Current Affairs Nov 17

Lonar Lake, Sur Sarovar declared as Ramsar sites

• India has 41 wetlands, the highest in South Asia, with two more added to the list of recognised sites of international importance under the treaty of Ramsar Convention.
• The Lonar Lake in Maharashtra and Sur Sarovar, also known as Keetham Lake, in Agra, have been added to the list of recognised Ramsar sites.
• Recently, Kabartal in Bihar’s Begusarai district was recognised as a wetland of international importance, the first such wetland in the State, under the Ramsar Convention.
• The Asan Conservation Reserve in Dehradun, the first wetland from Uttarakhand to be recognised by Ramsar convention, was added to the list in October this year.

The other 38 Ramsar sites in India include

• Chilika Lake in Odisha
• Keoladeo National Park in Rajasthan
• Harike Lake in Punjab
• Loktak Lake in Manipur
• Wular Lake in Jammu and Kashmir

About Ramsar Convention

• The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat is a treaty for conservation and sustainable use of such sites.
• It is named after Ramsar, the Iranian city where the treaty was signed in 1971, and places chosen for conservation under it are given the tag ‘Ramsar site.’
• It is one of the oldest inter-governmental accord for preserving the ecological character of wetlands.
• Also known as the Convention on Wetlands, it aims to develop a global network of wetlands for conservation of biological diversity and for sustaining human life.
• Wetlands provide a wide range of important resources and ecosystem services such as food, water, fibre, groundwater recharge, water purification, flood moderation, erosion control and climate regulation.
• Over 170 countries are party to the Ramsar Convention and over 2,000 designated sites covering over 20 crore hectares have been recognised under it.

THE HINDU

National Epilepsy Day: 17th November

• Epilepsy is a neurological disorder characterized by recurrent, unprovoked seizures. The condition leads to unusual behaviour, sensations, loss of awareness, and abnormal motor activity.
• Statistically, one in a hundred people develop this disorder, and it is more common among young children and older people.
• November 17 is observed as National Epilepsy Day in India to raise awareness about the condition.

Symptoms of Epilepsy

• The most frequent symptom of epilepsy is a seizure.
• In some cases, the individual may have an episode of a loss of consciousness which may be accompanied by uncontrollable jerking movements of the arms and legs.
• Other symptoms include short-term confusion, loss of consciousness, anxiety, or a sense of deja-vu.

What causes epilepsy?

• Traumatic brain injury, high fever, stroke, dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, prenatal injury, brain malformation, or lack of oxygen at birth, infectious diseases such as AIDS and meningitis, genetic or developmental disorders, certain neurological diseases, vascular diseases, and likewise are some of the conditions that may lead to epilepsy.

What are the risk factors?

• People are most likely to develop epilepsy if they have suffered from head injuries, heart diseases that can restrict the flow of oxygen to the brain, brain disorders like dementia, stroke or occurrence of seizures when they were young.
• It can also be caused due to illicit drugs, brain tumours or bleeding in the brain.

How to control the condition?

• While there may not be a complete cure for epilepsy, the condition can be controlled by medication or surgery.
• Furthermore, some people may also require a life-long treatment to control seizures. Additionally, some children may outgrow the disorder with age.

TIMES NOW

Phase 2 of Exercise MALABAR 2020

• Aircraft carriers of India and the U.S. will take part in Phase-II of Exercise Malabar 2020, also consisting of Australia and Japan, scheduled to take place from November 17 to 20 in the Northern Arabian Sea.
• A joint operations, centred on the Vikramaditya Carrier Battle Group of the Navy and the Nimitz Carrier Strike Group of the US Navy.
• The two carriers, along with other ships, submarine and aircraft of the participating navies, would be engaged in high intensity naval operations for over four days.
• These exercises include cross-deck flying operations and advanced air defence exercises by MiG-29K fighters of Vikramaditya and F-18 fighters and E2C Hawkeye from Nimitz.
• Advanced surface and anti-submarine warfare exercises, seamanship evolutions and weapon firings will also be undertaken to further enhance “interoperability and synergy” among the four navies.
• The Phase-I was held in the Bay of Bengal in the first week of November.
• The Navy is also deploying INS Kolkata and INS Chennai, stealth frigate INS Talwar, fleet support ship INS Deepak and their integral helicopters.
• Scorpene class submarine INS Khanderi and P8I maritime reconnaissance aircraft will also take part.
• The Nimitz carrier group will be accompanied by cruiser Princeton, destroyer Sterett and P8A patrol aircraft.
• The Royal Australian Navy will be represented by frigate Ballarat with its integral helicopter.
• Australia joined the exercise this year for the first time since 2007 bringing together all four countries of the Quadrilateral grouping for the military games.
• Malabar began as an annual bilateral naval exercise between India and the U.S. in 1992 and has over the years significantly grown in scope and complexity.
• It formally became a trilateral format with the inclusion of Japan in 2015.

