Junior Digest

BRUSSELS,Dec 16,2022:European Union leaders agreed on Thursday to make Bosnia and Herzegovina a formal candidate to join the bloc of 27 nations.
“Bosnia and Herzegovina was granted the status of candidate country today. A strong signal to the people, but also a clear expectation for the new authorities to deliver on reforms,” European Council President Charles Michel said in a tweet.
General affairs ministers of the EU countries had already agreed on the candidate status for Bosnia earlier this week.
It will be joining other EU candidates – Albania,Moldova, the Republic of North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine – in the process to join the EU, which can take many years and involves complex negotiations on adjusting local laws to match those of the EU.
Kosovo formally applied to join the EU on Thursday.

Dec 07,2022;Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that his army could be fighting in Ukraine for a long time, but he saw “no sense” in mobilizing additional soldiers at this point.

“As for the duration of the special military operation, well, of course, this can be a long process,” Putin said, using his preferred term to refer to the Russian invasion, now in its 10th month.

In a televised meeting of his human rights council that was dominated by the war, Putin said Russians would “defend ourselves with all the means at our disposal”, asserting that Russia was seen in the West as “a second-class country that has no right to exist at all”.
He said the risk of a nuclear war was growing – the latest in a series of such warnings from Moscow – but that Russia would not threaten recklessly to use such weapons.
He said there was no reason for a second round of mobilization at this point, after a call-up of at least 300,000 reservists in September and October.

Putin said that, out of that total, 150,000 were now deployed in Ukraine. Of those, 77,000 were in combat units and the remainder performing defensive functions, he said. The remaining 150,000 were still at training centers.
“Under these conditions, talk about any additional mobilization measures simply makes no sense,” he said.

Putin has rarely spoken about the likely duration of the war, although he boasted in July that Russia was just getting started.

Since then, Russia has been forced into a series of significant retreats, but Putin has said he has no regrets about launching the most devastating war in Europe since World War Two.

Dec 15,2022:Dozens of people, including a United States citizen, have been released in the latest prisoner swap between Russia and Ukraine, nearly 10 months into a grinding war that began after Moscow invaded its neighbour.

The latest exchange included 64 Ukrainian soldiers and a US national living in Ukraine, Andriy Yermak, the head of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office said on Wednesday.
The White House national security spokesman, John Kirby, did not name the freed American, citing privacy concerns.

“We certainly welcome that news,” Kirby told reporters.

Fighting is raging in Ukraine’s east and south, while the capital Kyiv was subjected to a significant drone attack on Wednesday. Tens of thousands of people have been killed, millions more displaced and cities reduced to rubble since the Russian invasion began on February 24.
“There is no calm on the front line,” Zelenskyy said in his regular evening video address, adding that Russia was destroying towns in the east with artillery “so that only bare ruins and craters” remained.

Zelenskyy said this week that Russia should start withdrawing from his country by Christmas as a step towards ending the conflict, Europe’s biggest since World War Two.

Dec 14,2022:At least 141 people were killed following floods and landslides caused by heavy rains that hit several outlying districts of Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), from late Monday till early Tuesday, according to the latest assessment made public late Tuesday by local authorities, Trend reports citing Xinhua.

According to a statement from the Kinshasa Provincial Ministry of Public Health, the heavy rains caused the death of 141 people, while 38,787 households had been flooded and about 280 houses collapsed.

Kinshasa’s authorities also spoke of damage to the N1 highway connecting Kinshasa to the port city of Matadi, a busy thoroughfare which was cut in two in the Mont-Ngafula district.

Dec 06,2022:President Ranil Wickremesinghe said that what Sri Lanka needs is a new economy and not reforms.

Sri Lanka should also concentrate more on a green hydrogen sector for the future, he said at the opening of the 2022 Economic Summit conducted by the Ceylon Chamber of commerce in Colombo yesterday.
He said that the private sector should concentrate on this segment which has tremendous potential than the solar industry.

The President also said that Sri Lanka can easily be converted into a major logistic hub and prudent steps are being taken towards this.

“Firstly we are planning to extend the Colombo harbor up to Ja-Ela and secondly we have allocated over 30 acres in the Colombo city specifically for the port development.

“We also have to give out the Easter container terminal and for this we have firstly approached Japan.”

