International and Bilateral Issues:

India and Pakistan on Sunday exchanged their lists of nuclear installations and facilities, a practice being followed for the last two decades under a pact prohibiting attack on each other's nuclear assets.
The “Agreement on the Prohibition of Attack against Nuclear Installations between India and Pakistan,” was signed on December 31, 1988 and it came into force on January 27, 1991.
It provides that the two countries inform each other of the installations and facilities to be covered under the agreement on January 1 every year.
- Meanwhile, Pakistan has also joined the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on a two-year term as a non-permanent member.

U.S. President Barack Obama has signed into law a massive $662-billion defence spending bill that also seeks to suspend a big chunk of $1.1 billion military aid to Pakistan, despite his “serious reservations” about provisions regulating detention and prosecution of suspected terrorists.
It seeks to suspend 60 per cent of $1.1 billion military aid to Pakistan — under the category Pakistan Counter-insurgency Fund — till Secretaries of State and Defence report to the Congress that Islamabad is making progress in the war on terror, particularly progress in strategies to counter manufacturing of improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
IEDs, which are mostly manufactured in Pakistan in its illicit factories, are one of the largest factors responsible for the death of American troops in Afghanistan.

The sanctions require foreign firms (including Foreign central banks) to make a choice between doing business with Tehran's oil and financial sectors or central bank or the mighty U.S. economy and financial sector.
- Thus has sparked fears of damage to U.S. ties with nations like Russia and China which trade with Iran.
The move raised concerns that sanctions on Iran's bank could spark chaos in global financial system and hike oil price.