Contemporary Events: World: UPSC Previous Year Questions (General Knowledge)

Explanation

In Monaco, the Prime Minister (Minister of State) is not directly elected by the people but is instead appointed by the Prince of Monaco from a list of three candidates proposed by the President of France. This is because of Monaco’s close political ties with France, as established in the Franco-Monegasque Treaty of 1918. While Monaco is an independent country, France plays a significant role in its governance, especially in defence and foreign relations.

Explanation

As of December 1996, the world’s fastest computer was ASCI Red, developed by Intel and Sandia National Laboratories under the U.S. Department of Energy’s Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative (ASCI). It was the first computer to break the 1 teraflop (10¹² floating point operations per second) barrier in December 1996. It had 9,298 Pentium Pro processors and achieved a sustained performance of 1.06 teraflops (1.06 × 10¹² operations per second) in 1997 on the LINPACK benchmark.

Explanation

As of 1997, the Basque separatist organization ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna) was still active in Spain, conducting violent attacks to push for an independent Basque state. The group, founded in 1959, intensified its activities in the 1980s and 1990s, targeting Spanish government officials, security forces, and civilians.

Explanation

The film "The Making of the Mahatma" was directed by Shyam Benegal. Released in 1996, the film is based on the book "The Apprenticeship of a Mahatma" by Fatima Meer and focuses on Mahatma Gandhi’s 21 years in South Africa (1893-1914), a crucial period that shaped his philosophy of non-violence (Satyagraha) and resistance against racial discrimination.

Explanation

In 1996, the Government of India launched the Pulse Polio Immunization (PPI) campaign as part of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. The program aimed to immunize all children under five years against polio through mass vaccination drives. It involved:

National Immunization Days (NIDs) to administer oral polio vaccine (OPV). Large-scale awareness campaigns and door-to-door vaccination efforts. Collaboration between the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and Rotary International.

Explanation

Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo and Jos Remos Horta were awarded the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts in bringing peace and advocating self-determination for East Timor. They played a crucial role in the non-violent struggle against Indonesian occupation, raising international awareness about human rights violations in East Timor and advocating for its independence, which was eventually achieved in 2002.

Explanation

In Germany, the constructive vote of no confidence ("Konstruktives Misstrauensvotum") is a unique parliamentary mechanism under Article 67 of the German Basic Law (Grundgesetz). It allows the Bundestag (the federal parliament) to pass a no-confidence motion against the Chancellor only if a successor with majority support is elected simultaneously. This system ensures government stability by preventing leadership vacuums and political deadlocks.

Explanation

In proportional representation (PR), a candidate needs 50% + 1 vote to win. In a two-party system, this majority is often secured automatically. PR ensures that the number of seats a party or group wins aligns with its share of votes.

Explanation

In Russia, the electoral system for the State Duma (Lower House of Parliament) in the 1990s followed a mixed electoral system. This mixed electoral system was in place from 1993 to 2003. 75% of the seats were filled using the first-past-the-post (FPTP) system, where candidates with the most votes in single-member constituencies won. 25% of the seats were filled using proportional representation (PR), where parties received seats based on their percentage of the national vote.

Explanation

Belgium and Luxembourg had a monetary agreement allowing their equal-valued francs (BEF & LUF) to circulate freely. This prefigured the 1999 Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and the Euro ().