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New York: A United Nations-backed treaty that seeks to slash the 24,000 lives estimated to be lost each year during fishing operations around the world will come into force next September, over 17 years after it was adopted by the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO).

New York: The head of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today called for the urgent protection of children in Yemen who are being caught in the crossfire of the civil unrest that began earlier this year.

New York: The United Nations independent working group on arbitrary detention today voiced concern over Germany’s preventive detention system, citing the practice of depriving some people of their liberty after serving their prison terms because they are considered a “danger to society.”

New York: Georgian manuscripts from the 5th century AD, a French royal decree from 1537, and a 20th-century astronomical study of the nearby parts of the universe are among seven new entries to a United Nations world heritage register.

New Delhi: The Afghan President Hamid Karzai today said that South Asian region should be free from terrorism in the interests of its progress and prosperity.

New Delhi: Russia has said that it would institutionalise measures to avoid delays in export clearances for vital repair equipment for already contracted weapons systems. The inordinate delay has been hampering supplies of Defence equipment and spares to India.

Implementation of comprehensive and bold policy action will help restore Europe’s recovery, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said today in its latest Regional Economic Outlook (REO) for Europe: Navigating Stormy Waters. Growth in Europe has slowed significantly, as a result of global shocks, and of the escalation of the euro area sovereign debt crisis, which has shaken confidence and curbed domestic demand.

Will there be a mid-term poll soon? If so what would be the results? These questions are being asked in the political circles stressing the uncertainty of the UPA-2 lasting its full term until 2014. The increasing number of scams, growing governance deficit, eroding authority of the Prime Minister and the dented image of the Congress party have added to the speculation.

BHOPAL: The Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan is quite adept in the art of launching populist programmes. Already, two very popular, women-centric programmes are running quite successfully in the State. They are ‘Ladli Laxmi’ and ‘Kanyadaan’. Under ‘Ladli Laxmi’ programme, all girl children are assured of receiving a sum of Rs. one lakh on attaining the age of 21 years. Under the ‘kanyadaan’ scheme, government extends help to the poor families for the marriage of their daughters. In this series, the Chief Minister is launching ‘Beti bachao abhiyan’ (Save girl child campaign) from October 5.

Food grains stock in the country with the Government procurement agencies as on July 1, 2011 was 640.06 lakh tonnes comprising 268.57 lakh tonnes of rice and 371.49 tonnes of wheat, according to figures just released by the union government. This is huge stock considering the fact that the minimum buffer stock requirement is 160 lakh tonnes. It is an irony that food inflation is rising when the country is saddled with such large stocks of food grains.