The Independent uses its front page to critique the latest Damian Hurst work of art

It is, depending on how you look at it, the ultimate bit of bling for a morbidly minded rapper or a searching interrogation of the complex relationship between value and price-tag in the contemporary art market. But whatever you think of Damien Hirst's latest high art provocation, there can be no disputing its brilliance - at least on a literal level. A platinum cast of a human skull has been set with 8,601 flawless diamonds, including a 52-carat, pear-shaped monster that could choke a Hollywood starlet, set off by another 37 carats of flawless whites. Displayed under spotlights in a darkened room in White Cube's Mason's Yard Gallery in south-west London, the skull, which contains three times the number of diamonds in the Imperial State Crown, appears to be the only source of light, a macabre glitter ball which casts a planetarium sparkle on to the awed faces of those who have come to gaze at it. It is a genuinely remarkable object - the silvery glitter of the pavé-set diamonds pierced here and there by dazzling points of intensely coloured light.

The picture features in most of the papers

£50 million for Hirst’s diamond geezer says the Times

It cost £12 million to make, has a £50 million price tag and resembles at first glance a cross between a disco glitter ball and a WAG handbag.
Damien Hirst’s latest creation – a platinum cast of a human skull encrusted with three times the number of diamonds on the Imperial State Crown – is, by his own admission, “quite bling”.
Hirst confessed yesterday that he was worried that it would look like something worn by Ali G, the comic character who has a fondness for ostentatious jewellery. “You spend all that money and you end up with something that looks like a disco ball – shock horror,” he said.

It leads though with

Warning over fake high street medicines

Thousands of patients taking a life-saving cancer medicine have been warned that counterfeits have entered the supply chain.
Drug regulators issued the alert yesterday after the discovery of fake batches of Casodex, a prostate cancer drug, after an alarming surge in counterfeit medications for critical conditions. The alert is the third in a week involving blockbuster drugs, which have also included a schizophrenia drug and a blood-thinning agent.
Police have launched a big investigation after the discoveries, which have all been traced to the same UK-based wholesaler. They are thought likely to have originated from an international criminal syndicate – possibly based in China, Pakistan or India – taking advantage of the huge profits to be made from fake drugs. The wholesaler linked to the counterfeit batch, 65520, of Casodex, a hormone treatment for men with advanced prostate cancer, has had his licence removed.

A lot of coverage as a video of Alan Johnston is released

Video released of abducted BBC man 'in good health' says the Guardian

Alan Johnston, the kidnapped BBC Gaza correspondent, appeared in a video released by his captors yesterday, nearly 12 weeks after he was seized, in which he says he is healthy and being well treated.
It is the first time the journalist has been seen since he disappeared on March 12 and he seems to be unhurt. Some in Gaza suggested the appearance of the video, on a website used by Islamic radicals, meant negotiations with his kidnappers were progressing. But it was not clear when the film was shot.

The Independent reports that

The video, published on a fundamentalist Islamic website, al-Ekhlaas, carries no date, making it unclear when it was made. A growth of hair around his ears suggests that Mr Johnston, who had a cut shortly before his kidnap, was filmed at least some time after his abduction.
Seated and dressed in a red sweatshirt, the correspondent, who was just over a fortnight away from completing his three- year tour of duty in Gaza when he was seized on 12 March, criticises British and American policy in the Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan, and says the "huge suffering" of the Palestinian people is "unacceptable". The conditions, as well as the timing, in which Mr Johnston made his declaration were unclear. The correspondent uses language which those familiar with his work would recognise as abnormal if used voluntarily

Package holidays for £5 as sales plummet is the lead in the Telegraph

The latest rash of bargain offers come as the industry tries to cope with a long-term slump, which has worsened in recent months, experts believe.
Many of the deals are for trips to some of Europe's most sought-after destinations, including Menorca and Crete, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.
The huge growth in low-cost airlines and the prevalence of broadband internet connections has made it increasingly easy for people to book their own holidays and cut out travel agents.