The President stressed that maintaining a small port as is currently done would not serve the economy in a great way and we need to aggressively promote the ports and convert Sri Lanka into a major logistic hub.
He said that while Trincomalee harbor is being developed, Hambantota harbor has made a tremendous positive impact on the local maritime sector.

The President also said that the agro sector too should also be developed along with high tech systems. In addition education too can make a huge contribution to the Sri Lankan economy.

Dec 13,2022:Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday informed Parliament that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army on December 9 tried to unilaterally change the status quo in the Yangtse area of Arunachal Pradesh’s Tawang sector. The Chinese attempt was successfully thwarted by the Indian Army. In the border clash, soldiers from both sides sustained injuries but no one died in the incident.
Rajnath told MPs that the Chinese troops went back to their locations following a timely intervention by Indian commanders.
“On December 9, PLA troops tried to transgress the LAC in the Yangtse area of the Tawang sector and unilaterally change the status quo. The Chinese attempt was contested by our troops in a firm and resolute manner. The ensuing face-off led to a physical scuffle in which the Indian Army bravely prevented the PLA from transgressing into our territory and compelled them to return to their posts,” the minister said.
A brief face-off was reported between the two sides near Yangtse in October 2021 as well.

Dec 02,2022:US regulators partially approved plans by Elon Musk’s SpaceX to operate another massive fleet of Starlink satellites, giving the company the go-ahead to launch 7,500 of a proposed constellation of nearly 30,000 satellites.
The Federal Communications Commission announced the step in an order and authorization notice published Thursday. SpaceX has approval to operate these next generation Starlink satellites, known as Gen 2, at three altitudes between 326 miles (525 kilometers) and 332 miles, according to the notice. The FCC said it’s deferring “action on the remainder of SpaceX’s application at this time.”
Space Exploration Technologies Corp., the formal name of Musk’s closely held company, told the FCC in May it had launched about 2,500 first-generation satellites of its earlier-authorized fleet of about 4,400 Starlinks. The company said it was serving more than 400,000 subscribers worldwide.

Dec 12,2022:A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched on December 11 from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, carrying into space the first ever Arab-built lunar spacecraft.

The Rashid Rover was built by Dubai’s Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC), in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and is being delivered by the HAKUTO-R lander, engineered by Japanese lunar exploration company ispace. If the landing is successful, HAKUTO-R will also become the first commercial spacecraft ever to make a controlled landing on the moon.

The mission is taking a low energy route to the moon and is due to arrive around April 2023. Once there, the rover will spend one lunar day (equivalent to 14.75 days on Earth) on the surface, conducting its main operations. It will spend a second lunar day conducting secondary operations, to check whether the rover will survive the moon’s tough nighttime environment, before decommissioning.
Scheduled to touch down in the Atlas crater the northeast part of the moon, the rover has been designed to withstand the lunar night, when temperatures can reach as low as -183°C, or -297.4°F.

The Rashid Rover, named after the late Sheikh Rashid Al Saeed, the former ruler of Dubai, will analyze the plasma on the lunar surface and conduct experiments to understand more about lunar dust. Razor-sharp lunar dust particles can stick to and erode spacesuits and equipment, causing operational problems for astronauts.

KYIV, Dec 5,2022: A Group of Seven (G7) price cap on Russian seaborne oil came into force on Monday as the West tries to limit Moscow’s ability to finance its war in Ukraine, though Russia has said it will not abide by the measure even if it has to cut production.

The G7 nations and Australia on Friday agreed a $60 per barrel price cap on Russian seaborne crude oil after European Union members overcame resistance from Poland. Russia is the world’s second-largest oil exporter.

Kohima,Dec 02,2022: Displaying traditional diverse culture and vibrant life, the 10-day-long 23rd edition of Hornbill Festival began at the Naga Heritage Village Kisama on Thursday.
In another development, demanding a separate state, the Eastern Nagaland People’s Organisation (ENPO) despite the state government’s appeal has asked the tribes of the area not to participate in the annual Hornbill Festival.
The Hornbill Festival, named after a colourful forest bird, coincides with the 60th Nagaland statehood day celebrations.
Organised by the Nagaland government’s Tourism and Art and Culture department, the Hornbill Festival showcases Nagaland’s deep-rooted traditions and its rich cultural heritage in all its ethnicity, diversity, and grandeur. The festival is also a tribute to the great Hornbill, which is an admired and revered bird by the Naga people, for its qualities of alertness and grandeur.
The Hornbill Festival of Nagaland is a cultural extravaganza to revive, protect and preserve the richness and uniqueness of the Naga heritage. For the tourists and guests, it is an opportunity to get a comprehensive understanding of the Naga people, their land, and their rich culture.

