Latest News
EDITORIALS & ARTICLES
19th May 2021
India's stand on Palestine issue
Recently, India’s permanent representative to the United Nations has made a carefully crafted statement at the UN Security Council “open debate” on the escalating Israel-Palestine violence.
Farzad-B gas field
- The statement at UNSC strives to maintain balance between India’s historic ties with Palestine and its blossoming relations with Israel.
- The statement appears to implicitly hold Israel responsible for triggering the current cycle of violence by locating its beginnings in East Jerusalem rather than from Gaza.
- The request that both sides refrain from “attempts to unilaterally change the existing status quo including in East Jerusalem and its neighbourhoods” seems to be a message to Israel about its settler policy.
- The statement was also emphatic that the historic status quo at the holy places of Jerusalem including the Haraml al Sharif/Temple Mount must be respected.
- The site, administered by Jordan, is revered in both Islam and Judaism.
- India’s policy on the longest running conflict in the world has gone from being unequivocally pro-Palestine for the first four decades, to a tense balancing act with its three-decade-old friendly ties with Israel.
- The balancing began with India’s decision to normalise ties with Israel in 1992, which came against the backdrop of the break-up of the Soviet Union.
- In 1990, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) lost much of its clout in the Arab world by siding with Iraq and Saddam Hussein in the occupation of Kuwait.
- The opening of an Indian embassy in Tel Aviv in January 1992 marked an end to four decades of giving Israel the cold shoulder, as India’s recognition of Israel in 1950 had been minus full diplomatic ties.
- The then PM Jawaharlal Nehru’s reasoning for the decision to recognise Israel was that it was “an established fact”, and that not doing so would create rancour between two UN members.
- In 1948, India was the only non-Arab-state among 13 countries that voted against the UN partition plan of Palestine in the General Assembly that led to the creation of Israel.
- The relationship with Palestine was almost an article of faith in Indian foreign policyfor over four decades.
- At the 53rd UN session, India co-sponsored the draft resolution on the right of the Palestinians to self-determination.
- In the 1967 and 1973 wars, India lashed out at Israel as the aggressor.
- In the 1970s, India rallied behind the PLO and its leader Yasser Arafat as the sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.
- In 1975, India became the first non-Arab country to recognise the PLO as the sole representative of the Palestinian people, and invited it to open an office in Delhi.
- In 1988, when the PLO declared an independent state of Palestine with its capital in East Jerusalem, India granted recognition immediately.
- In 1992, the Indian government established a diplomatic mission in Tel Aviv, India opened a Representative Office in Gaza.
- It was later moved to Ramallah as the Palestinian movement split between the Hamas (which gained control of Gaza) and the PLO.
- In 2003, India voted in favour of the UN General Assembly resolution against Israel’s construction of a separation wall.
- It voted for Palestine to become a full member of UNESCO in 2011.
- In 2012, India co-sponsored the UN General Assembly resolution that enabled Palestine to become a “non-member” observer state at the UN without voting rights.
- India also supported the installation of the Palestinian flag on the UN premises in September 2015.
- The first indication of the new phase came with an abstention by India at the UN Human Rights Council on a resolution welcoming a report by the HRC High Commissioner.
- The report said it had evidence of alleged war crimes committed by Israeli forcesand Hamas during the 2014 airstrikes against Gaza that killed over 2000.
- The abstention was conspicuous because in 2014, India had voted for the resolution through which the UNHRC inquiry was set up.
- In 2016, India abstained again at on a UNHRC resolution against Israel but the big change was the status of the historic city that both Israel and Palestine claim.
- The de-hypenhation is actually a careful balancing act, with India shifting from one side to another as the situation demands.
- India voted in favour of a resolution in the General Assembly opposing the Trump administration’s recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.
- In 2020, India voted against Israel in three resolutions:
- One on the right of self-determination of the Palestinian people;
- Second on Israeli settlement policy; and
- Third on the human rights situation in the Golan Heights.
- The number of people working long hours is increasing and this trend puts even more people at risk of work-related disability and early death.
- It is the first global analysis of the loss of life and health associated with working long hours jointly prepared by WHO and ILO.
- Disease and Long Working Hours
-
- It estimated that in 2016, 3.98 lakh people died from stroke and 3.47 lakh from heart disease as a result of having worked at least 55 hours a week.
- It highlights that between 2000 and 2016, the number of deaths from heart diseasedue to working long hours increased by 42%, and from stroke by 19%.
- The study concludes that working 55 or more hours per week is associated with an estimated 35% higher risk of a stroke and a 17% higher risk of dying from ischemic heart disease, compared to working 35-40 hours a week.
