Current Affairs

India and Pakistan on 10 July 2015 were accepted as the full members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a six-member regional grouping, including China and Russia. India that has had on the observer status of the group for past 10 years, will become a full member of SCO by 2016.

The Japanese Cabinet on 21 July 2015 approved the Defense White Paper for the year 2015. In the White Paper 2015, the cabinet described the security situation surrounding Japan as increasingly tough. The defense white paper for 2015 examines a range of global threats.

Nepal’s political parties on 27 July 2015 agreed to remove the word “secularism” from the yet-to-be framed Constitution. They agreed to this during a discussion on peoples’ view vis-à-vis the new constitution in the Constituent Assembly.

Skill development and entrepreneurship efforts across the country have been highly fragmented so far. As opposed to developed countries, where the percentage of skilled workforce is between 60 percent and 90 percent of the total workforce, India records a low 5 percent of workforce (20-24 years) with formal vocational skills.

The United Nations on 6 July 2015 released the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Report 2015. It is an annual assessment of global and regional progress towards the eight MDGs produced by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

The World Bank on 1 July 2015 released the annual revised classification of the world’s economies based on estimates of gross national income (GNI) per capita for 2014. The GNI calculations are based on World Bank Atlas method.

The United Nations General Assembly as early as 1946 called for the total elimination of nuclear weapons. In 1996 it recommended that an annual Nuclear Weapons Convention should be organized to achieve global disarmament.

Scientists are now analysing seismic data in an effort to understand the strongest earthquake to hit Nepal in more than 80 years, which has left more than 3,000 people dead.The Earth's crust is made of large tectonic plates. These land masses, which sometimes include whole continents, are constantly moving and bumping into each other.

Saudi Arabia waged early Thursday “Operation Decisive Storm” against the Houthi coup in Yemen and in support of legitimate President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.A Saudi air campaign was launched overnight which has already resulted in the elimination of several Houthi leaders.

India Financial Code will be introduced inParliament soon, Finance Minister ArunJaitley said today. As suggested by the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission (FSLRC), IFC lays out clear objectives for financial regulations.