What the papers say

Journalist Mike Philpott takes a look at what is making the headlines in Thursday's morning papers.

As Education Secretary Ruth Kelly prepares to face fellow MPs to defend her handling of the controversy over sex offenders working in schools, the News Letter explores the local angle.

The paper reports on the admission by the Department of Education that three such offenders are employed in schools here, "but none poses a risk to children".

It is not the only national story with an application on this side of the water.

The Guardian reports on what it calls "CIA torture flights" stopping at British airports, and says the government is secretly trying to stifle attempts by MPs to find out more about UK involvement.

The Daily Mail points the finger at the prime minister himself.

It says Tony Blair told Parliament that he knew nothing about British airports being used in the secret transfer of terrorist suspects, but a memo dated a few days earlier "would suggest otherwise".

Daily Ireland leads with a warning by the American academic Noam Chomsky that allowing such flights to stop at Shannon would make the Republic "guilty of war crimes".

Speaking in Dublin, Professor Chomsky said he supported a Dail investigation into the alleged use of Shannon by the CIA.

The story also receives coverage in the Irish News, Irish Times and Irish Independent.

Crime

There is still much discussion about the IRA, after the Policing Board was told that it was still involved in crime.

The News Letter says "the overwhelming majority of people will accept that the police are in the best position to make a judgement on the issue" - but it says more will become clear when the Independent Monitoring Commission releases its report next month.

The Belfast Telegraph agrees, and says the public will judge matters by results on the ground.

The Irish News says the forthcoming IMC document has assumed an even greater significance.

In the meantime, it says, there is little point in politicians "getting themselves overly excited" about the issue of IRA activity.

It describes the organisation as "a shadow of its former self" and says loyalist paramilitaries pose a much greater threat.

In Dublin, the Irish Independent follows up the story of a priest in his 70s who has had a child with a woman less than half his age.

It reports that "the couple have gone into hiding", but adds that "their affair has been going on for nine years".

The Irish Times talks of sympathy and support for Father Maurice Dillane in the parish in Galway from which he retired once the affair became known.

It quotes one parish official, who said "matters might have been very different if the story had broken a decade ago, but things had moved on".

The so-called plot was nothing more than a chat in a pub and was never a serious plan The Mirror

There is much coverage of the apparent plot to kidnap the prime minister's son Leo, and the subsequent disbanding of the Fathers 4 Justice campaign.

The Mirror pours scorn on the Sun's story, arguing that "the so-called plot was nothing more than a chat in a pub and was never a serious plan".

The Daily Telegraph credits the pressure group with helping to shape government policy, but says it was "fatally undermined by extremists and in-fighting".

Finally, the Daily Telegraph reports on a highly successful weight loss campaign by a man in Australia.

Robert Cole dropped three stone in two years, ending up at his ideal weight of 8 stone 10 pounds.

It allowed him to escape through a wall in the prison where he was serving time for armed robbery.