News Flash (30th May 2020): Top 12 Stories Of The Day

1. US, Minneapolis policeman who knelt on black man’s neck and killed him, now charged with murder

The Minneapolis cop who was seen in a video kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a handcuffed black man who succumbed to due to the inability to breathe while in custody, has been charged with third-degree murder. “Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin has been charged by the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office with murder and with manslaughter,” said Mike Freeman, the county’s prosecutor. The arrest of the Minneapolis cop comes 3 days after the protests in the US.

2. Fact-checking on social media platforms should be open source: Twitter CEO

Fact-checking on social media platforms should make use of open-source technology and must be verifiable by everyone, said Jack Dorsey, Twitter CEO. He made this statement while replying to entrepreneur Balaji Srinivasan, who said, “It shouldn’t be tech firms per se getting into fact-checking. It should be open source tech.” Open-source refers to a publicly accessible software which can be modified and shared by anyone.

3. 3 Indian companies receive license to make Covid-19 ventilator built by NASA in 37 days

NASA has issued licenses to three Indian companies to manufacture its indigenously developed ventilators for critical COVID-19 patients, that it created within just 37 days. The three Indian companies who have received the licenses are Alpha Design Technologies Pvt Ltd, Bharat Forge Ltd, and Medha Servo Drives Pvt Ltd. Apart from these 3 Indian companies, 18 other companies, including eight American and three Brazilian, have received the license. 

4. Virat Kohli, only Indian to feature in Forbes’ list of top 100 highest-paid athletes of 2020

Cricketer and India captain Virat Kohli is the only cricketer to be included in the Forbes’ list of top 100 highest-paid athletes of 2020. Virat is also the only Indian athlete to be featured in this list. According to the magazine, Kohli earns a total of $26 million ($24m from endorsements and $2m from salary/winnings). He made a jump of over 30 places from 2019, as he was positioned at the 66th spot in this year’s list.

5. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh in talk with US Secy of Defence on COVID-19 cooperation

On Friday, Defence minister Rajnath Singh and US secretary of defense Mark T Esper spoke over the phone and exchanged views on “regional developments of shared security interest,” a defence ministry spokesperson said. The phone call, requested by Esper, has come at a time when tight tension is looming over India and China over a tense border standoff in eastern Ladakh, and diplomatic and military talks are underway to break the stalemate. Both the officials exchanged their experiences of fighting COVID-19 in their respective countries, over the call.  

6. UK proposing 5G club of 10 nations including India to avoid reliance on Huawei

The UK is on its way to proposing a “D10” club of democracies that would include the G7 nations and also other countries that include, India, Australia, and South Korea, to create alternative suppliers of 5G equipment in order to do away with relying on China’s Huawei. As reported by The Times, it has approached the US with the proposal. The proposal comes ahead of a planned G7 summit in the US scheduled to be held next month.

7. Archaeologists discover a perfectly preserved Roman mosaic floor from 3rd century AD

Archaeologists have recently discovered a ‘perfectly preserved’ ancient Roman mosaic floor under the soil of a vineyard situated in the Italian city of Verona. The floor, which is believed to be existent from the 3rd century AD, is part of a Roman villa which was discovered in 1922. Local authorities are in talks with the land’s owners to make the unique site accessible to the public.

8. Antarctic ice sheet melted 10 times faster than the satellite-derived rates observed today

The researchers at Cambridge University have found that the Antarctica ice sheets have melted at a speed almost 10 times faster than the satellite-derived rates observed today. After analyzing, the researchers have calculated that roughly 12,000 years ago, ice was melting up to 50 meters per day, equating to over 10 kilometres a year. In comparison, the fastest-retreating grounding lines in Antarctica today retreat only 1.6 kilometres per year.

9. Trump states his administration will start revoking special treatment for Hong Kong

U.S. President Donald Trump has directed his administration to begin eliminating special treatment for Hong Kong, as a  response to China’s plans to impose new security legislation in the territory.

The US President announced this at a White House news conference, stating that China had failed in keeping its word over Hong Kong’s autonomy. He said its move against Hong Kong was a tragedy for the people of Hong Kong, China and the world collectively. During the news conference, he said, “We will take action to revoke Hong Kong’s preferential treatment,” and also said that the United States would also impose sanctions on individuals found responsible for threatening Hong Kong’s autonomy.

10. Air India’s Delhi-Moscow flight takes a u-turn as pilot tests Covid-19 positive

On Saturday, an Air India flight from Delhi to Moscow had to return midway to Delhi after the ground team found out that the pilot was COVID-19 positive. The crew members of the flight have been placed under quarantine. As reported by PTI, the A320 plane did carry any passengers and was flying to Moscow to bring back stranded Indians, as a part of the Vande Bharat Mission. On reaching Uzbekistan’s airspace, their team on ground discovered that one of the pilots had tested positive for COVID-19. “The flight was immediately asked to return. It came back to Delhi around 12.30 pm on Saturday,” an official said. The flight had begun its journey from Delhi around 7 am.

11. Paytm moves HC on telecom companies failure to prevent dangers from scammers

One97 Communications Ltd owned online payment platform Paytm, moved the Delhi High Court alleging that the telecom service providers were failing to block fraudsters who are defrauding its customers by “phishing” activities over the multiple mobile networks. Paytm claims that millions of its users have been defrauded by the phishing activities over the mobile networks and the failure of the telecom service providers to prevent the same has “caused financial and reputational loss” to the company that has caused damages of Rs 100 crore.  Phishing is a cybercrime, a cyber theft where customers are contacted through email, phone calls or text messages by fraudsters claiming to be legitimate representatives of an organization to seek their sensitive data, including banking and credit card details and passwords.

12. Award-winning editor & screenwriter Apurva Asrani buys new home with gay partner Siddhant

National  Award-winning editor & screenwriter Apurva Asrani and his partner Siddhant recently bought an apartment together. The writer shared a picture of his new house’s nameplate on his social media handle that reads “Apurva and Siddhant”. “For 13 years we pretended to be cousins so we could rent a home together. We were told ‘keep curtains drawn so neighbors don’t know ‘what’ you are’. We recently bought our own home. Now we voluntarily tell neighbors we are partners. It’s time LGBTQ families are normalized too,” tweeted Apurva Asrani.