The same paper also reports that there are

Calls for 'NHS tax' to finance health care

Senior doctors are to propose that health care should be paid for through a compulsory NHS income tax.
Hospital consultants will next week argue that the present centralised system funded through general taxation is "unsustainable and dysfunctional".
A motion to be debated at a British Medical Association conference will suggest a means-tested system similar to those used in France and Germany.

Bob Woolmer WASN'T murdered, police will reveal is the Mail's lead this morning





Cricket coach Bob Woolmer died of natural causes, police will admit next week.
In a humiliating U-turn leaving them open to worldwide ridicule, Jamaican police are to announce that his death is no longer being treated as murder.
Instead, officers believe he died of heart failure brought on by chronic ill-health and possibly diabetes.
The sensational twist follows an extensive review of the evidence led by a senior Scotland Yard murder squad detective.


The same paper asks

Is Cameron losing his grip after his worst week yet?

David Cameron is attempting to reassert his authority after his worst week as Tory leader ended in further confusion and recrimination.
He is under fire on a growing number of fronts and there are fears he is losing his grip on the party and handing Labour a propaganda gift in the process.
The grammar school row is threatening to claim the scalp of his education spokesman David Willetts, and Mr Cameron is also facing widespread criticism for his decision to appoint a former red-top editor as his chief spin doctor.
Yesterday he tried to play down a fortnight of difficult headlines, interrupting his family break to issue a statement to insist he was "very relaxed".

Grammar school row is froth, says Cameron reports the Telegraph

Mr Cameron, ending a family holiday in Crete, dismissed the worst row to hit the party since he became leader as mere "froth and nonsense" whipped up by the media. He rejected demands from MPs that he should disown comments about grammar schools made by David Willetts, his education spokesman, and sort out the confusion. He said he would stand firm and "win the argument".

Handbags at dawn among Labour women reports the Indy

The battle for the deputy leadership of the Labour Party has not so far been notable for moments of high excitement. But that all changed yesterday as a classic political spat unfolded which was instantaneously dubbed "handbags at dawn".
It began with a complaint by Harriet Harman, the minister for Justice, that Britain was in danger of becoming a divided society in which many people struggle to make ends meet, while others "spend £10,000 on a handbag".
Hazel Blears, the diminutive but combative Labour Party chairman, who was brought up in working-class Salford, disagreed. "I don't think it is the job of politicians to tell people what they should spend their money on," she said. "Labour represents the poor and less well-off but it cannot only be a party for them."
An unapologetic Blairite, Ms Blears supplemented her defence of expensive handbags with a critique of flared trousers. Comments like that made by Ms Harman, she asserted, risked taking Labour back to the Life on Mars Britain of the 1970s, when socialism was red in tooth and claw and 18 years of Tory rule just around the corner. "We can go back to the views of the Seventies and get out our flares, but let's not kid ourselves that is where the rest of the British people are," she said.



'I CAN'T FIX MUGABE' reports the Mirror



TONY Blair ended his farewell African tour yesterday by admitting he could do little to free Zimbabwe from Robert Mugabe's brutal regime.
Mr Blair, speaking in Johannesburg as he met with South African president Thabo Mbeki, said: "We'll do what we can.
"But in the end that is something that will have to come from Africa."
Mr Blair is known to want Mr Mbeki to make a stand against Mugabe. He has been reluctant as both he and Mugabe were once leading lights in the battle against white rule.
The UK feels it cannot act as it is the region's former colonial power.



Blair: 'I'll be clinging to No 10 doorknocker' on last day says the Guardian



Tony Blair has offered an illuminating insight into the culture he helped to create by remarking that when he leaves office in 25 days' time he will become known as "a former celebrity".
The semi-serious admission, revealed by the writer Martin Amis in today's Guardian Weekend magazine, came as a rather rueful aside during a joint podcast with Bob Geldof on Africa, held in Downing Street. The prime minister tells Amis that he feels "all right so far" about power ebbing away from him, but acknowledges: "When the day comes, I'll probably be clinging to the doorknocker, but so far I think I can just ... let it go."

