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New York: The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has found that among 12 European Union (EU) nations, there are inconsistencies in the way asylum applications are assessed.

After the sharpest decline in more than 70 years, world trade is set to rebound in 2010 by growing at 9.5%, according to WTO economists. “WTO rules and principles have assisted governments in keeping markets open and they now provide a platform from which trade can grow as the global economy improves. We see the light at the end of the tunnel and trade promises to be an important part of the recovery. But we must avoid derailing any economic revival through protectionism,” said Director-General Pascal Lamy.

Deputy Director-General Rufus Yerxa, in a speech to the United Kingdom Public Interest Environmental Law Conference in London on 26 March 2010, said that more open trade can have beneficial impacts on the environment, including “improved access to, and development of, the new technologies and services that are needed to reduce pollution or energy use.'

MANILA, PHILIPPINES - The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is extending loans totaling $266 million to help Bangladesh address natural gas supply constraints in a bid to spur economic growth and cut poverty.

Kapil Sibal, who as a Union Minister for Science and Technology & Earth Science during the UPA-1, brought science and technology on the fore as an instrument of change for human strides in all walks of life and as a harbinger of growth and prosperity of India, seems to be messing up as the Union Minister for Human Resource Development during the UPA-11.

New Delhi: Majority of media persons accredited to Parliament of India for reporting the proceedings of both the Houses are bogus with their doubtful professional credentials. Most of the journalists so accredited are fake ones representing innocuous news bodies. They are, in fact, agents of multi national corporations (MNCs) and large industrial houses, wheeling, dealing, lobbying, liasoning and pimping on their behalf through their unhindered access and proximity to the movers and shakers in the Government of the day. In all, they are any thing but genuine journalists!

India enters the new fiscal year (2010-11) amid high inflation, an uncertain outlook for the targeted growth (8.5 per cent), as it depends largely on a normal monsoon with a rebound in agriculture, and a patchy record in social and economic development in the first three years of the 11th five-year plan. Striking improvements in infrastructure are yet to be sighted while risks remain for global economy from instability in the financial system and weak post-recession recovery in highly-indebted advanced economies, to make external environment less promising.

Never mind the disturbing UN report crediting India as home To world's largest number of poor living on less than one dollar per day, Indians are among the world's top billionaires. IIM interns bag Rs. 1-crore-plus annual pay package at in-campus job placement mela. Corporate head honchos get fat 'pity bonuses' to cover the shortfall in the performance-linked annual remuneration due to lower sales and profit growth. Senior executives are given further pay hikes to keep their morale high in the year when the government is made to spend thousands of crores as economic booster to combat recession and protect lower level jobs.

The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a successor one-year arrangement for Mexico under the Flexible Credit Line (FCL) in an amount equivalent to SDR 31.528 billion (about US$48 billion). The Mexican authorities stated they intend to treat the arrangement as precautionary and do not intend to draw on the line.

New York: Sexual violence during conflicts is all too often downplayed and treated as part of local cultural traditions instead of being viewed as a war crime, a senior United Nations official has warned as she called for much greater international action to defeat the scourge.