Daily Top-10 Current Affairs MCQs/News (Apr 21 2023) for CSS

Table of Contents

6. Macron, Biden to `engage` China on Ukraine

• French President Emmanuel Macron and his counterpart Joe Biden `agreed on the importance of continuing to engage` China in helping to end the war in Ukraine, the French presidency said on April 20, 2023 after talks by phone between the leaders.
• In a statement, Macron`s office said the president had briefed Biden about `the results obtained` during his visit in the first week of this month to Beijing where the French leader spent several hours in talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
• The French statement added: `China has a role to play in contributing, in the medium term, in ending the conflict in accordance with the principles and aims of the United Nations charter

7. Five Indian soldiers shot dead in held Kashmir

• Unidentified men on April 20, 2023 opened fire at an Indian army vehicle in held Kashmir, killing at least five soldiers, the army said.
• Grenades were also likely thrown at the vehicle in the Rajouri sector of the region, causing it to catch fire, the army said.
• One soldier was severely wounded.
• `Operations are in progress to locate the perpetrators,` the army said in a statement

8. UN seeks truce for Eid, peace talks in Sudan

• The United Nations reiterated its appeal for an immediate end to the military power struggle in Sudan, as Secretary General António Guterres and leaders from the African Union, the Arab League, and the East African bloc IGAD held a virtual meeting on the crisis on Thursday.
• Soon after the talks, Mr Guterres held a news briefing at the UN headquarters in New York, and urge d Sudanese generals to put aside their differences, at least for Eidul Fitr

9. Russia releases first feature film shot in space

• The first feature film shot in space premiered in Russian cinemas on April 20, 2023, as Moscow delighted in beating a rival Hollywood project amid a confrontation with the West over Ukraine.
• The Challenge is about a surgeon dispatched to the International Space Station (ISS) to save an injured cosmonaut.
• Russia sent an actress and a film director for a 12-day stint on the ISS in October 2021 to film scenes aboard the orbiting laboratory.
• The Russian crew beat a Hollywood project announced in 2020 by `Mission Impossible` star Tom Cruise together with Nasa and Elon Musk`s SpaceX

10. Most powerful rocket Starship explodes during first flight

• Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built, exploded during its first flight on April 20, 2023, but Elon Musk congratulated his SpaceX team on an `exciting` test of the spacecraft designed to send astronauts to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
• The uncrewed rocket disintegrated four minutes after successfully blasting off at 8:33am Central Time (1333 GMT) from Starbase, the SpaceX spaceport in Boca Chica, Texas.
• The Starship spacecraft that will eventually carry crew and cargo had been scheduled to separate from the first-stage rocket booster three minutes into the flight, but separation failed to occur and the rocket blew up in a ball of fire over the Gulf of Mexico.
• Despite the failure to complete the full 90-minute flight test and reach orbit, SpaceX and Musk, the founder and CEO of the private space company, declared it a success