The Guardian reports that

Five years on, genocide accused awaits his fate

The five-year trial of Theoneste Bagosora, the alleged mastermind of the Rwandan genocide, ended yesterday with the 65-year-old former colonel insisting he was "a victim of ignominious propaganda".
Dressed in a pink dress shirt and tie - the colour worn by convicted "genocidaires" in Rwandan prisons - and speaking without emotion, Mr Bagosora denied responsibility for any killings and urged the judge to "rehabilitate" him in society.
Together with three top army commanders, Mr Bagosora was accused of planning and coordinating the slaughter by Hutus of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994. Prosecutors at the international criminal tribunal for Rwanda have described the case as "the most important genocide trial" since the term was legally defined in 1948.

It leads though with more news on climate change

Abuse and incompetence in fight against global warming

A Guardian investigation has found evidence of serious irregularities at the heart of the process the world is relying on to control global warming.
The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which is supposed to offset greenhouse gases emitted in the developed world by selling carbon credits from elsewhere, has been contaminated by gross incompetence, rule-breaking and possible fraud by companies in the developing world, according to UN paperwork, an unpublished expert report and alarming feedback from projects on the ground.

HOUNDED OUT OF HOME FOR BEING GINGER according to the Mirror's front page

A FAMILY have been forced out of three homes - just because they have ginger hair.
Kevin and Barbara Chapman and their four children have endured three years of abuse and violence. Son Kevin junior, 11, attempted suicide in despair.
Each time the family move, the hate mob reappears. Dad Kevin, of Newcastle, said: "The abuse we get is unbelievable."
The distraught Chapman family told yesterday how they have suffered appalling violence and abuse for three years - because they have ginger hair.
Taunting yobs have smashed Kevin and Barbara Chapman's windows, battered their car, hurled eggs at their house and daubed offensive graffiti on their walls.
And things are even worse for children Jordan, 13, Kevin junior, 11, Ryelle, 10, and Daniel, nine. They are abused and attacked in the street, classroom and playground.



Meanwhile reporting



VC HERO SAYS 'THANK YOU'



WAR hero Tul Bahadur Pun yesterday thanked the Mirror after the Government caved in over our campaign to let him live in Britain.
Former Gurkha Pun, 84, who won the Victoria Cross for his bravery in the Second World War, said from his home in Nepal: "I'm as happy as the day I won the VC.
"I want to come to the UK as soon as I can. I want to say a huge thank you to the British public and the Daily Mirror for supporting me and helping me get the decision overturned.
"I feel very moved by everybody's kind words and the efforts they have made for me."
Pun added: "I also want to thank all the former and serving members of the British armed forces who offered their support to me when I needed it. They have helped me and I am very grateful.

MADELEINE: NEW DNA CLUE TO KIDNAP is the Express's lead


DETECTIVES believe that they have found the DNA of Madeleine McCann’s kidnapper.
The evidence was discovered in the bedroom where the four-year-old girl was sleeping when she was snatched.It does not belong to any of the McCann family or chief suspect Robert Murat, 33.And police sources in Portugal said there was no link to Russian Sergey Malinka, 22, who has also been questioned over the disappearance. The discovery by forensic scientists proves a stranger was in the family’s Ocean Club Resort apartment in Praia da Luz.

'WE PRAY MADELEINE IS BEING LOOKED AFTER says the Mirror

THE parents of Madeleine McCann said yesterday they hoped her abductor was someone who longed for a daughter of their own - and so would never harm her.
Dad Gerry, 38, told a press conference in Madrid: "We are not blinkered to the possibility of her not coming back.
"We pray she's being looked after and it's someone who wants a little girl of their own and would look after her well.
"But we don't know who's taken her and it doesn't help us search for her. It's the most terrible, terrible pain imaginable."



The Sun leads with an exclusive



WILL'S OLD RIVAL DATES KATE



WEALTHY toff Henry Ropner is “delighted” to be dating Kate Middleton — three years after Prince William snapped up one of his ex-girlfriends.
Wills “comforted” land-owner’s daughter Jecca Craig, 25, within a month of her split from shipping heir Henry in 2004.
Now Henry, also 25 — who was at Eton with William — has turned the tables by going out on the town with Kate six weeks after she and the Prince ended their relationship.
A source said: “Henry is delighted to be there for Kate now that she’s split from William. They’ve been meeting up and enjoying themselves.
“There’s been a lot of flirting. Now she’s single, Kate is enjoying Henry’s company regularly.”



