Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/900922
WWW.MALTATODAY.COM.MT WEDNESDAY EDITION €1.00 Newspaper post PAGE 9 • Editorial WEDNESDAY • 15 NOVEMBER 2017 • ISSUE 563 • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY 6-7 4 PN deputy leadership contenders in final pitch to members Bundy made unauthorised entry into chairman's office KURT SANSONE ALL doctors may soon be able to prescribe medicine derived from cannabis as government plans to present the legal changes to Par- liament in the coming days. The Bill to amend the Drug De- pendency Act will make it pos- sible for general practitioners to prescribe the medicine, a government spokesper- son said. 2 3 MEDICAL CANNABIS: Legal changes coming up in a few days MATTHEW VELLA BRUSSELS sent out a cautious note to Members of the European Parliament debating a motion on the rule of law of Malta, asking that the country be al- lowed to carry out a thorough investi- gation into the brutal assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. The comments by European Commis- sion vice president Franz Timmermans bookmarked Tuesday's debate on a non- binding resolution that calls for an inter- national and independent investigation into the journalist's murder. "The Maltese government has indicat- ed that the investigation and prosecu- tion should be allowed to run their full course, regardless of the consequences. And I want to add that at every occasion I have to talk to members of the Maltese government, I make this point, and it is acknowledged by them that they will do so, and that they will commit to that," Timmermans said. But when it came to accusations on money laundering in Malta, Timmer- mans said that the Commission had conducted its own fact-finding exercise. "The facts as they resulted from our analysis – and let me stress this – raise no general concerns on Malta's over- all compliance. However, improvement could be made on various levels." Brussels has now asked Malta for fol- low-up investigations to recommenda- tions after the Maltese Financial Intel- ligence and Analysis Unit (FIAU) report, with Timmermans calling for Malta to swiftly join the European Public Prose- cutor's Office. "This would send a strong positive signal of Malta's commitment to work actively together in the area of freedom, security and justice." Yesterday's debate delivered a bruis- ing for Malta, as MEPs rallying behind a joint resolution endorsed by all politi- cal groupings except for the socialists, railed against the conditions – notably the lack of police investigation into Pan- amagate – that laid the fertile ground for the murder of Caruana Galizia. PAGE 4 ONE MONTH AFTER DAPHNE CARUANA GALIZIA'S MURDER, EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT DISCUSSES MALTA'S INSTITUTIONS European Commission tempers MEPs' criticism on rule of law in Malta