PIB

International Crops Research Institute permitted to use drones

• Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) and Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) have granted conditional exemption to the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics(ICRISAT), Hyderabad, Telangana for the deployment of drones for agricultural research activities.
• Drones are poised to play a big role in agriculture sector in India especially in areas like precision agriculture, locust control and improvement in crop yield.
• The Government is encouraging young entrepreneurs and researchers to look at ruggedized low-cost drone solutions for the over 6.6 lakh villages in India.

PIB

DIPAM signs pact with World Bank

• Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM), which mainly handles government’s disinvestment programme, has signed an agreement with World Bank.
• Under the agreement, World Bank is to provide advisory services to DIPAM for asset monetization.
• DIPAM is mandated with facilitating monetization of non-core assets of government CPSEs under strategic disinvestment or closure and enemy property of value of ₹100 crore and above.
• DIPAM has a framework for monetizing non-core assets.
• The World Bank advisory project, approved by the Finance Minister, is aimed at analyzing public asset monetization in India and benchmarking its institutional and business models against international best practices as well as supporting development of operational guidelines and capacity building for their implementation.
• This project would facilitate and accelerate the non-core asset monetization process and help unlock the value of these unused/marginally used assets which have the potential to substantially augment financial resources for further investments and growth.
• The amount raised through the sale of non-core assets would form part of the disinvestment proceeds.
• The government has set a target of raising Rs 2.10 lakh crore from disinvestment in the current financial year. Of this, Rs 1.20 lakh crore is to be raised through CPSE disinvestment.

ET

Compliance of Policy on FDI in Digital Media

• After bringing digital news portals and video streaming platforms like Netflix under its jurisdiction, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting issued a detailed notification asking the companies to comply with the 26% cap on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) sanctioned last year.
• The notification reiterates last years Cabinet decision, imposing a 26% cap on FDI under government route for uploading/streaming of news and current affairs through digital media on the lines of print media.
• The only major departure is that now even the companies that have investment below the 26% cap have to intimate the ministry about the shareholding pattern along with the ‘names and address of its directors/shareholders’.
• These details have to be submitted within a month’s time.
• The firms who have more than 26% of FDI have been instructed to take “necessary steps for bringing down the foreign investment to 26 % by 15th October 2021”.
• The notice comes after the Supreme Court issued a notice to the Centre seeking its response on a PIL for regulating over-the-top (OTT) platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime by an autonomous body.
• Recently, the Centre brought OTT platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+Hotstar, besides other online news and current affairs content, under the ambit of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, giving it powers to regulate policies and rules for the digital space.
• Any entity which intends to bring fresh foreign investment in the country has to seek prior approval of the central government, through the Foreign Investment Facilitation Portal of DPIIT, as per the requirements of the FDI policy of the government.
• Every entity has to comply with the requirements of citizenship of the Board of Directors and of the Chief Executive Officers (by whatever name called).
• The entities are required to obtain security clearance for all foreign personnel likely to be deployed for over 60 days in a year by way of appointment, contract or consultancy or any other capacity for functioning of the entity, prior to their deployment.
• “For this purpose, the entities will apply to the ministry at least 60 days in advance and the proposed foreign personnel shall be deployed by the entity only after prior approval of this ministry”.

The Hindu

Moderna’s Vaccine Appears To Be 94.5% Effective

• Moderna said its vaccine appears to be 94.5% effective, according to preliminary data from the company’s still ongoing study.
• A week ago, competitor Pfizer Inc. announced its own COVID-19 vaccine appeared similarly effective.
• Moderna’s vaccine, created with the National Institutes of Health, is being studied in 30,000 volunteers who received either the real vaccination or a dummy shot.
• Recently, an independent monitoring board broke the code to examine 95 infections that were recorded starting two weeks after volunteers’ second dose — and discovered all but five illnesses occurred in participants who got the placebo.

