Tuesday's papers

There are many more just like me says the Telegraph as the paper reports that security agencies in Britain and the US are under increasing pressure to explain how the Detroit bomber was able to board an aircraft carrying explosives despite being on intelligence “watch lists” in both countries.

Abdulmutallab has given a defiant warning to US investigators, telling them: “There are more just like me who will strike soon.”
Dozens of Islamic militants from Britain are thought to have travelled to Yemen in recent months, where the security services fear they are being trained by al-Qaeda bomb-makers to launch further attacks against Western targets.

The Sun leads with the same headline as the paper reports Al Queda admitted last night that it WAS behind the Christmas Day attempt to blow an American airliner out of the sky.

The Express leads with the story that Muslim travellers must be singled out for airport ­security screening to foil future Al Qaeda attacks on airliners, a terrorism expert said last night

The profiling of Muslim ­passengers is the “obvious and rational” response to deter Islamic terrorists striking against British targets, said Professor Anthony Glees.

The Guardian reports that

A number of Britons have travelled to Yemen to train at secret terrorist camps, counter-terrorism officials revealed yesterday, raising fears that the country is becoming a stronghold for a new generation of al-Qaida-inspired fighters.

Elsewhere the Mail leads with the news that Shoppers face a New Year sales nightmare as retailers dither over when to reimpose the full rate of VAT.

Drivers, drinkers and shoppers will suffer an £11billion ‘VAT shock’ - the amount the cut saved them this year. The sales tax was slashed to 15 per cent a year ago to boost consumer spending, but will return to 17.5 per cent on New Year’s Day.

According to the Times

Hundreds of millions of pounds of charity donations to hospitals are to be “nationalised” under an NHS accounting change, which critics say will make it easier to slash health budgets.

The Independent leads with the story that

Boys aged three and four must be made to write more to stop them falling behind girls before they even reach school, the Government will order nurseries and childminders.

Keir Starmer, the Director of Prosecutions, has widened the rift with the Conservatives after rejecting Tory plans to give greater protection to householders who tackle burglars. reports the Telegraph

There is muich coverage of the situation in Iran.The Times says that

Iran’s beleaguered regime struck back at the resurgent opposition yesterday, arresting several leading activists and confiscating the corpse of Mir Hossein Mousavi’s nephew to prevent his funeral becoming another massive anti-government demonstration.

Plainclothes agents and special police units were reported to be deployed in overwhelming numbers in four of Tehran's main squares – Enghelab, Haft-e Tir, Valiasr and Ferdowsi – which formed part of the focal point of Sunday's fierce confrontations. Three city-centre underground stations were also closed as authorities sought to block off gathering points for protesters.

says the Guardian

According to the Independent,the Government is accused of driving women on to the streets by cracking down on high-class escort agencies,

high-class escort agencies are being targeted by police in a wider clampdown on online prostitution linked to money-laundering and people trafficking. The move, supported by ministers, opens up a new front in the war against sex workers who are estimated to earn £1bn a year in untaxed revenues.

aAgroup of employment experts have warned that another 250,000 jobs will be lost in Britain before unemployment starts to ease in 2010, and the number of jobless will remain high for years, says the Telegraph

The FT reports that

The UK in the first decade of the new century recorded the lowest economic growth of the postwar period and the worst returns for stock-market investors since the 1930s,

The Guardian has learned that Britain's leading companies are devising pay schemes that enable top executives to escape the new 50p rate of income tax for high earners that takes effect in April,