Current Affairs For SSC CGL Exam - 14 February, 2014

Current Affairs For SSC CGL Exam

Belgium has recently passed a law allowing euthanasia for children. The Low Countries allow for suicide and doctor-assisted suicide, but Brussels is the first to open to door to dealing death to children of any age.
The law has “safeguards” to ensure all the killing will be purely voluntary if the prospect of youngsters being helped to off themselves seems horrifying. A psychologist has to certify that the child has “capacity or discernment” to understand what they are doing.
Aside from its inherent significance, Belgium’s move requires us to revisit Roper v. Simmons, the 2005 Supreme Court case that ruled it inherently unconstitutional to apply the death penalty to anyone under 18.
European nations had long waged a moral campaign against America’s allowance of the death penalty for 16-18 year olds, which they called barbaric and savage. After all, minors are not really responsible for their actions. America was labelled a human rights violator, an international outlier.

The use of pepper spray inside the Lok Sabha by a member recently has prised open the issue of security within Parliament House, the country’s most closely guarded building.
MPs and senior government officers are exempt from frisking or checking. Even their bags and cars are not thoroughly checked.
Security arrangements in Parliament House were beefed up in anticipation of trouble over the introduction of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Bill, 2013, which has held up proceedings for several sessions now.
Watch-and-ward staff and security personnel were on alert and extra fire extinguishers, ambulances and blankets were kept ready in case MPs took to extreme measures. But the surprise came in the form of a pepper spray that L. Rajagopal sneaked into the House.
The incident has prompted demands from some members for screening legislators.

The Communist Party of India (Maoist) has been ranked fourth among the top ten most active non-state armed groups in 2013, according to study released this week by a major defence and business risk think-tank.
According to the IHS Jane’s latest ‘Global Terrorism and Insurgency Attack Index,’ a total of 258 attacks were claimed by, or attributed to, the CPI(Maoist), even though this represented a 29 per cent decrease from the 362 attacks recorded in 2012.
The decrease in CPI(Maoist) attacks not only came amid a wider 16 per cent decrease in attacks nationwide, but also a 19 per cent decrease in the number of recorded counter-terrorism operations.
Among other insurgent groups listed in the top ten rankings are the Taliban (second rank), al-Qaeda in Iraq (fifth), al-Shabaab (sixth), Colombia’s FARC (seventh) and Syrian Jabhat al-Nusra (ninth).

Telecom operator Vodafone and Star India has announced a tie-up through which the broadcaster's sports telecasts can be viewed on mobile phones.
Kapil Dev, who led India to their first World Cup title in 1983, wished this sort of cutting edge technology was available when he was playing.
The former captain said it was good to see age group cricket being televised as most of the modern day cricketers have emerged from these competitions.

Favorite to host IPL7 is India and South Africa now. The IPL governing council categorically said the seventh edition of the tournament would be played in South Africa if it had to be moved out of India.
Bangladesh and UAE too, were in the short-list earlier, but no longer feature in the race.