Former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has sought a breach of privilege over "slanderous" claims made earlier by Nationalist MP Jason Azzopardi.
Speaking at the end of the morning session, Azzopardi said Muscat had called an early election in 2017 because he knew about the plan to assassinate Daphne Caruana Galizia.
The MP called Muscat a "liar" and said the former PM had cried "crocodile tears" when he called the election on the excuse of the Egrant allegations.
"The best-case scenario is that Muscat called early election because he knew Daphne was going to publish the Montenegro story, because the Montenegro scandal was the motive behind the killing. Much more will come out about that. In the worst-case scenario, Muscat knew there was a plan to kill her through his best buddy Yorgen Fenech," Azzopardi said.
He claimed that there was a Whatsapp chat between Muscat, Fenech and Schembri ... "they were close that they even used to share photos of the food they were cooking."
Speaking during the evening session, Muscat said these were "slanderous and baseless claims" and called on the Speaker to deliver a ruling.
The claims, he said, "result from nowhere but Jason Azzopardi's nonsensical fantasy."
Muscat said that, while he was willing to accept criticism, he would not allow anyone to tarnish his reputation with "calumnies."
"I am the only prime minister on whose watch, such a high profile murder was solved," he added.
The former PM accused Azzopardi of abusing his parliamentary privilege.
He said that Azzopardi had sent him messages, via third persons, not to criticise him on certain matters. Muscat said that he had not criticised Azzopardi on this, as he always drew a line when it came to personal situations.
Speaker Anglu Farrugia said he will rule on the matter in another sitting.