BANGKOK,Dec 02,2022: At least 2,000 pro-democracy fighters have been killed in Myanmar battling a military junta that seized power last year, the head of a parallel civilian government said in an interview aired on Thursday, urging allies to provide military aid.
Duwa Lashi La, acting president of the National Unity Government (NUG), comprised of remnants of the administration of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi and others, was speaking to the Reuters NEXT conference from an undisclosed location in Myanmar.

“We regard (the deaths) as the price we must pay,” said Duwa Lashi La, a former teacher and lawyer in his seventies who fled his home in Kachin State in northern Myanmar with his family.

The military has branded him and his colleagues terrorists and banned citizens from communicating with them, but their parallel civilian government enjoys widespread support. Allied armed groups known as People’s Defense Forces have emerged across the country.
Duwa Lashi La has been pictured visiting troops, who include former students and professionals driven to the jungles by military crackdowns, clad in a flak jacket and helmet.

“I have no idea when I will give up my life,” he said. “It is up to God’s will. I am already committed to sacrificing anything for my country,” he said.

The Southeast Asian nation has been in turmoil since the military seized power in February last year, reversing a decade-long democratic experiment, and used deadly force to crush protests.

In addition to the 2,000 deaths in fighting, more than 2,500 civilians have been killed elsewhere, mostly in crackdowns on protests, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a rights group that has been monitoring the unrest.

SUPPORT LIKE UKRAINE

Pro-democracy fighters are out-gunned by an army equipped by Russia, China and India, which uses fighter jets to carry out deadly bombing raids. More than 1.3 million people have been internally displaced since the coup, according to the United Nations, which has said military attacks may constitute war crimes.
The junta did not respond to requests for comment by Reuters. It has said it does not target civilians with air strikes and its operations are responding to attacks by “terrorists”.

Duwa Lashi La said the opposition fighters had killed about 20,000 junta troops. It was not possible to independently confirm the numbers.
While Western nations have voiced support for the NUG and sanctioned military commanders and companies, they have stopped short of military aid for the opposition and say the regional Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which has a convention of non-interference in each other’s affairs, is best placed to solve the crisis.

KYIV, Dec 15,2022: Russia ruled out a “Christmas ceasefire” after nearly 10 months of war in Ukraine and rejected a call by Kyiv to start withdrawing troops by Christmas as a step to end Europe’s biggest conflict since World War Two.

Russia and Ukraine are not currently engaged in talks to end the fighting, which is raging in the east and south with little movement on either side.

Violence returned to Kyiv on Wednesday, with the first major drone attack on Ukraine’s capital in weeks. Two administrative buildings were hit, but air defences largely repelled the attack. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said 13 drones had been shot down.

WASHINGTON, Dec 16,2022: Puerto Rico’s movement for greater self-government got a boost on Thursday in the U.S. House of Representatives, which passed a bill for a referendum on three potential futures although the measure had little chance of being taken up by the Senate.

The Puerto Rico Status Act outlines terms for a binding referendum on the three options: full independence, U.S. statehood or sovereignty with formal U.S. association, similar to the Marshall Islands and Micronesia.
Democratic Representative Raul Grijalva, the bill’s original sponsor, said that whether the measure gets a vote in the Senate or not, it will still set “an important historical precedent” for Puerto Rico.
The legislation “tells the people in Puerto Rico, our fellow U.S. citizens, that this election is going to be aboveboard and the consequences are going to be aboveboard,” Grijalva told a House committee hearing on Wednesday night.
The measure passed in the Democratic-controlled House in a 233-219 vote largely along party lines.

Dec 12,2022:Two days after the results of the Himachal Pradesh elections were announced on December 8, senior Congress leader Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu took the oath as the 15th Chief Minister of the hill state on Sunday, December 11. He was administered the oath by Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar, in presence of the Congress top brass.

Sukhu’s name was announced in the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) meeting. Mukesh Agnihotri took oath as the Deputy Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh.