• The main side effects were fatigue, muscle aches and injection-site pain after the vaccine’s second dose, at rates that Hoge characterized as more common than with flu shots but on par with others such as shingles vaccine.
• Both Moderna’s shots and the Pfizer-BioNTech candidate are so-called mRNA vaccines, a brand-new technology.
• They aren’t made with the coronavirus itself, meaning there’s no chance anyone could catch it from the shots.
• Instead, the vaccine contains a piece of genetic code that trains the immune system to recognize the spiked protein on the surface of the virus.
• Another steep challenge: distributing doses that must be kept very cold.
• Both the Moderna and Pfizer shots are frozen but at different temperatures.
• Moderna announced that once thawed, its doses can last longer in a refrigerator than initially thought, up to 30 days.
• Pfizer’s shots require long-term storage at ultra-cold temperatures.

THE HINDU

What is mRNA vaccine?

• The mRNA, in this case, is coded to tell the cells to recreate the spike protein of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which causes Covid-19.
• It is the spike protein — which appears as spikes on the surface of the coronavirus — that initiates the process of infection; it allows the virus to penetrate cells, after which it goes on to replicate.
• A coronavirus vaccine based on mRNA, once injected into the body, will instruct the body’s cells to create copies of the spike protein.
• In turn, this is expected to prompt the immune cells to create antibodies to fight it.
• These antibodies will remain in the blood and fight the real virus if and when it infects the human body.
• Other types of vaccine include the non-replicating viral vector category, an example of which is the vaccine developed by Oxford and AstraZeneca.
• The vaccine uses a different virus — in the Oxford-AstraZeneca case, a weakened version of a common cold virus (adenovirus) that infects chimpanzees — to carry just the code to make the spike protein, like a Trojan horse.
• The adenovirus, which has been genetically modified so that it cannot replicate in humans, will enter the cell and release the code to make only the spike protein.
• The body’s immune system is expected to recognise the spike protein as a potentially harmful foreign substance, and starts building antibodies against it.
• There are inactivated virus vaccines made by using particles of the Covid-19 virus that were killed, making them unable to infect or replicate;
• Protein subunit vaccines that use a part of the virus (spike protein again, in this case) to build a targeted immune response towards; and
• DNA vaccines that use genetically engineered DNA molecules that, again, are coded with the antigen against which the immune response is to be built.

IE

Winter Session Parliament unlikely

• The winter session of Parliament that usually commences by last week of November is unlikely to be held due to the high number of coronavirus (COVID -19) positive cases in Delhi.
• As per the Parliamentary records, there had been only three such instances – 1975, 1979 and 1984.
• The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs (CCPA) meets to decide the dates of the session and an announcement has to be made giving the members at least two weeks of notice.
• So far, the CCPA has not met and the government is mulling that the Budget session of Parliament that begins usually on February 1 and the winter session should be combined.
• The Constitution mandates there should not be a gap of six months or more between two sessions.
• With the monsoon session held in September, the government has no constitutional compulsion to hold a winter session.

THE HINDU

India Tops Worldwide Game Downloads List In 2020

• India has been ranked number one in global mobile game downloads in the first nine months of 2020.
• The country’s citizens installed 7.3 billion games, nearly 17% of all worldwide downloads.
• The U.S. came second position in terms of installs with nearly 10% of the total downloads, followed by Brazil at 8%.
• Garena Free Fire was the most downloaded game globally in the first nine months of 2020, followed by PUBG Mobile and Subway Surfers.
• PUBG Mobile was banned in India earlier in October, and the popular game recently said it is making a re-entry in a new avatar.
• In October, InnerSloth’s Among Us was the most downloaded game worldwide.
• Google Play downloads grew more than 40% in the first nine months compared with last year, while Apple’s App Store installs rose 16% compared with last year.

THE HINDU

An All-weather Chip for Reliable Wireless Communications

• A new chip designed for wireless communications is capable of working in bad weather to deliver secure and reliable communications.
• The chip was designed by a team of researchers from The University of Texas, Austin (UT).
• The chip operates in mid-infrared area of the light spectrum that allows signal to pass through rain, clouds and other weather conditions to reach its destination without losing much of the light.
• It re-directs light in the direction of a specific target using beam steering technique, to transmit the signal more accurately than other methods, reducing interference and saving power.
• Low light loss means signal can travel further, and through the earth’s atmosphere, with better integrity and less power consumption.
• The chip could aid military communications in challenging areas, improve the ability of self-driving cars to see the environment around them and speed up wireless data for potential 6G networks.
• The device has much wider angles for steering light which increases the range by about 30 degrees compared to other options, and as a result, it does not require any moving parts as they are susceptible to damage.
• They are also working on embedding artificial intelligence into the device for environmental sensing to pick up thing such as gas leaks and smoke stack emissions.

