The following are the top stories in the Maltese and overseas press.
Times of Malta says power cuts in various localities are the result of faults in cables, not power generation.
The Malta Independent says GO's biggest shareholder could be shifting focus to more profitable real estate.
In-Nazzjon reports that a Portomaso apartment being used by minister Chris Cardona is two bedroomed and not one bedroomed as the minister said.
l-orizzont says the GWU is demanding agreement in the coming days on the bus service.
The overseas press
Reuters reports up to 40 African migrants, including many women and children, were feared drowned after their inflatable boat sank near the Libyan coast. Survivors told the UN refugee agency after reaching Italy all the dead came from sub-Saharan countries such as Senegal, Mali, Benin, Eritrea and Somalia. A German naval vessel took 283 refugees and migrants to Port Augusta. Two other boats brought a further 669 immigrants to Sicily and southern Italy.
Bloomberg says the Greek government has extended the shutdown of its financial markets at least through Monday as it prepared to welcome creditors for negotiations on a third bailout programme. The first representatives of Greece’s official creditors are due to arrive in Athens today at the same time as Greek bankers meet officials from of the Single Supervisory Mechanism in Frankfurt.
President Obama told the BBC that Britain must remain in the European Union to maintain its global influence, adding the EU had “made the world safer and more prosperous”. Speaking to the BBC’s North America editor Jon Sopel, Obama added that his biggest frustration was the failure to pass “common-sense gun safety laws” in the United States “even in the face of repeated mass killings”.
In the fight against the self-proclaimed Islamic State terrorist group, the Turkish government has given the US permission to conduct air strikes from its soil, according to the Wall Street Journal and Turkish media. The deal would allow for both manned and unmanned aircraft to conduct strikes against the terrorist group in Syria. According to Zaman, the agreement will also establish “safe zones” along the border, where Syrian refugees will be kept under the watch of the Turkish military.
US Secretary of State John Kerry has challenged critics of the nuclear deal with Iran, calling it “fantasy” to think the United States failed to hold out for a better deal at the bargaining table. Fox News reports he and other Obama administration officials were trying to make the case for approval of the accord that the US and five other world powers negotiated to lift economic sanctions against Iran in exchange for concessions to limit the Islamic state’s nuclear programme.
Le Soir says EUforeign policy chief Federica Mogherini will visit Saudi Arabia and Iran next week – her first official visit to the regional powers in the wake of the landmark deal she helped broker on Iran’s nuclear programme. Saudi Arabia has reservations about the deal under which its regional adversary Iran agreed to limit its sensitive nuclear work in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Mogherini will then go on to Iran, where to discuss implementation of the nuclear dea.
Xinhua reports China has begun construction on its largest solar power plant which, when completed, will be capable of powering one million homes and will drastically reduce the country’s coal use. The plant will cover 2,550 hectares (nearly 10 square miles) in the Gobi desert, in Qinghai province. Once operational, the plant will slash standard coal use by 4.26 million tons every year, reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide by 896,000 tons and 8,080 tons, respectively.
Metro quotes Amnesty International saying Iranian authorities are believed to have executed 694 people since the beginning of 2015 – most of whom were convicted of drug charges in “blatantly unfair” trials. It said if this execution rate continues, “we are likely to see more than 1,000 state-sanctioned deaths by the year’s end”.
CNN reports Oklahoma police responding to a 911 call in which no one spoke found a gruesome scene at a suburban Tulsa home – five members of a family dead or dying from stabbing and a sixth wounded but alive near the front door. The police said two teenage sons were apprehended and expected to be charged in the deaths of their parents, three siblings and an attack on a fourth sibling. A fifth sibling, a two-year-old girl, was found unharmed and transferred to state custody.
According to Bild, the Catholic Church’s diocese of Limburg in western Germany wants €3.9 million in damages from its former bishop, who built a mansion that put the diocese in debt. Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, dubbed “the bling bishop”, was removed from his post after he built himself the lavish residence costing €31.3 million.
LBC reports a Church of England vicar has gone on the run as he was convicted of pocketing thousands of pounds of cash handed over as fees for weddings, funerals and graveyard memorials. Simon Reynolds, 50, went out for lunch and did not come back afterwards, an official at Sheffield Crown Court said. The jury later came back and convicted him on all charges, she said.
AGI says the Italian Finance Ministry estimates the cost to the public purse of a new law permitting civil unions for same-sex couples would be about €3.7 million in 2016, rising to €6 million in 2017. The ministry added making gay couples official would cost €22.7 million in 2025 due to “a reduced personal income tax take due to larger deductions, more family benefits, and more pension benefits to same-sex partners”.
France Football reports UEFA’s disciplinary committee has deducted one point from Croatia’s 14 points in their 2016 European Championship qualifying group after a swastika was painted on the field before the qualifying match against Italy. Croatia must also play their next two home qualifiers in an empty stadium and pay a €100,000 euro fine. UEFA also barred Croatia from playing qualifiers in the Polijud Stadion, which hosted the 1-1 draw with Italy on June 12. The group also has Norway, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan and Malta. The Croatian Football Federation has three days to appeal.