And more royal gossip in the Mail



The night Camilla lost her virginity - and changed the history of the royals



Some might say it is prurient to revisit Camilla’s long-past sexual history, yet what took place between her and Burke raises a tantalising constitutional question. What if Camilla had bowed to the moral dictates of the day - admittedly in Swinging London they were fast becoming unfashionable - and decided to keep herself "tidy" until after marriage?
If she had been a virgin and she and Charles had married after their famous meeting on a polo field in 1970, what would the Royal Family be like?
It is doubtful there would be the modernity and glamour Lady Diana Spencer brought to "the Firm" when she married Charles. If he had been allowed to marry Camilla, the monarchy would surely have remained remote and fusty, stuck in an age in which hunting was held in higher regard than haute couture.





Chanelle's mum was prostitute according to the Sun





BIG Brother beauty Chanelle Hayes is the daughter of a prostitute who was MURDERED, The Sun can reveal.
The pretty 19-year-old was only four years old when her mother was slaughtered.
She was put up for adoption by social workers — and was brought up by Christine and Harry Hayes in Wakefield, West Yorks.
Posh Spice lookalike Chanelle is understood to have been born in Manchester, in November 1987.
She is believed to have two half-sisters, but did not grow up with them. Instead, she was raised with an adoptive brother.

BIG BROTHER'S GOT MALE says the Mirror

THE man-hungry Big Brother girls mobbed hunky new male housemate Ziggy last night - within seconds of him walking into the house.
The 18-year-old Barbie twins couldn't believe their eyes when blond 26-year-old former model Zac "Ziggy" Lichman turned up, dressed in a smart designer black suit, white shirt and tie.
They ambushed him screeching and jumping about closely followed by Charley, Emily and Chanelle.
But Ziggy, a music producer from North London, had no idea he was walking into an-all girl house - and assumed it was launch night.



Back to more serious matters and the Telegraph reports on

Our forgotten war

The angry zip of machine gun bullets skims over our heads, followed by a ferocious blast of mortar bombs. "Contact. Contact right," shouts a sergeant next to me in the turret of a Viking armoured vehicle. Bullets dissect the air as I duck down inside the protected interior...................





The 1Bn the Royal Anglians is spearheading a multi-national force of 2,000 troops - half of them British - pushing up the Sangin Valley, a Taliban stronghold where well-armed insurgents


terrorise the populace.
The British are supported by paratroopers from the 82 US Airborne division, along with Danish and Estonian soldiers. For the last two days they have been engaged in heavy fighting in Operation Lashtay Kulang - meaning "pick axe handle" - which only now am I able to report.



Great escape: survivors reveal horror of North Korean concentration camps reports the Indy

Two survivors of a North Korean concentration camp have spoken out about the grim conditions in the gulag where inmates are left to die in tiny cells, in the latest accounts to shed light on the human rights atrocities carried out in the world's most isolated country.
A 27-year-old North Korean, Kim Eun Chul, was one of a group of seven fleeing their country in 1999 who were intercepted in Russia after they scrambled through barbed wire on the border with China.
The Russians sent them back to China despite a UN decision to grant them refugee status. China, which remains North Korea's staunchest ally, allowed the seven to be handed back to North Korea which subsequently informed the UN that the majority had been returned to their homes and factory jobs.

Finally the Times reports

Kidney reality show is revealed as a hoax


It was the reality show to end all reality shows.
The Dutch Prime Minister had said that he feared for his country’s reputation after The Big Donor Show promised to force three patients to compete for a terminally ill woman’s kidney.
In the end, after international condemnation and 45 tense prime-time minutes in which “Lisa” agonised in front of a live studio audience over whether Esther-Claire, Vincent or Charlotte would receive her kidney, the lights went up and it was revealed as a hoax.
“We are not giving away a kidney here, that is going too far even for us,” Patrick Lodiers, the presenter, announced. Turning to the contestants, he added: “They are not actors, they are real kidney patients and their stories were deadly serious.”