Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 24 November 2019

::NATIONAL::

Protesters picketed the home of Colombian President Ivan Duque and defied a curfew yesterday. Colombians took to the streets in Bogota and other cities on Thursday to protest Duque's economic, social and security policies, as part of a nationwide general strike.
There were arrests and clashes as trade unions, students, opposition parties and the South American country's indigenous organizations vented their anger.
Bogota Mayor Enrique Penalosa declared a night-time curfew in the capital, following clashes between protesters and police in the southern part of the city.
The popularity of Duque's right-wing government has been on the wane since his election 18 months ago as his government hosted 1.4 million refugees from Venezuela's economic meltdown.

Russia's foreign minister Serge Lavrov said that the US-Japan security alliance poses a problem for Russia-Japan relations and complicates peace treaty talks.
Mr Lavrov said today that implementation of the 1956 Soviet-Japanese Declaration, which outlined conditions for a peace treaty, was not possible with the US military presence in Japan. He said, the Japanese government has promised to address Russia's concerns.
The two countries have been struggling to negotiate a peace treaty after World War II because of a territorial dispute.
The Soviet Union took the four southernmost Kuril Islands during the final days of the war. Japan asserts territorial rights to the islands and the dispute has kept the countries from signing a peace treaty.

The 2017 nuclear test by North Korea shifted the ground by a few metres, and was 17 times more powerful than the bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in 1945, according to scientists from the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
It subsequently developed nuclear weapons, with five underground nuclear tests culminating in a suspected thermonuclear explosion -- a hydrogen bomb -- on September 3, 2017.
The scientists, including RiteshAgrawal and A S Rajawat from Geosciences Division, Space Applications Centre, ISRO, used satellite data to augment measurements of tests on the ground.
In the study, published in the journal Geophysical Journal International, the researchers noted that conventional detection of nuclear tests relies on seismic measurements using the networks deployed to monitor earthquakes.
The study demonstrates the value of space-borne InSAR data for measurement of the characteristics of underground nuclear tests, with greater precision than conventional seismic methods.
The team noted that currently operating satellites such as Sentinel-1 and ALOS-2, along with the NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) mission -- due to launch in 2022 -- could be used for this purpose.

In wrestling, Indians grapplers continued their golden rush at the Under-15 Asian Wrestling Championships in Taichung, Chinese Taipei, clinching six gold medals yesterday. In freestyle, Akash performed brilliantly to beat Daiki Ogawa of Japan in the 48kg category.
In Greco-Roman category, AnkitGulia defeated Korganov of Kazakhstan to win the gold in the 68kg while ChiragDhalia clinched a gold by winning both his bouts in 75kg.
Three Indian girls - Saloni in 33kg, Babli in 36kg and Komal in 39kg also performed brilliantly to win gold medals for the country.