THE HINDU

GAIL completes Kochi-Mangaluru pipeline

• The Kochi-Mangaluru natural gas pipeline project is ready for commissioning as GAIL India has completed the final 540-metre treacherous stretch across the Chandragiri River in northern Kerala.
• The 444-km-long natural gas pipeline was launched in 2009 at an estimated cost of Rs 2,915 crore and was to be commissioned in 2014.
• But opposition on safety and commercial grounds wherein the land price was the main hurdle has resulted in the project cost nearly doubling to over ₹5,750 crore.
• Koottanad is the main junction of the project, as from here the line bifurcates to Managaluru and Bengaluru.
• The first phase of the project was commissioned in August 2013 in the Kochi metropolitan area with industrial supplies and domestic supplies from February 2016 by Adani Gas.
• Pipeline will supply gas to all seven districts it passes through Kerala — Ernakulam, Thrissur, Palakkad, Malappuram, Kozhikode, Kannur and Kasargod — and the hilly Wayanad district.

Statue of Peace

• Prime Minister unveiled ‘Statue of Peace’ to mark the 151st Birth Anniversary celebrations of Jainacharya Shree Vijay Vallabh Surishwer Ji Maharaj.
• The Statue unveiled in the honour of the Jain acharya has been named as ‘Statue of Peace’.
• The 151-inch tall statue has been made from Ashtadhatu, i.e. 8 metals, with Copper being the major constituent and is installed at Vijay Vallabh Sadhana Kendra, Jetpura, in Pali, Rajasthan.
• The saint, who lived during 1870-1954, led an austere life, working selflessly and dedicatedly to spread the message of Lord Mahavira
• Worked relentlessly for the welfare of the masses, spread of education and eradication of social evils, wrote inspiring literature (poetry, essays, devotional hymns and stavans) and gave active support to the freedom movement and the cause of the swadeshi.
• With his inspiration, more than 50 educational institutions of eminence, including colleges, schools and study centres, are operational across several states.

The Statesman

‘Pincer Catalysts’ For Biofuel and Lactic Acid Production

• Researchers at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati, have formulated efficient “pincer” catalytic systems that transform industrial or biomass wastes into valuable chemicals.
• According to the team, tiny amounts of these “pincer catalysts” repeatedly convert large amounts of industrial waste such as glycerol into lactic acid and hydrogen.
• Such catalysts also efficiently convert bioethanol, a low-energy density fuel, into high-energy density butanol.
• Pincer catalysts are complex molecules in which, an organic moiety holds on tightly to a metal core, much like the claws of a crab.
• Such an arrangement not only confers stability to the catalyst, but also selectivity to bring about the intended transformations.
• The most efficient pincer catalyst was found to be one that had least crowding around the metal centre.
• Such an arrangement enabled easy removal of hydrogen from the starting materials, glycerol and ethanol, and their selective conversion into lactic acid and butanol, respectively.

NDTV

Economic Implications of India Opting Out Of RCEP

What is RCEP?

• Described as the “largest” regional trading agreement to this day, RCEP was originally being negotiated between 16 countries —
• ASEAN members and countries with which they have free trade agreements (FTAs), namely Australia, China, Korea, Japan, New Zealand and India.
• The purpose of RCEP was to make it easier for products and services of each of these countries to be available across this region.
• Negotiations to chart out this deal had been on since 2013, and India was expected to be a signatory until its decision last November.

Why did India walk out?

• On November 4, 2019, India decided to exit discussions over “significant outstanding issues”.
• Its decision was to safeguard the interests of industries like agriculture and dairy and to give an advantage to the country’s services sector.
• The current structure of RCEP still does not address these issues and concerns.

How far is China’s presence a factor?

• Escalating tensions with China are a major reason for India’s decision.
• Major issues that were unresolved during RCEP negotiations were related to the exposure that India would have to China.
• This included India’s fears that there were “inadequate” protections against surges in imports.
• It felt there could also be a possible circumvention of rules of origin— the criteria used to determine the national source of a product — in the absence of which some countries could dump their products by routing them through other countries that enjoyed lower tariffs.
• India was unable to ensure countermeasures like an auto-trigger mechanism to raise tariffs on products when their imports crossed a certain threshold.
• It also wanted RCEP to exclude most-favoured nation (MFN) obligations from the investment chapter, as it did not want to hand out, especially to countries with which it has border disputes, the benefits it was giving to strategic allies or for geopolitical reasons.
• RCEP also lacked clear assurance over market access issues in countries such as China and non-tariff barriers on Indian companies.

What can the decision cost India?

