**Keith Schembri’s Assistant Messaged Yorgen Fenech Hours Before His Arrest: A Nation Left Reeling** In the early hours of November 20, 2019, as Malta slept fitfully under the weight of its own political turmoil, a WhatsApp message pinged on Yorgen Fenech’s phone. The sender: Karl Cini, right-hand man to then-Prime Minister Joseph Muscat’s chief of…
Valletta’s Grand Harbour was still cloaked in dawn haze when Foreign Minister Ian Borg stepped up to the UN rostrum in New York and declared, “Malta recognises the State of Palestine.” The sentence, delivered at yesterday’s General Assembly summit, lasted four seconds—but it has been echoing across the archipelago ever since, from the pigeon-flecked balconies…
**Nine Months Behind Bars for Umbrella-Wielding Attacker Who Ambushed PA Officers** A Marsa man who turned a humble Maltese umbrella into a weapon against two Planning Authority enforcement officers has been sentenced to nine months imprisonment, in a case that has sent ripples through Malta’s tight-knit community of building-permit enforcers and reignited debate over the…
Speeding past the illuminated façade of the Casino di Venezia on Tuesday night, a 27-year-old Birkirkara resident thought he could outrun Malta’s thin blue line. He was wrong. At 23:47 his Peugeot 308 clipped a centre-island planter on the Msida traffic fly-over, flipped twice, and came to rest against the newly unveiled “Jannar 2024” billboard…
**8,600 State-School Educators Return to Classrooms as Malta Embraces New Scholastic Year** The familiar hum of schoolyards across Malta and Gozo returned this week as 8,600 state-school educators headed back to their classrooms, marking the official launch of the 2024-2025 scholastic year. From the historic streets of Valletta to the quiet villages of Gozo, teachers,…
Leonardo DiCaprio storms back onto the screen this month in “One Battle After Another,” a razor-sharp political thriller that feels almost tailor-made for Maltese audiences still dizzy from our own revolving-door governments and Panama-scented headlines. The two-time Oscar winner plays a dogged American investigative reporter who uncovers a covert network of shell companies funnelling dark…
HSBC Malta customers found themselves locked out of several services yesterday after dozens of bank employees staged a surprise sit-in strike at the Qormi headquarters, the first industrial action to hit the island’s largest lender in 17 years. The protest began at 07:30 when roughly 60 unionised staff – mostly back-office clerks and customer-care operators…
**HSBC Staff Sit-In Sends Ripples Across Malta’s Tight-Knit Banking Community** Valletta – Mid-morning on Tuesday, the air inside HSBC’s flagship Republic Street branch carried more than the usual scent of espresso and printer toner; it hummed with tension as 42 employees staged an impromptu sit-in, refusing to leave the dealing hall until headquarters in London…
Housekeepers Held After Tourist’s Bag And €350 Vanish From St Julian’s Hotel By Hot Malta Staff | 09:45 • 17 June 2025 The trust that travellers place in Malta’s smiling “room-make-up” teams was shattered yesterday when two housekeepers were marched out of a sea-front St Julian’s hotel in hand-cuffs, accused of pocketing a guest’s designer…
**Solidarity in Silk: What French Mayors’ Palestinian Flag Gesture Means for Malta’s Own Crossroads** By [Author Name] | Hot Malta When the mairies of Lyon, Montpellier, and a dozen other French cities raised the red-green-black-white of Palestine above their 19th-century balconies last week, they weren’t just defying Parisian circulars—they were writing a footnote that Maltese…
**Nine Months for Seven Grams: Maltese Court’s Harsh Cannabis Sentence Sparks Debate** A 34-year-old Maltese man has been sentenced to nine months in prison after police found just seven grams of cannabis and three grams of cocaine during a routine stop in St Julian’s last December – a ruling that has reignited fierce debate about…
**Gozo Deserves Leaders Who Act Not Out of Political Convenience** Gozo, Malta’s sister island, has long carried the quiet dignity of being the nation’s rural soul. While Malta races ahead with high-rise towers and sprawling developments, Gozo remains tethered to its terraced fields, baroque churches, and a rhythm of life that moves with the seasons…
