Both the Guardian and the Independent lead with different stories on Afghanistan

Lest we forget says the Indy

In Afghan fields, the poppies blow... and another British soldier dies in a war without end

Staff at the British embassy in Kabul are wearing poppies in honour of the country's dead in Afghanistan, as well as the other conflicts in which British soldiers have fought over the past century. But Afghans do not understand the meaning of the symbol.
"Why do you have that paper flower pinned to your clothes?" the proprietor of a bookshop in Kabul asked a British customer yesterday. " I have seen the newscasters on BBC and Sky wearing them too. What is it for?" The explanation seemed to leave the bookseller even more confused – in Afghanistan, poppies have a very different significance.

UK's new Afghanistan plan: pay farmers to ditch opium reports the Guardian

Gordon Brown is planning a radical scheme to subsidise farmers in Afghanistan to persuade them to stop producing heroin, as part of a wide-ranging drive to re-energise policy in the conflict the prime minister now regards as the front line in the fight against terrorism.
The Foreign Office minister Lord Malloch-Brown has admitted that the rise in opium production in the country means Britain "cannot just muddle along in the middle" and must come up with more imaginative ideas on opium eradication.

Staying with the poppy theme,the Telegraph reminds us of the significance of tomorrow,under the headline

Gordon Brown: A silence for the fallen with the PM writing

In 1918, "at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month", the guns fell silent, signalling the Armistice and victory on the Western Front after more than 50 months of epic and exhausting combat. The following year, at the same hour, our nation observed for the first time two minutes of silence to remember the dead of the "Great War".

Hero we salute you says the Sun

TODAY The Sun salutes Sergeant Stu Pearson — a hero paratrooper who embodies everything that makes the British Army the best in the world.
In the service of his country, tough Scot Stu, 31, took the blasts from three land mines — losing his left leg and his right heel — then watched one of his best mates die.
But he still manages to keep a smile on his face.
With typical squaddie black humour, his favourite T-shirt reads: “I went to Afghanistan and all I got was this crappy false leg.”

The Tabloids continue to lead with the Meredith killing

MEREDITH BLED TO DEATH IN AGONY says the front page of the Express

MURDERED Meredith Kercher died a “slow and agonising death”, it emerged yesterday.


The last horrifying moments of the 21-year-old student were revealed in an Italian judge’s report.
Judge Claudia Matteini said Miss Kercher bled to death slowly because the knife used to slash her throat missed her carotid artery. Had it been severed she would have died in seconds.

The Mail also leads with the story

Meredith suffered 'slow, painful death after refusing to take part in extreme sexual experiences'

The British student was slashed three times with a knife during a sickening drug-fuelled attack which lasted up to two hours.
Miss Kercher, 21, was killed because she refused to participate in "extreme sexual experiences" with her female flatmate, the flatmate's boyfriend and a bar owner in the town of Perugia.
This morning the mother of one of the suspects, Amanda Knox, was due to visit her daughter in prison.

Her last terrifying hours says the Mirror

The Times leads with the story that

Green tax puts extra £1,000 on family cars

Families who choose to drive larger cars face an increase of up to £1,000 in the cost of motoring under a government plan to force people to switch to greener vehicles.
At the same time, manufacturers will be given incentives to accelerate the introduction of hybrid cars — which have a petrol engine and an electric motor — and those that run entirely on electricity.

The storm that never was is widely reported

Relief after East Anglian coast emerges from storm surge says the Guardian


Dawn came with a terrible sense of foreboding as East Anglia woke in the knowledge that the worst high seas for more than 50 years were heading for shore amid dire warnings of threats to life and property.
Sandbags had been filled, makeshift barricades erected and thousands of homes evacuated as a tidal surge to rival the devastating high waters of 1953 approached. But when morning came the peak of the conditions caused by a combination of gale-force winds in the North Sea and a high tide which battered the coasts of Norfolk and Suffolk left only minor damage

Great Yarmouth sees river rise - and fall again says the Indy

The waves were crashing against the sea walls at Great Yarmouth yesterday as the flags along the front were whipped by the winds. But, apart from the odd large puddle, there was little evidence of the watery Armageddon that had been predicted.

The Telegraph carries an interview with the leader with the Muslim council

Dr Bari: Government stoking Muslim tension

Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari, the leader of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), thinks the Government is stoking the tension.
"There is a disproportionate amount of discussion surrounding us," he says. "The air is thick with suspicion and unease. It is not good for the Muslim community, it is not good for society."

It leads though with a report that

Middle classes abandon state schools

A growing proportion of middle-class parents are giving up on state education after 10 years of Labour rule by paying to educate their children in the independent sector, official figures have disclosed.The scale of the exodus is shown for the first time in statistics indicating that many families outside the traditional fee-paying heartland of the South East are shunning comprehensives in favour of private schools.

A-level reputation in severe decline...now even an exam board chief doubts their value says the Times

The reputation of A levels has been dealt a blow after the head of an exam board expressed doubts about their value. Simon Lebus, group chief executive of the Cambridge Assessment board, part of Cambridge University, said that examiners, regulators and politicians had all been wrong in failing to address declining public confidence in “A-level currency”.