In line with Himachal’s pattern of sending the incumbent government out of power every five years, Congress wrested the hill state from the BJP winning 40 seats in the 68-member Assembly. The BJP managed 25 seats.
Top Congress leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi, and President Mallikarjun Kharge, were present during the oath-taking ceremony in Shimla. Congress leaders Ashok Gehlot, Bhupesh Baghel, BS Hooda and party’s state unit chief Pratibha Singh were also in attendance.

Dec 05,2022:Dominique Lapierre, the Padma Bhushan awardee and renowned French author, passed away on December 4, 2022. He was aged 91 during his death. The news was confirmed by Dominique Conchon-Lapierre, wife and partner of Dominique Lapierre in his literary projects. “At 91, he died of old age,” she told the French newspaper Var-Matin on Sunday.
The notable author was born on July 30, 1931, in Chatelaillon, France. The author is revered by the readers for his books such as “City of Joy,” “Is Paris Burning,” and “Five past Midnight in Bhopal,” among others. Of these, the 1985 novel “City of Joy” which addressed the struggles of a rickshaw puller in Kolkata touched the masses, and also was made into a movie in 1992.

Lapierre was awarded the Padma Bhushan, India’s third highest civilian award in 2008.
Talking of his legacy in literature works, Lapierre and Larry Collins’ contributions together can’t be forgotten. It is reported that the French author lived near Collins in Saint-Tropez as their houses were just separated by a tennis court.

Reportedly, Lapierre sold about 50 million copies of the six books he wrote in collaboration with the American writer, and of which “Is Paris Burning?” being the most read. The two also co-authored “Or I’ll Dress You in Mourning” (1968), “O Jerusalem” (1972), “Freedom at Midnight” (1975), “The Fifth Horseman” (1980), and the thriller “Is New York Burning?”

DEC03,2022:Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh said India’s “bio-economy” has grown 8 times in the last 8 years unde from $10 billion in 2014 to over $80 billion in 2022. He added number of biotech startups has grown 100 times in the last 8 years from 52 in 2014 to 5300 plus in 2022.
Three Biotech Startups were incorporated every day in 2021 and a total of 1,128 biotech startups were set up in 2021 alone, signaling the rapid growth of the sector in India, said Dr Singh, while addressing an international conference on emerging trends in Biosciences and Chemical Technology in Jammu.
The number of bio tech incubators have increased from 6 in 2014 to 75 in 2022, and biotech products have increased from 10 to over 700 during the period. The investment in India’s biotech industry has increased from Rs 10 Crore in 2014 to Rs 4200 crore in 2022, increasing 400 times and leading to creation of over 2500 skilled jobs over the period.
The minister further added that research & development spending in the sector trebled from $320 million in 2020 to $1.02 billion currently during the Covid era. India will soon enter the league of top-5 countries in Biotech’s global ecosystem, he added.
The conference, organized by Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, School of Biotechnology, Jammu in collaboration with CSIR-IIIM Jammu and The Biotech Research Society of India, from December 3- 5, is being attended by international participants and keynote speakers from USA, Greece, South Korea, Scotland, Singapore, Thailand, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Malaysia and Vietnam.
He added India’s diverse climatic zones, skilled human capital pool, increasing efforts for ease of doing business, demand for bio-products and subsequent growth of the sector provide ample opportunities.

LONDON,Dec 14,2022: The United Nations on Tuesday announced its top priorities for restoring ecosystems from South America’s Atlantic Forest to the Ganges River in India.

With countries negotiating a global conservation pact at the U.N. nature summit in Montreal, the U.N. sought to boost momentum by naming 10 flagship restoration initiatives to receive funding and scientific expertise.

Without specifying how much money might be allocated, the U.N. said it hoped to add to the funds with private donations.

Inger Andersen, head of the U.N. Environment Programme, told Reuters she hoped the initiative would demonstrate that restoration is possible. The agency estimates about 40% of the world’s land is degraded.

“You can, with a little concerted effort and some wonderful leadership at all levels of society, actually turn this around,” Andersen told Reuters.

While the COP15 negotiations aim for new conservation rules to prevent further nature loss, one of the two dozen proposed targets would see countries agreeing to restore 20% to 30% of degraded landscapes, including mountains, wetlands, deserts, and coastlines.

Altogether, the projects cover a total of some 68 million hectares (168 million acres) – an area bigger than France.

