The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
The Times of Malta says the Mosta cats killer left a note saying he was suffering.
l-orizzont leads with stills from the police videos of the Mosta cat killer. It also reports that two officials from SNS Lavelin allegedly plotted to free Saadi Gaddafi, one of Muammar Gaddafi’s sons.
The Malta Independent reports that the Attorney General has given the green light for criminal action against the owners of Fantasy Tours.
In-Nazzjon highlights the PN’s call for a jobs strategy.
The overseas press
AFP reports Sochi dazzled the world with an opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games 2014 featuring a feast of Russian music and a cast of thousands including ballet stars, acrobats, cosmonauts – and even an ex-heavyweight boxer.
Ansa says Pope Francis said divorced and separated couples should not be excluded from Church activities. The remarks came as the Vatican was on the defensive, accusing a United Nations committee of prejudice in its scathing report on the Holy See's track record on child sex abuse.
Reuters says top US diplomat tried to play down the damage to Washington’s diplomacy in Ukraine from a leaked telephone call on Friday, but German Chancellor Angela Merkel called an obscene remark about the EU “absolutely unacceptable”.
Bosnia Post reports at least people 150 were injured in protests which began in Tuzla on Wednesday and spread to 33 other cities across Bosnia. The demonstrations, who accused local authorities of corruption and nepotism, set fire to government buildings and fought with riot police as long-simmering anger over lack of jobs and political inertia fuelled a third day of the worst civil unrest in Bosnia since a 1992-95 war.
Al Jazeera says Syria evacuated 83 civilians who had lived under government siege in the devastated city of Homs for 18 months – the first concrete result of talks launched two weeks ago to try to end the country’s civil war.
Libya Herald reports several thousand Libyans marched in Tripoli and Benghazi to demand the dissolution of the interim national parliament, whose mandate had originally been due to expire on Friday with the country deeply split over its future. The parliament dispute has exposed Libya’s continued fragility nearly three years after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi, with rival Islamist and nationalist parties, former rebels and regional tribes all pushing their own political visions.
Gazete Oku says Turkish security forces seized a Ukrainian man who officials said made a bomb threat and tried to hijack a passenger plane, demanding to go to the Winter Olympics venue of Sochi just as the opening ceremony was taking place.
El Tiempo quotes Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro saying four people had been held following another rowdy anti-government protest, the latest in a spate of sporadic street demonstrations being fanned by hardline opposition parties.
USA Today says two Wisconsin men have been charged with stealing a rare Stradivarius violin worth millions of dollars from a concert violinist in late January. Police said the violin, which was made in 1715 and had an appraised value of $5 million for insurance purposes, was recovered late Wednesday from a Milwaukee residence, where it had been stored in a suitcase in the attic.
Corriere della Sera reports a 37-year-old woman gave birth to a baby girl in the early hours of Friday in a street in the northern city of Milan as she waited to catch the bus to a local hospital. The woman believed she was in the early stages of labour but her contractions rapidly intensified and she delivered the infant at the bus stop. The woman’s South American husband was with her and had called an ambulance but by the time it arrived, he was already cradling the newborn baby in his arms. The mother and baby were admitted to Milan's San Carlo hospital, where doctors said both were doing well. The baby is the couple's fourth child.