Current Affairs 24th and 25th February 2019 | Daily GK Update

i. World Bank, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), and Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) launched new social impact bonds exclusively for women, called Women’s Livelihood Bonds (WLBs), with an initial corpus of Rs 300 crore.
ii. It will enable individual women entrepreneurs in sectors like food processing, agriculture, services, and small units to borrow around Rs 50,000 to Rs 3 lakh at an annual interest rate of around 13% to 14% or less and have a tenure of 5 years. They will be unsecured, unlisted bonds and offer a fixed coupon rate of 3% per annum to bond investors.

Static/Current Takeaways Important for NIACL AO Mains Exam:

• World Bank Interim President: Kristalina Georgieva, Headquarters: Washington D. C.
• SIDBI Chairman & Managing Director: Mohammad Mustafa Headquarters: Lucknow.
• UN Women Executive Director: Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Headquarters: New York.

i. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has been invited to deliver an address at the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Abu Dhabi. This is the first time that a leader of the non-Muslim country has been invited to the OIC conference.
ii. Mrs Swaraj will be the Guest of Honour and address the inaugural plenary of the 46th Session of the Council of Foreign Ministers of OIC on the 1st and 2nd of March.

Static/Current Takeaways Important For NIACL AO Mains Exam:

• Abu Dhabi is the capital city of the UAE.

i. US President Donald Trump signed Space Policy Directive-4 (SPD-4), ordering the Pentagon to establish the Space Force as the 6th branch of the United States military, to go along with the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard, in order to secure and extend American dominance of the space domain.
ii. Donald Trump signs SPD-4 to create US Space Force SPD-4, as the name suggests, is Mr. Trump’s 4th space policy directive. The initial 3 were:
SPD-1– Directed NASA to get humans back to the Moon as a stepping-stone to Mars.
SPD-2– Streamlined regulations for the commercial space sector.
SPD-3– Dealt with space traffic management.

i. Thailand and the United States hosted the annual Cobra Gold military exercise, the biggest activity of its type in the Asia-Pacific region with 29 nations taking part as participants or observers. Apart from the 2 countries, 7 countries who participated in the exercise were India, Singapore, Japan, China, Indonesia, Malaysia and South Korea.
ii. The Indian Army participated in the military training exercise with a 14-member contingent. India participated in this exercise for the first time in the ‘Observer Plus’ category in 2016 alongside China.

         

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