Malaysiakini compares the key news and views in major newspapers. What is today's agenda for the newspapers?

Front Page

English newspapers

New Straits Times led with news of the appeal filed by the Home Ministry over last week's High Court ruling to set aside the ministry's earlier ban on the use of the word ‘Allah' by Catholic weekly Herald in the publication's Malay language section.

Star frontpaged news of security measures being tightened in Malaysian airports to screen for ‘high risk'nationals following ‘requests' from the United States and Australia, based upon a list of countries and ‘high risk' individuals circulated by the two countries.

Malay newspapers

Utusan Malaysia and Berita Harian highlighted the Home Ministry's appeal against the Kuala Lumpur High Court's ruling which overturned the ministry's earlier ban on the use of the ‘word' Allah by Catholic weekly Herald.

Tamil Newspapers

All Tamil dailies - Tamil Nesan, Malaysian Nanban and Makkal Osai - reported on the increase in the number of Year One students in all 523 Tamil schools with 22,000 enrolments. This was almost 2,000 higher than the numbers for last year.

Editorial

New Straits Times warned the public over the transitory nature of subsidies, cautioning that it may be time to recall some of those which are mostly redundant benefits, especially when the government was having financial difficulties in it's budgetary balancing act.

Utusan Malaysia urged the public to remain calm amidst what it said were direct challenges being mounted against the constitutionally enshrined rights of ‘bumiputeras' and the official religion of Islam.

Berita Harian extolled the virtues of the National Service programme as a means of educating and reaching out to youths, who it said, are actually being propelled towards negative activities by the smothering restrictions placed upon them by society and parents.

Makkal Osai welcomed Transport Minister Ong Tee Keat's assurance yesterday that the Ipoh-Padang Besar electrified railway double tracking project will be completed according to schedule in 2013.

Tamil Nesan commented on the increase in the number of students in Tamil schools in the country, pointing at the increase in the awareness of parents for mother tongue education as the reason.