The city of Newark in the United States state of New Jersey has rescinded a sister-city agreement with the so-called 'United States of Kailasa', founded by Indian fugitive Nithyananda, citing deceptive circumstances surrounding the fictional country and terming the incident as regrettable.

Two Indian nationals were among five persons arrested by United States border authorities after they were apprehended for illegally crossing into the country from Canada by boat.

India abstained in the UN General Assembly on Thursday on a resolution that underscored the need to reach "comprehensive, just and lasting peace" in Ukraine, citing the resolution's "inherent limitations" in reaching New Delhi's desired goal of securing lasting peace and ending the conflict which has been raging for one year now.

The 193-member General Assembly adopted the draft resolution, put forward by Ukraine and its supporters, titled 'Principles of the Charter of the United Nations underlying a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in Ukraine'.

Tensions between India and Pakistan spiked after New Delhi abrogated Article 370 of the Constitution to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir on August 5, 2019. India's decision evoked strong reactions from Pakistan, which downgraded diplomatic ties and expelled the Indian envoy.

Eminent economist Arvind Panagariya has said India is on the cusp of returning to a high growth trajectory and voiced confidence that the country will become the world's third-largest economy by 2027-28. Currently, India is the fifth largest economy "so it's another five years.We are already in (the year) 2023. "So 2027-28, India should be the third-largest economy," Panagariya, Columbia University Professor and former Vice Chairman of NITI Aayog, told PTI in an interview in New York.

The committee acknowledged that the COVID-19 pandemic may be approaching an "inflexion point".

Google will lay off 12,000 jobs across the globe, its CEO Sundar Pichai announced on Friday, becoming the latest tech giant after Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon to retrench staff en mass amid the global economic downturn. In an email to employees, the Indian-origin CEO said: "I have some difficult news to share. We've decided to reduce our workforce by approximately 12,000 roles." Pichai said the layoffs at Google were carried out after a "rigorous review" of its operations.

Microsoft will lay off 10,000 workers, about five per cent of its total workforce, its CEO Satya Nadella announced on Wednesday, terming it a hard choice that the tech giant had to make to remain a "consequential company" amid global economic uncertainties. Microsoft is the latest company after Facebook and Amazon to cut jobs as the bloodbath continues in the technology sector in 2023. Describing the current times as "significant change", Indian-origin Nadella said customers who accelerated their digital spend during the Covid-19 pandemic, are now optimising their digital spend to do more with less.

About 150 terrorist entities and individuals, either based or with links to Pakistan have been blacklisted by the United Nations, with the latest addition being of Abdul Rehman Makki, the Lashkar-e-Taiba deputy chief designated by the Security Council's Al Qaeda sanctions committee.

Makki and other LeT/JUD operatives "have been involved in raising funds, recruiting and radicalising youth to violence and planning attacks in India, particularly in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K)," the sanctions committee said, providing a statement for the reasons of Makki's listing.

Bhattacharjee in a handwritten complaint to the airlines had stated that the distressed passenger was made to go back to her soiled seat despite four seats in the First Class being vacant.

The United States and Israel voted against the resolution while Brazil, Japan, Myanmar and France were among those that abstained.

The global health agency has asked Chinese health officials to share data on genetic sequencing, hospitalisations, deaths and vaccinations.

'I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software and servers teams,' he tweeted Tuesday.

He added that there was a proposal from France and UK some time ago for some restrictions in the use of the right of veto.

The world today sees them (Pakistan) as the epicentre of terrorism, Jaishankar said.

Jaishankar, who presided over the UNSC Briefing: Global Counterterrorism Approach: Challenges and Way Forward, described terrorism as an existential threat to international peace and security and said it knows no borders, nationality, or race.

Multilateral platforms are being misused to justify and protect perpetrators of terrorism, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said

India proposes to organise a briefing of the Security Council on December 15 on 'Global counter-terrorism approach - principles and the way forward" under the 'Threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts'.