The U.N. selected its 10 projects for restoration through 2030 out of more than 150 applications. “We were looking for inspiration, we were looking for diversity, and we were looking for something that gives people hope,” said the UNEP’s Mirey Atallah, who helped coordinate the initiative.

There are efforts to regreen logged-out areas of the Atlantic Forest and clean the polluted Ganges; restore seagrass beds to protect endangered dugongs in the Persian Gulf around the United Arab Emirates; plant trees and savannahs for Africa’s Great Green Wall; and supporting traditional farming throughout drought-prone Central America.

The other five involve restoring diverse ecosystems in China, shoring up low-lying coastlines against storm surges and erosion on Indonesia’s main island of Java, building resilience in mountain communities of Europe and Africa, protecting three island nations’ corals, forests and communities, and restoring grasslands to the Kazakh steppe.

A report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature found on Monday that restoration work is currently unfolding on 14 million hectares (35 million acres) across 18 countries, carried out with $26 billion in funding.

The U.N. plans to monitor progress on the 10 projects through tools like satellite imagery, Atallah said.

Dec 02,2022:As many as 13,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in battle since Russia invaded the country nine months ago, according to an official in Kyiv.

The comments from Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, appeared to be the first update on the number of fighters killed since late August when the head of the armed forces said nearly 9,000 troops had died.

“We have official figures from the general staff, we have official figures from the top command, and they amount to (between) 10,000 and 12,500 to 13,000 killed,” Podolyak told Ukraine’s Channel 24 on Thursday.

“We are open in talking about the number of dead,” he added, saying more soldiers had been wounded than had died.

The number of military casualties has not been confirmed by Ukraine’s armed forces. Podolyak added that Zelenskyy would make the official data public “when the right moment comes”.

Ukraine’s military mounted a lightning counterattack in September that saw them win back swathes of territory in the northeast and south of the country, including the strategically-important city of Kherson which had been occupied by Russia shortly after its February 24 invasion.

With the weather turning colder, the most intense clashes are now taking place in the eastern region of Donetsk.

Earlier, United States President Joe Biden and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, who is in Washington, DC, promised to maintain support for Ukraine and condemned “Russia’s illegal war of aggression” against its neighbour.
Last month, the US’s top general estimated that Russia’s military had seen more than 100,000 of its soldiers killed or wounded in Ukraine, adding that Kyiv’s armed forces have “probably” suffered in a similar way.

Dec 13,2022:US government scientists have reportedly made a breakthrough in harnessing the much sought-after fusion energy power source.

It’s believed fusion energy, the same reaction that powers the sun, could one day provide a limitless and cleaner alternative to fossil fuels.

The Financial Times today reported three separate sources confirmed a recent experiment at the federal Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California yielded successful results.
The experiment reportedly produced a net gain in energy produced for the first time since observations began back in the 1950s.

The Financial Times said the fusion reaction, “produced about 2.5 megajoules of energy, which was about 120 per cent of the 2.1 megajoules of energy in the lasers, the people with knowledge of the results said, adding that the data was still being analysed”.

The US department of energy told the news outlet it will announce “a major scientific breakthrough” at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on Tuesday (local time, Wednesday NZT).

“Initial diagnostic data suggests another successful experiment at the National Ignition Facility,” the lab said.

“However, the exact yield is still being determined and we can’t confirm that it is over the threshold at this time. That analysis is in process, so publishing the information…before that process is complete would be inaccurate.”

The Financial Times reports the results are being widely shared behind the scenes in the scientific world.

LIMA, Dec 8,2022: Peru swore in a new president on Wednesday after a day of political drama that saw leftist leader Pedro Castillo arrested after his ousting from office in an impeachment trial following his last-ditch bid to cling to power by dissolving Congress.

Ignoring Castillo’s attempt to shut down the legislature by decree, lawmakers moved ahead with a previously planned impeachment trial, with 101 votes in favor of removing him, six against and 10 abstentions.
The result was announced to loud cheers, and the legislature called on Vice President Dina Boluarte to take office.
The 60-year-old Boluarte was sworn in as president through 2026, making her the first woman to lead Peru. She called for a political truce after months of instability, including two prior impeachment attempts, and said a new cabinet inclusive of all political stripes would be formed.

She lambasted Castillo’s move to dissolve Congress as an “attempted coup.”