henry, who is a specialist in tax havens, says that secretive jurisdictions including Switzerland, Luxembourg and Hong Kong are being used to keep trillions of pounds from out-of-the reach of the taxman. The analysis in the report shows that oil-rich countries such as Russia and Nigeria are leaking money to tax havens at a colossal rate. The campaign group believes the total value of the money being leaked from some nations even dwarfs the debts they often owed to the rest of the world.
The People’s Daily says that the heaviest rain in the Chinese capital in 60 years had killed 37 people over the past two days. The Chinese government reported that at least 30,000 people had to be evacuated and 80,000 were stranded at the city's airport. Most of the victims died from drowning or were electrocuted because of falling power lines, but some were crushed when their houses collapsed and one was hit by lightning.