Day by Day Current Affairs (August 22, 2018) | MCQs for CSS, PMS, NTS

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August 22, 2018

1. Govt releases Rs30.3b under PSDP

• The government has released over Rs 30.3 billion under its Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) 2018-19 for various ongoing and new schemes against the total allocations of Rs 1,030 billion.
• The released funds include Rs 18.76 billion for federal ministries and Rs 11.8 billion for special areas besides other projects, according to the data released by the Ministry of Planning, Development and Reforms.
• Out of these allocations, the government has released Rs 4.67 billion for Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission for which Rs 30.4 billion have been allocated for the year 2018-19, whereas for Maritime Affairs Division, an amount of Rs 334 million has been released out of total allocation of Rs 10.1 billion.
• Similarly, Rs 200 million have been released for Cabinet Division for which the government has earmarked Rs 1.1 billion, whereas for Aviation division, an amount of Rs 210 million was released under PSDP 2018-19.
• Higher Education Commission (HEC) received Rs 4.632 billion out of total allocation of Rs 46.67 billion while Interior Division obtained Rs 2.57 billion out of total allocation of Rs 24.2 billion for the year 2018-19. The government also released Rs 3.38 billion for Railways division, Rs 821 million for Planning Division, Rs 541 million for National Health Services, Regulations & Coordination division, and Rs 60 million for Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority.
• The government also released Rs 4.7 billion for AJK (block and other projects) out of its allocations of Rs 29.8 billion for the FY 2018-19 whereas for Gilgit Baltistan (block and other projects), an amount of Rs 7.07 billion out of total allocation of Rs 21.33 billion for the year 2018-19.

2. Table of Contents

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   Iran unveils first domestic fighter jet

• Iran unveiled its first domestic fighter jet on August 21, 2018, with President Hassan Rouhani insisting that Tehran`s military strength was only designed to deter enemies and create `lasting peace`.
• Images on state television showed Rouhani sitting in the cockpit of the new `Kowsar` fourthgeneration fighter at the National Defence Industry exhibition in Tehran.
• State media said it had `advanced avionics` and multi-purpose radar, and that it was `100-percent indigenously made` forthe first time.
• Footage of the Kowsar`s test flights was circulated by various official media.
• But live footage of the plane taxiing along a runway at the defence show was cut before it could take off. `When I speak of our readiness to defend, it means we seek lasting peace. If we lack readiness, we welcome war,` Rouhani said in a televised speech shortly after.

3. No indication N Korea nuclear activities stopped: IAEA

• The UN’s nuclear watchdog said it had not seen any indication that nuclear activities in North Korea have stopped despite its pledges to denuclearise.
• “The continuation and further development of the DPRK’s nuclear programme and related statements by the DPRK are a cause for grave concern,” said a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), referring to North Korea’s official name. The report, by director general Yukiya Amano is to be submitted to an IAEA board meeting in September.
• In 2009 Pyongyang expelled IAEA inspectors from its Yongbyon nuclear site and has since refused to allow IAEA inspections on its territory.
• The watchdog has stepped up monitoring through open source information and satellite imagery, it said.
• “As the Agency remains unable to carry out verification activities in the DPRK, its knowledge of the DPRK’s nuclear programme is limited and, as further nuclear activities take place in the country, this knowledge is declining,” it said.
• Between late-April and early-May, there were indications of the operation of the steam plant that serves the radiochemical laboratory at the Yongbyon site, according to the report. However, the steam plant was not operative long enough to have supported the reprocessing of a complete core from the experimental nuclear power plant reactor, it added.
• The report added steam charges and the outflow of cooling water at the Yongbyon experimental

4. China launches first financial court in Shanghai

• China’s first court specializing in handling finance-related cases has opened in the country’s financial hub of Shanghai.
• The Shanghai Financial Court will be responsible for commercial cases such as disputes involving securities, futures, insurance, bills and financial lending, according to a document by the Supreme People’s Court earlier this month.
• It will also deal with bankruptcy cases where financial institutions are the debtors and administrative cases with financial regulators as defendants.
• The court will work to ensure that finance serves the real economy, curb financial risks and deepen financial reform, according to an official release from the Shanghai Financial Court

5. Malaysia to shelve China-backed projects worth $22bn

• Malaysia will shelve three China-backed projects worth a total $22 billion until the debt-laden Southeast Asian nation can afford to pay for them, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on August 21, 2018 during a visit to Beijing.
• The projects include a railway connecting Malaysia`s east coast to southern Thailand and Kuala Lumpur, and two gas pipelines.
• Mahathir is trying to reduce Malaysia`s national debt, which has ballooned to some $250bn.

