Daily Top-10 Current Affairs MCQs / News (March 27, 2022) for CSS, PMS

Table of Contents

6. Taliban `block unaccompanied women from flights`

• Afghanistan`s Taliban rulers refused to allow dozens of women to board several flights, including some overseas, because they were traveling without a male guardian, two Afghan airline officials said on Saturday, whereas dozens of girls demonstrated in the Afghan capital demanding the right to go to school.
• The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of repercussions from the Taliban, said dozens of women who arrived at Kabul`s international airport Friday to board domestic and international flights were told they couldn`t do so without a male guardian.
• Some of the women were dual nationals returning to their homes overseas, including some from Canada, according to one of the officials. Women were denied boarding on flights to Islamabad, Dubai and Turkey on Kam Air and the state-owned Ariana Airline, said the officials.
• The order came from the Taliban leadership, said one official

7. Nuclear deal with Iran `very close`, says EU

• Top European Union diplomat Josep Borrell has said Iran and world powers are `very close` to agreement on reviving their 2015 nuclear deal, which would curb Tehran`s nuclear programme in exchange for lifting tough sanctions.
• Then-US President Donald Trump abandoned the pact in 2018, prompting Tehran to start violating its nuclear limits about a year later, and 11 months of on-and-off talks to revive it paused in Vienna earlier this month after Russia presented a new obstacle.
• Russia later said it had received written guarantees that it would be able to carry out its work as a party to the deal, suggesting Moscow could allow it to be resuscitated

8. Russia signals less ambitious goals in Ukraine war

• Russia has signalled it may dial back its war aims to focus on eastern Ukraine after failing to break the nation`s resistance in a month of fighting and attacks on civilians, including up to 300 feared killed in the bombing of a theatre. Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered the February invasion to destroy Ukraine`s military and topple pro-Western President Volodymyr Zelensky, bringing the country under Russia`s sway.
• But Sergei Rudskoi, a senior general, suggested a considerably reduced `main goal` of controlling Donbas, an eastern region already partly held by Russian proxies.
• His surprise statement came as a Western official reported that a seventh Russian general, Lieutenant General Yakov Rezanstev, had died in Ukraine and that a colonel had been `deliberately` killed by his own demoralised men

9. Saudi Arabia `foils oil tanker attack` after rebels disrupt F1

• Saudi forces destroyed explosives laden boats and launched air strikes in Yemen on Saturday after Houthi rebel drones and missiles hit targets around the country, setting off an inferno at an oil plant within sight of Jeddah`s Formula One race.
• Three people were killed in the operation against the booby-trapped boats, according to the Saudi-led coalition, which also carried out air raids on the Yemeni cities of Sanaa and Hodeida overnight.
• It marked a violent seventh anniversary of the coalition`s military intervention in Saudi Arabia`s impoverished neighbour Yemen, after the Iran-backed Houthis had seized the capital Sanaa in 2014

10. Russia accuses Azerbaijan of violating ceasefire deal in Karabakh

• Moscow on March 26, 2022 accused Azerbaijan of violating a ceasefire agreement by entering the Russian peace keeping mission`s zone in the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh and using drones to strike Karabakh troops.
• `Violating the provisions of a trilateral statement of the leaders of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia from November 9, 2020, Azerbaijan`s armed forces between March 24 and March 25 entered the zone of responsibility of the Russian peacekeeping contingent in Nagorno-Karabakh and set up an observation post,` the Russian defence ministry said in a statement.
• The statement added that Turkish-made drones were used to strike Karabakh troops near the village of Farukh also known as Parukh