Riot police deployed to prevent Benazir from leading anti-Musharraf protest reports the Guardian

Benazir Bhutto was going nowhere. A phalanx of riot police stood at the end of her leafy street, tapping their shields and manning a barbed wire barricade. Armoured vehicles rolled in.
Officers even prowled the neighbours' gardens, just in case the opposition leader might vault her back wall. "All this, for one unarmed woman," said her spokeswoman Sherry Rehman.
In nearby Rawalpindi, where Bhutto was due to hold a mass rally against President Pervez Musharraf's emergency rule, the clampdown was even greater. A city of 5 million people had virtually shut down. Police roamed the deserted streets on motorbikes, horses and by foot.

Burma democracy leader Suu Kyi allowed to meet party colleagues reports the Indy

Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese democracy leader, has been allowed to meet the other leaders of her party, the National League for Democracy, for the first time in more than three years.
During yesterday's hour-long meeting at a government guest house, from which the press and public were excluded, she told her NLD colleagues that she was "very optimistic" about the prospects of a dialogue between the democracy forces and the junta, which the United Nations has been attempting to broker.

Meanwhile the Telegraph reports that

US seeks Merkel's backing over Iran

During talks at Mr Bush's private ranch in Texas, Mrs Merkel was expected to argue that all diplomatic options should be exhausted before military action could be taken against Teheran's regime, which the West believes is developing nuclear weapons.

Protege's corruption charge embarrasses Giuliani reports the Guardian

Rudy Giuliani's bid to become Republican candidate for US president faces months of questioning on the campaign trail, after his friend and protege Bernard Kerik was yesterday charged with corruption and lying to cover-up his misdeeds.
Mr Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, faces embarrassment in connection with his long-term friend who stands accused of a corrupt relationship with a firm linked to the mob. Mr Giuliani appointed Mr Kerik in 2000 to be New York police commissioner, and also put his name forward in 2004 to be head of the department of homeland security.

Government urged to investigate Lawrence inquiry leak says the Independent

Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, is under growing pressure to investigate the leaking of new evidence on the killing of the black teenager Stephen Lawrence, just hours before a report criticised the head of the Metropolitan Police for obstructing an inquiry into the Stockwell shooting.
The police were forced to confirm media reports this week that detectives had made a late breakthrough in the 14-year Lawrence case after a newspaper revealed details of a key forensic discovery.

FURY OVER 40p-A-MINUTE CALLS TO DOCS' SURGERY reports the Mirror

Patients are being forced to use rip off phone numbers to call their GPs' surgeries.

They can pay up to 40p a minute to make an appointment, get test results or repeat prescriptions at 1,200 doctors' practices in England and Wales. Government guidelines say GPs should only charge a local call rate - 3.25p a minute at peak times with BT. But calls to the surgeries on 0844 numbers cost 40p a minute from a mobile and 5p from a landline, figures given to MPs show. They want Health Secretary Alan Johnson to step in.





Rise of the Saga divorce: More over-50s go it alone once children leave home reports the Mail

Their children have grown up. Their mortgage is paid off. And they are looking forward to a long and happy retirement - apart.
This is increasingly the experience of Britain's over-50s, with the number of divorced couples in that age group rising relentlessly despite the overall divorce rate dropping to its lowest level for nearly three decades.
Last year in England and Wales 54,034 over-50s divorced, compared with 47,763 in 2001.

It hasn't gone away

McCanns put on trial by TV reports the Mirror

Detectives remain convinced the McCanns were involved in Madeleine's disappearance, a Portuguese TV documentary has claimed.
It says senior officers are focusing their attention on a number of key periods in which the youngster could have died. Journalist Sandra Felgueiras said there were three "windows of opportunity" in which they believe Kate and Gerry could have hidden Madeleine's body on the night she disappeared

The three timings 'key to solving Madeleine case'says the Mail

Police in Portugal have identified three time-slots which they believe hold the key to what really happened to Madeleine McCann.
Crucially all three "windows of opportunity" are linked to Kate and Gerry McCann's movements, suggesting detectives still believe they were involved in their daughter's disappearance.


The Express meanwhile reports that

'GROWING NUMBER' REJECTED FOR LOANS

The proportion of people being accepted for a personal loan has fallen every month since April as lenders tighten their lending criteria, according to financial website moneysupermarket.com.

The Sun has an exclusive

SOBBING AMY WINEHOUSE last night vowed to stand by hubby BLAKE FIELDER-CIVIL over his trial-fixing arrest, saying: “He’s told me he’s done nothing wrong and I believe him.”

All the papers carry the arrival of the I-phone

At 6.02pm the worshippers got their reward says the Guardian

Some people might argue that you'd have to be mad to queue from before dawn until after sunset, in icy weather, just to purchase a small and arguably overpriced slab of metal and plastic. Oddly, this also seemed to be the consensus among those who queued from before dawn until after sunset yesterday, in the bone-chilling wind, just to be the first in the UK to purchase an Apple iPhone.

British Apple fans finally got their hands on the iPhone - but would they be better off with a trip to France? asks the Mail

Glasgow catches Commonwealth Games fever reports the Telegraph

Children screamed, athletes dreamed, and political rivals hugged each other for the first time.
There was no escaping Commonwealth Games fever yesterday as Glaswegians on buses, trains, taxis and the underground learned that they were to host one of the great sporting jamborees.

And finally

Why Kate Moss thought Tory leader was the man to mend her drains

The Times reports that

David Cameron’s fortunes have improved sharply since the summer. But he has been brought down to earth by Kate Moss, the supermodel, who apparently mistook him for a plumber. The encounter between the Conservative leader and Ms Moss took place at a charity function.