Ø India could soon get access to a U.S. database of 11,000 terror
suspects if the countries sign a pact to exchange information on terrorists,
during the Homeland Security dialogue in December. The information would be
shared through the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s legal attache at the U.S.
embassy in New Delhi. Though some security agencies expressed concern
over giving unhindered access to the U.S. on such “sensitive database”, the
government is of the view that it would be beneficial in the long run. India
is, however, insisting that “privacy issues” be taken care of, and the
agreement not be a tool to serve only the interests of the U.S. In return, it
wants access to Internet-related data from U.S.-based service providers like
Google, Yahoo, and Bing, among others. The Homeland Security
Presidential Directive (HSPD -6) is a model text agreement proposed by the U.S.
for exchange of terrorist screening information between the Terrorist Screening
Centre of the U.S. and an Indian agency.
Ø Military veterans on Friday boycotted the official functions for
commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the 1965 Indo-Pak war, and held their
own felicitation at the Jantar Mantar protest site here. The
ex-servicemen, who have been on an agitation demanding One Rank One Pension,
hardened their stance after talks with the government remained inconclusive.
Ø It rained seeds on the hills around Vijayawada and the capital
region of Amaravati on Friday. Pursuing his vision of a “blue and green”
Amaravati, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu flagged off a
helicopter that will spray seeds of select tree species over nearly 1,500
hectares of degraded forest land that are not suitable for traditional methods
of sowing. Aerial seeding is a technique of sowing seeds using helicopters and
aeroplanes to scatter them over a designated area. Aerial reforestation has
been in vogue since the 1930s to repopulate forest land after disasters. Mr.
Naidu said 150 tonnes of seed has bden requisitioned for the purpose. More seed
would be procured if necessary. Special Chief Secretary (Forests) A.K. Parida
said aerial seeding was being taken up at 27 locations covering 1,080 hectates
in Guntur and 374.67 hectares in Krishna.
Ø Stung by Afghanistan’s security and strategic shift towards
Pakistan in the past year, India has rebuffed another invitation from Kabul to
revive the Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA) signed in 2011 to hold a
meeting of the Strategic Partnership Council (SPC). Diplomatic sources
at the highest level have confirmed to The Hindu that India has conveyed its
inability to hold the meeting that would be chaired by External Affairs
Minister Sushma Swaraj and her Afghan counterpart Salahuddin Rabbani “due to
prior commitments.” New Delhi has also conveyed that Ms. Swaraj will not attend
the upcoming Regional Economic Cooperation Conference on Afghanistan (RECCA) in
Kabul on September 3 and 4, and instead Sujata Mehta, Secretary, Multilateral
and Economic Relations, will represent India at the conference. India’s
representation will be in sharp contrast to some of the other regional
countries participating at the Foreign Minister-level, while Iran is expected
to send its Interior Minister and Pakistan its National Security Adviser Sartaj
Aziz. While India’s decision to not attend the RECCA conference, which
is essentially a development and donor conference, may not affect relations
given India’s $2.3-billion strong commitment to Afghanistan, Afghan officials
said the delay in the SPC meeting is more significant. India and Afghanistan
have held only one meeting of the SPC (in 2012) since former Afghanistan
President Hamid Karzai and former India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh signed
the historic agreement in 2011. India was the first country Afghanistan chose to
sign a strategic partnership agreement with, despite the U.S. and Pakistan keen
on doing so. Since then, however, India has significantly withdrawn from its
strategic promises to Afghanistan for a number of reasons. Next, said
officials, after President Ashraf Ghani took charge in 2014, he made a decisive
shift towards mending fences with the Pakistan Army, including visits to the
Pakistan General Headquarters and inviting the Army and intelligence chiefs to
Kabul, and signing an MoU between intelligence agencies NDS and ISI, even as
his government joined talks with the Taliban hosted by Pakistan.
Ø Research groups at TIFR, Mumbai, IISc, Bangalore and the
University of Toronto working together, may have gotten the closest yet to
figuring out how the toxic form of the Alzheimer’s molecule looks. This brings
with it implications of development of better drugs to treat patients. Alzheimer’s
disease is a progressive form of dementia that is characterised by loss of
short-term memory, deterioration in behaviour and intellectual performance,
besides slowness of thought. It may occur in middle age or in old age, and
while a lot of research is on for drug treatments, none has been successful.
While it is widely accepted that a specific form of the Amyloid beta molecule
is a major player in causing Alzheimer’s, the shape and form of this remained
elusive, experts say. The excitement now is that scientists have caught a
glimpse of the molecule during its attempt to enter a cell membrane, using a
new method involving laser light and fat-coated silver nanoparticles. It
is a rare protein and is difficult to probe. It was slightly fortuitous that we
found it, using a modified version of Raman Spectroscopy. Usually the signal
from this is weak, but we mimicked the cell’s outer layer by encasing silver
nanoparticles in a fat membrane
Ø Noted Indian agriculture scientist Modadugu Vijay Gupta, who has
done pioneering work in aquaculture in India and several other countries, was
on Friday awarded the first Sunhak Peace Prize, billed as an alternative to the
Nobel Peace Prize, which he shared with the President of Kiribati Islands.
Dr. Gupta, 76, received the $1 million prize along with Anote Tong, President
of Kiribati Islands, here at a glittering function which was attended by
invitees from all over the world. Mr. Tong, 63, the head of the Pacific
Ocean island nation which is facing the dire prospects of being engulfed by
rising sea waters by 2050, was chosen for the award for his dogged fight to end
the carbon emissions which are spelling doom for small island nations. The
awards were presented by South Korean religious leader Hak Ja Han Moon, the
wife of late Rev Sun Myung Moon, who instituted the awards to recognise and
highlight the work of individuals making big efforts for the betterment of
people.
Ø The U.S. has asked Pakistan and all other nuclear-armed countries
to exercise restraint in expanding their nuclear capabilities after two
American think-tanks said Pakistan could have the third largest stockpile of
atomic weapons in about a decade. We continue to urge all
nuclear-capable states, including Pakistan, to exercise restraint regarding
furthering their nuclear capabilities. He was responding to a question
on a latest report by two top American think-tanks, according to which in a
decade or so, Pakistan would have more than 350 nuclear weapons that would be
third largest stockpile of nuclear weapons after the United State and Russia.
The 48-page report titled “A Normal Nuclear Pakistan” by two renowned scholars
Tom Dalton and Michael Krepon of Stimson Center and the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace says that the growth path of the country’s nuclear arsenal,
enabled by existing infrastructure, goes well beyond the assurances of credible
minimal deterrence provided by its officials and analysts after testing nuclear
devices. The report said that Pakistan will retain its capabilities for
the foreseeable future as a necessary deterrent against perceived existential
threats from India.
Ø Aiming big in defence production, Anil Ambani led Reliance Group
has announced plans to invest over Rs. 6,500
crore in setting up an aerospace park at Nagpur. The Maharashtra
Government on Friday allotted 289 acres in Mihan SEZ, Nagpur to Reliance Group
firm Reliance Aerostructure Ltd which will undertake this project named
Dhirubhai Ambani Aerospace Park (DAAP). The land allotment letter was handed
over to the company at a ceremony in Nagpur which was attended by Maharashtra
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari and Reliance
Group Chairman Anil Ambani.
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