International and Bilateral Issues:

With 40 per cent of the world's natural disasters occurring in the Asia Pacific region, increasingly countries are putting employment and livelihood concerns at the heart of policies.
Even in conflict areas like Afghanistan, the government is concerned about the large numbers of educated youth and the need to gainfully employ them.
There have been initiatives in Iraq and Lebanon to provide employment but Afghanistan is perhaps the worst-off. The Afghan government has very little idea about the labour market
Based on the 2007-08 National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (NRVA), there is 7.9 per cent unemployment and 47 per cent under-employment in Afghanistan.
The challenge is huge considering the likelihood of some 600,000 graduates coming out of colleges by 2014 and an estimated 3.7 million returnees from neighbouring countries.
The international community should focus on developing decent work in Afghanistan where just under 70 per cent of the population is below 24 years of age
Most jobs are generated through micro and small enterprises and these are the ones which need more attention as also the extraction industry, which could create employment. But the issue is how much of these jobs will go to local people.
jobs did not follow the peace process but contribute to the stability of the situation. If people had jobs, they would be less likely to work for the Taliban for $10 a day, which is the norm.
The ILO wants to put jobs as the central pillar to stability in Afghanistan.

India and the U.S. will review the state of their economic and strategic cooperation next week with discussions expected to touch on the nuclear liability law and facilitating greater American investment in the infrastructure sector
Washington will seek greater clarity on regulations for the nuclear liability Bill notified on the eve of the Obama-Manmohan meeting in Indonesia last month.
U.S. companies, promised contracts for 10,000 MWe of nuclear energy, have felt stymied by the Indian liability law that holds suppliers culpable in the event of a nuclear accident. French and Russian-origin companies, which have also been asked to set up civil nuclear plants in India, have a similar grievance and are also eager to seek clarity on the guidelines of the Bill.
Russia's two reactors at Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu do not come within the ambit of the law.
Russia says no new condition can be inserted for plants III & IV because all other terms are the same as that for Kudankulam I & II civil nuclear plants.
The government has met a long standing demand of the European and American companies by proposing FDI in multi-brand retail, but protests in Parliament forced it to shelve the plan for the time being. India is also keen on allowing FDI in aviation and pension funds.

Liberia's President, a fellow Liberian and a Yemeni activist received the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo on Saturday for showing how women facing war and oppression can shed the mantle of victimhood and lead the way to peace and democracy.
“You represent one of the most important motive forces for change in today's world: the struggle for human rights in general and the struggle of women for equality and peace in particular,” said Norwegian Nobel Committee
Yemeni human rights activist Tawakul Karman, Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee and Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf at Nobel Peace Prize awarding ceremony in Oslo
Ms. Sirleaf, Africa's first democratically elected woman President who last month won a second term, also hailed the Nobel Committee's focus on women's struggle after the world, in recent decades, witnessed “unprecedented levels of cruelty directed against women” in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and her own Liberia.
At a separate ceremony in Stockholm, the winners of the Nobel Prizes for Medicine, Physics, Chemistry, Literature and Economics were set to receive their prizes later on Saturday.

The Pakistani Taliban is in peace talks with the Pakistani government, a senior commander in the militant group said
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said his government followed a policy of “dialogue, deterrence and development” to tackle militancy.
Pakistani officials have earlier stated however that they do not talk to militants unless they lay down their arms.
U.S. forces and their NATO and Afghan allies regularly come under attack from Afghan militants and al-Qaeda operatives, who live alongside Pakistani Taliban militants in the border region.
Previous peace deals there did not last long, and gave militants time to regroup.
Despite the Taliban's violence, there is political and public support for a peace deal with the group.

China on Saturday began deploying a more-than-200-strong police force to patrol the Mekong river as part of a new joint initiative with Thailand, Myanmar and Laos to boost regional security following recent attacks on ships.
The Mekong river, which has its source in China and flows through the three other countries as well as Cambodia and Vietnam, is a transport artery in the region.
Shipping has suffered following the October attack, which underscored persisting security fears amid a rise in regional smuggling networks and the drug trade.

Yemen's national unity government, led by the opposition, was sworn in Saturday to lead a three-month transition period until early elections are held and President Ali Abdullah Saleh formally steps down
Vice-President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi will take over the presidency for a two-year period as stipulated by a Gulf-sponsored deal.

Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and GAIL (India) are looking closely to pick up equity in LNG projects in the African region to meet India's future energy needs in a big way
Inaugurating the third Africa Hydrocarbon Conference here, Mr. Reddy said India's oil companies were looking at farm-in opportunities in producing blocks, especially those in Libya, Algeria, Egypt and Nigeria.
Africa supplies 35.31 million tonnes, or 21.5 per cent, of India's crude oil requirement.