6. World’s biggest plane inches closer to takeoff

• The world’s largest plane, Stratolaunch, could be just months away from its first flight.
• The aircraft – which is the vision of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen – has a wingspan longer than a football field and comes equipped with two cockpits, 28 wheels and six engines normally used to power 747 jumbo jets.
• Eventually will be used to transport rockets carrying satellites and even a newly revealed manned space plane into the Earth’s upper atmosphere, where they will blast off into space.

7. US Army begins testing bulletproof ‘spidersuits’

• The US Army has begun testing radical new ‘spider suit’ bulletproof armour.
• Made from a substance called dragon silk, the flexible, fabric like panels will be tested for ‘critical soldier protective applications including ballistic impact’.
• The firm behind the product claims it is one of the strongest materials known to man, and has used genetically engineered silkworms to produce it.
• Kraig Biocraft Laboratories revealed it has already delivered the first prototype panels to Us Army bosses.
• The GM silkworms were developed to be a direct drop-in replacement into the traditional silk production infrastructure which produces more than 150,000 metric tons of silk per year.

8. Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles

• In the darkest and coldest parts of its polar regions, a team of scientists has directly observed definitive evidence of water ice on the Moon’s surface. These ice deposits are patchily distributed and could possibly be ancient. At the southern pole, most of the ice is concentrated at lunar craters, while the northern pole’s ice is more widely, but sparsely spread.
• A team of scientists, led by Shuai Li of the University of Hawaii and Brown University and including Richard Elphic from Nasa’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, used data from Nasa’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) instrument to identify three specific signatures that definitively prove there is water ice at the surface of the Moon.
• M3, aboard the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, launched in 2008 by the Indian Space Research Organization, was uniquely equipped to confirm the presence of solid ice on the Moon. It collected data that not only picked up the reflective properties we’d expect from ice, but was able to directly measure the distinctive way its molecules absorb infrared light, so it can differentiate between liquid water or vapor and solid ice.
• Most of the newfound water ice lies in the shadows of craters near the poles, where the warmest temperatures never reach above minus 250 degrees Fahrenheit. Because of the very small tilt of the Moon’s rotation axis, sunlight never reaches these regions.
• Previous observations indirectly found possible signs of surface ice at the lunar south pole, but these could have been explained by other phenomena, such as unusually reflective lunar soil.

9. Life on earth formed 100m years earlier than previously thought

• British scientists have claimed that the first life on Earth evolved after a small planet called Theia collided with Earth.
• It ‘sterilised’ our planet and then went on to form the moon when it rebounded.
• A side-effect of this galactic collision was the first life on Earth, and scientists have now discovered that it happened 100 million years earlier than previously thought.
• Researchers worked back through the evolutionary history of current animals to find the ‘Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA).
• They found that this animal is the ancestor of every living thing on Earth and likely existed around 3.9 billion years ago, when the Earth was still in its primitive stages.
• PhD candidate in palaeontology Holly Betts at the University of Bristol explains more about the research in an article for The Conversation.
• Science may have enabled us to travel in space and trace the history of the entire universe, but it has not yet been able to answer exactly how and when life first arose on our planet.

10. Pakistan win in kabaddi, handball as Talha sets national record in Asian Games

• Indonesia were Pakistan`s favourite rivals at the Asian Games on August 21, 2018 as both kabaddi and handball teams recorded victories against them while teenaged weightlifter Talha Talib set a national record.
• The kabaddi team thrashed the hosts 40-11 in their Group `B` clash to rebound from a defeat to Iran the other day and keep themselves in contention for a top-two finish in the section and a potential medal.
• The handball team finally recorded their first triumph on the fourth attempt, beating the hosts 28-23 in their 9-13 classification group match.
• Talha`s performance was the individual highlight of the day for Pakist an when he lifted a national record 287kg in the men`s 62kg competition.
• Lifting 133kg in snatch and 154kg in clean and jerk, the 18-year-old finished seventh in the event won byIndonesia`s Eko Yuli Irawan, who lifted 311kg.
• Mohammad Yahya Khan won his men`s 50m freestyle heat in 25.50 but ended 42nd among 51 competitors, failing to qualify for the final.a