- Impact of Long Working Hours on Gender
- It highlighted that the work-related disease burden is particularly significant in men(72% of deaths occurred among males), people living in the Western Pacific and South-East Asia regions, and middle-aged or older workers.
- Most of the deaths recorded were among people dying aged 60-79 years, who had worked for 55 hours or more per week between the ages of 45 and 74 years.
- The working long hours is now known to be responsible for about one-third of the total estimated work-related burden of disease.
- The governments can introduce, implement and enforce laws, regulations and policies that ban mandatory overtime and ensure maximum limits on working time;
- The bipartite or collective bargaining agreements between employers and workers’ associations can arrange working time to be more flexible, while at the same time agreeing on a maximum number of working hours;
- The employees could share working hours to ensure that numbers of hours worked do not climb above 55 or more per week.
- In February, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had allowed undiluted vials of the vaccine to be stored at conventional temperatures for a period of up to two weeks.
- The US and Singapore approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for use in children between the ages of 12-15 years.
- An unopened thawed vial of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine can be stored between 2-8 degrees Celsius for up to a month.
- It implies that it can be stored in a regular refrigerator once it has been taken out of the deep freeze.
- Before this, an unopened thawed vaccine vial could be kept in a regular refrigerator for a period of only up to five days.
- It increased flexibility in storing and handling of the vaccines is expected to positively impact the vaccine rollout in the EU.
- The mRNA vaccines need to be stored at much lower temperatures than some other kind of COVID-19 vaccines because RNA is much less stable than DNA.
- The second reason for the relative instability of RNA is because of its shape, which is a single strand, while DNA is expressed as a double-stranded helix.
- The mRNA vaccine called BNT162b2 was initially meant for individuals who are 16 years or older and is administered in two doses of 30 μg each.
- The vaccine is injected into the person’s upper arm and takes a few weeks after the completion of the second dose to work.
- One of the essential ingredients of this vaccine is the messenger RNA or mRNA, which carries instructions to create the SARS-CoV-2 virus’s so-called spike protein.
- Once the mRNA vaccine is injected into the body, it instructs the body’s cells to create copies of this spike protein.
- The idea is to trigger the body’s immune system response similar to if the individual had actually been infected by the virus.
- Once the vaccine is able to trigger this response, the immune system should be able to produce the antibodies necessary to fight the infection.
- The ingredients are mRNA, lipids, potassium chloride, monobasic potassium phosphate, sodium chloride, dibasic sodium phosphate dihydrate, and sucrose.
- In 2020, a three-member international arbitral tribunal had ruled an unanimous verdict that the Indian government was in breach of the guarantee of fair and equitable treatment.
- It was against the India-UK bilateral treaty and that the breach caused a loss to the British energy company.
- It awarded Cairn $1.2 billion in compensation that India was liable to pay.
- The Cairn has moved a court in the South District of New York against Air India and India has also challenged the arbitration award in Netherlands.
- India has moved an appeal in Netherlands because the arbitration award was delivered in Hague.
- Cairn has chosen New York to sue India because it has located substantial assets that it can recover the compensation from in that jurisdiction.
- Air India’s United States operations are headquartered in this district, at 570 Lexington Avenue, New York.
- Cairn also told the court it has initiated proceedings in numerous other locationsaround the world seeking recognition and enforcement of the award.
- The Cairn’s main argument is that Air India is the “alter ego” of India, and that it should be held jointly and severally responsible for India’s debts.
- The Cairn cited a 1983 US Supreme Court verdict to argue that a principal-agent relationship exists between them.
- The court will have to determine:
- The level of economic control of Air India by the government;
- Whether Air India’s profits go to the government; and
- The degree to which government officials manage the entity or otherwise have a hand in its daily affairs, among others.
- The arbitration was initiated by Cairn, similar to what Vodafone did for a breach relating to India’s 2012 retrospective amendments to tax laws.
- In 2006, Cairn Energy made a bid to consolidate its Indian assets under a holding company called Cairn India Limited.
- Cairn UK transferred shares of Cairn India Holdings to Cairn India, essentially transferring shares in non-Indian companies to an Indian holding company.
- The tax authorities in India said in the 2006 transactions, the share transfers attracted capital gains tax of over Rs 6,000 crore by Cairn UK.
- In 2012, following the Supreme Court ruling that a similar series of transactions involving Vodafone did not attract capital gains as the transaction did not amount to transfer of a capital asset within the meaning of Section 2(14) of the Income Tax Act, the government amended the law retrospectively.
