Daily Top-10 Current Affairs MCQs/News (Apr 14 2023) for CSS

Table of Contents

6. Zero-markup loans for e-bikes, rickshaws

• Under criticism over a proposed fuel subsidy scheme ahead of elections, the government on April 13, 2023 approved a subsidised electric bike and rickshaw scheme through Prime Minister`s Youth Programme at an initial estimated cost of about Rs7.5 billion.
• The decision was taken at a meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet that also approved about Rs15bn loan guarantee to Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and the sale of over 20,000 tonnes of sugar at a controlled rate of Rs95 per kg in Punjab as retail prices jumped following export permission.
• The meeting presided over by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar also allowed the declaration of Customs Station Angoor Adda as an authorised export land route to Afghanistan and through Afghanistan to central Asian republics

7. IMF chief urges world to avoid a `second Cold War`

• Countries must do more to avert the costly consequences of growing global trade fragmentation, and help avert a `second Cold War,` the International Monetary Fund`s (IMF) managing director said on April 13, 2023.
• `I am among those who know what are the consequences of a Cold War: it is loss of talent and contribution to the world,` Kristalina Georgieva said during a press conference at the official start of the World Bank and IMF`s spring meetings.
• `I don`t want to see that repeating, she said, adding that the world should `rationally accept there will be some cost, there will be some fragmentation, but keep these costs low.` Georgieva was born and raised in Bulgaria, a former Soviet satellite state

8. Qatar and Bahrain re-establish relations

• Qatar and Bahrain announced late on April 13, 2023 that they had agreed to end a long-running diplomatic feud and re-establish relations.
• Bahrain in 2017 joined Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt in imposing a diplomatic blockade on Qatar. The countries’ rivalry goes back even further, however, and Bahrain is the last to renew ties.
• Agreement on the reconciliation was reached in talks at the Gulf Cooperation Council headquarters in Saudi Arabia, Qatar’s foreign ministry said

9. US airman arrested over classified leaks

• FBI agents on April 13, 2023 arrested a young national guardsman suspected of being behind a major leak of sensitive US government secrets including about the Ukraine war.
• US Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the arrest made `in connection with an investigation into alleged unauthorised removal, retention and transmission of classified national defense information`.
• Addressing a news briefing, Garland named the suspect as Jack Teixeira previously identified by US media as a 21-year-old airman, and the apparent leader of an online chat room where the document trove first emerged

10. Arab nations meet today to end Syria`s isolation

• Saudi Arabia was preparing on April 13, 2023 to host an Arab regional meeting on ending Syria`s isolation at a time of dizzying diplomatic shifts following its deal to resume relations with rival Iran.
• Friday`s nine-nation talks in Jeddah, the Red Sea gateway to Makkah, come after Syria`s foreign minister arrived on a previously unannounced visit the first since the outbreak of the country`s civil war in 2011.
• It was one in a flurry of events that were nearly unthinkable before Saudi Arabia and Iran`s landmark, Chinese-brokered announce-ment on March 10 that they would resume ties, seven years after an acrimonious split