Daily News Notes: 14th Feb, 2012

· Inaugurating the 44th Indian Labour Conference in New Delhi Dr. Manmohan Singh said that the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana now covers more than 2 and a half crore Below Poverty Line families in the unorganized sector. The scheme has been extended to cover construction workers, street vendors, Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme beneficiaries, Beedi workers and domestic workers. The Prime Minister said that MGNREGA has checked distress migration substantially from villages and brought about an improvement in the wages of rural workers. The Prime Minister said there is a need to provide opportunities to a large number of youth. This can happen only if we equip our young people with skills that are required to meet the demands of our rapidly growing economy. Recognizing this problem, the govt. has launched the skill development mission which seeks to bring about the massive increase in the number of formally trained workers through Public Private Partnership. Reiterating his government's commitment to strengthening labour laws and ensuring their compliance for securing the welfare of the working class, Dr. Singh said, the Factories Act 1948 is being amended to include concerns arising out of disasters such as the Bhopal gas tragedy, and those relating to industrial disaster mitigation, rehabilitation and compensation for industrial workers and other affected persons.
· Government will develop aircraft probing facilities to forecast tropical cyclones in the 12th five year plan. This facility will help the forecasting agencies especially in the coastal areas of the country to predict tropical cyclones and to prevent loss of lives from the devastating impact of cyclones.
· Headline inflation, as measured by the Wholesale Price Index, dipped to a 25-month low of 6.55 per cent in January.
· India has said that the investigations are on into the explosion outside the Israeli embassy in Delhi and perpetrators of this suspected terror attack will be brought to justice. It added that the diplomats of every country are entitled to live and work here in peace and security and any attempt to attack any diplomat or member of the diplomat’s family is condemnable. (1 Israeli and 3 Indians injured). Investigators say a sophisticated incendiary device was used in the blast, a first for a terror attack in India.
· As India and Israel commemorate the 20th anniversary of establishment of full diplomatic relations, India and Israel signed a Joint Declaration aimed at bringing about long-lasting cooperation and exchange between the two countries in the field of water technology. Under the Joint Declaration, an India-Israel Working Group will be created with the objective of long-term planning, development, improvement and sharing of technology and other matters related to water, waste water and sewage management. The visit of Indian Minister of Urban Development to Israel is aimed at enhancing cooperation between the two countries in the Urban Development sector such as housing, urban planning, water supply, sewage management, water treatment, etc., through sharing of technology, experiences, and best practices.
· The Arab League proposal to send in Joint UN-Arab peacekeepers in Syria to end the bloodshed in the country has drawn a guarded international response. The opinion among the five members of UN Security Council is divided. Among the Arab nations. Algeria and Lebanon opposed the resolution in the Arab League meeting while the rest supported the move. Experts say the idea of a Joint UN-Arab peacekeeper’s mission in Syria is a complex and long process and the response has not been forthcoming while Russia made it clear Moscow won’t support the peacekeeping plan unless the government forces and their armed opponents halt the violence. France said that any external military intervention would only worsen the situation and UK said that any peacekeeping troops should come from non-Western countries.
· The United States has been exploring a resumption of six-nation de-nuclearisation talks with North Korea in China, resuming a dialogue put on hold last year by the death of leader Kim Jong-II. It has insisted that Pyongyang respect a 2005 agreement at the talks to give up its atomic weapons.