- It is a combination of “retrospective” and “tax” where “retrospective” means taking effect from a date in the past and “tax” refers to a new or additional levy of tax on a specified transaction.
- It effectively allows a country to pass a rule on taxing certain products, items or services, and deals, and charge companies from a time before the date on which the law is passed.
- The retrospective tax is not so easily welcomed by taxpayers as it creates an additional levy on the transaction which is already concluded when the provisions of law were different.
- It was established in 1899 to facilitate arbitration and other forms of dispute resolution between states.
- It is an intergovernmental organization dedicated to serving the international community in the field of dispute resolution.
- The PCA has a three-part organizational structure consisting of:
- Administrative Council that oversees its policies and budgets,
- Panel of independent potential arbitrators known as the Members of the Court, and
- Secretariat, known as the International Bureau, headed by the Secretary-General.
- It is a genre of art in which the artist depicts prehistoric life based on scientific evidence.
- It began in 1800s, with the discovery of the first fossils from the Mesozoic era.
- The Paleoart is continuously adjusting to new evidence, as one small discovery can completely distort the dinosaurs we have imagined for so long.
- While paleoart is typically defined as being scientifically informed, it is often the basis of depictions of prehistoric animals in popular culture, which in turn influences public perception of and fuels interest in these animals.
- The term "paleoart" which is a portmanteau of paleo, the Ancient Greek word for "old," and "art" was introduced in the late 1980s by Mark Hallett for art that depicts subjects related to paleontology.
- The new concept, Protein– Antibody Conjugates or PACs, combines two different approaches to drug delivery:
- One is biologics, where the idea is to target a defective protein in the system by delivering proteins to it.
- The other approach is to use antibodies for drug delivery.
- The antibodies are something the body produces to detect a foreign substance inside the body.
- The Protein–antibody conjugates or PACs, developed by the group, which have a protein attached to the antibody such as pancreatic cancer cells.
- The antibody plays the role of the address and indicates the cell where the drug should precisely be delivered.
- The biology involves complexity and this method may well fail if it is not tuneable.
- It combines concepts of biologics and antibody–drug conjugates to produce protein– antibody conjugates that can be used for targeted drug delivery.
- Antibody conjugation, also known as antibody labeling, is a technique for modification of antibodies which involves with the attachment of a specific tag to an antibody.
- These labeled antibodies can be used to isolate and purify a protein of interest from a complex mixture, usually cells, tissues or whole organisms.
- Horseradish peroxidase (HRP) is a commonly used enzyme for conjugation of antibodies.
- It was discovered by ONGC Videsh Ltd in the Persian Gulf.
- The ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), the overseas investment arm of state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC), had in 2008 discovered a giant gas field in the Farsi offshore exploration block.
- The field holds 23 trillion cubic feet of in-place gas reserves, of which about 60 per cent is recoverable.
- It holds gas condensates of about 5,000 barrels per billion cubic feet of gas.
- OVL and its partners had offered to invest up to USD 11 billion for the development of the discovery, which was later named Farzad-B.
- The National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) has signed a contract worth USD 1.78 billionwith Petropars Group for the development of Farzad B Gas Field.
- The buyback contract signed has envisaged daily production of 28 million cubic meters of sour gas over five years.
- Farzad-B is the second Indian investment proposal to come unstuck in Iran despite commitments by the top leadership of both countries.
- In 2020, Teheran had dropped India’s $2-billion offer and decided to build the Chabahar railway link on its own.
Farzad-B gas field
- The OVL, with 40 per cent operatorship interest, signed the Exploration Service Contract (ESC) for the block on December 25, 2002.
- The OVL discovered gas in the block, which was declared commercially viable by NIOC in 2008.
- The firm submitted a Master Development Plan (MDP) of Farzad-B gas field in April 2011 to Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC).
- A Development Service Contract (DSC) of the Farzad-B gas field was negotiated till November 2012, but could not be finalized due to difficult terms and international sanctions on Iran.
- In April 2015, negotiations restarted with Iranian authorities to develop the Farzad-B gas field under a new Iran Petroleum Contract (IPC).
- In April 2016, both sides negotiated to develop the Farzad-B gas field under an integrated contract covering upstream and downstream.
POSTED ON 19-05-2021 BY ADMIN
Next previous 
General Studies
Political Science and International Relations
Some Reference Essays
List of previous year essay topics (1997-2019)
IAS GOOGLE is googled by the team of Raja Sir’s Cracking IAS Academy. Sources include The Hindu, Indian Express, pib.nic.in, Down To Earth, Economic Times, Vigyan Prasar, AIR and the like. IAS GOOGLE has been prepared in pace with emerging UPSC Trends.