• There are concerns that India’s decision would impact its bilateral trade ties with RCEP member nations, as they may be more inclined to focus on bolstering economic ties within the bloc.
• The move could potentially leave India with less scope to tap the large market that RCEP presents
• India’s decision could impact the Australia-India-Japan network in the Indo-Pacific.
• India’s stance on the deal also comes as a result of learnings from unfavourable trade balances that it has with several RCEP members, with some of which it even has FTAs.
• An internal assessment by the government has revealed that the growth in trade (CAGR) with partners over the last five financial years was a modest 7.1%.
• India has trade deficits with 11 of the 15 RCEP countries.
• A country don’t get into FTAs merely to provide its market to their partner countries. While they accommodate their partner countries, their objective is also to increase the presence of its products in the markets of their partners, and India hasn’t been able to achieve the latter objective.

What are India’s options now?

• India, as an original negotiating participant of RCEP, has the option of joining the agreement without having to wait 18 months as stipulated for new members in the terms of the pact.
• RCEP signatory states said they plan to commence negotiations with India once it submits a request of its intention to join the pact “in writing”, and it may participate in meetings as an observer prior to its accession.
• The possible alternative that India may be exploring is reviews of its existing bilateral FTAs with some of these RCEP members as well as newer agreements with other markets with potential for Indian exports. Over 20 negotiations are underway.
• India currently has agreements with members like the ASEAN bloc, South Korea and Japan and is negotiating agreements with members like Australia and New Zealand.
• Two reviews of the India-Singapore CECA have been completed; the India-Bhutan Agreement on Trade Commerce and Transit was renewed in 2016;
• The India-Nepal Treaty of Trade was extended in 2016.
• Eight rounds of negotiations have been completed for the review of the India-Korea CEPA, which began in 2016.
• India has taken up the review of the India-Japan CEPA and India-ASEAN FTA with its trading partners.

IE

AI Will ‘read’ Articles on BBC’s Online Platform

• BBC Global News announced the global launch of an AI-enabled text-to-speech tool on its international digital online platform, com.
• The tool converts text into speech using artificial intelligence, ‘reading’ it aloud with a synthetic voice.
• The media major has worked with Microsoft to create the new voice and AI software “using deep neural networks to create a synthetic voice with a natural tone and clear articulation of words”.
• The audio will continue to play even after users navigate away from the article on desktop or a phone is locked.
• Articles will be curated based on the user’s behaviour pattern along with the relevance and importance of stories.
• BBC is planning to add the product to other areas of the site along with other features such as background soundscapes and infinite scroll as part of an initiative called Project Songbird.

BusinessLine

ADB allocates $20 mn to help developing member’s access Covid-19 vaccine

• The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has allocated $20.3 million aid to its developing member countries to access coronavirus vaccine and establish systems to enable equitable and efficient vaccine distribution.
• The funds will be available for ADB developing members to support vaccine-related health system assessments and the development of country readiness plans to strengthen the capacity to access, introduce, deploy, deliver, and monitor vaccines safely and effectively.
• The technical assistance will also support the identification and promotion of innovative cold chain and vaccine tracking technologies.
• Funds will help members assess and strengthen vaccine cold chain and logistics, infection control, supply and skills of health workers, risk communications, and real-time data capturing and monitoring.
• ADB expects to implement the technical assistance with its partners UNICEF and the World Health Organidation, in coordination with COVAX, Gavi, the World Bank, and bilateral agencies.
• The funds comprise $20 million from ADB’s Technical Assistance Special Fund (TASF) and $300,000 from the High-Level Technology Fund financed by the government of Japan.
• In April, ADB had approved a $20-billion expanded assistance package to support its developing members’ Covid-19 response.

BusinessLine

Solar To Overtake Wind

• The solar power segment is expected to surpass the wind segment’s cumulative capacity this fiscal.
• The gap between the two clean energy segments has been narrowing and currently stands at about 1,900 plus MW.
• During October 2020, a total of 406.22 MW of new capacity was added in the renewable energy (RE) sector, taking the cumulative RE energy capacity to 89.63 GW as on October 31, 2020.
• In the total capacity, the wind power segment accounted for 38.26 GW, while the total solar capacity’s share was 36.32 GW.
• The past five years have seen a massive capacity addition in the renewable energy sector.
• The total RE capacity has grown from 45,924 MW as of March 31, 2016 to 88,793 MW as of March 31, 2020.
• Supported by a favourable government policy framework and falling prices, solar power capacity has grown by more than 11 times in the last five years till March 2019, while wind energy capacity has grown by just 1.7 times in the past four years.
• The seven states in the country with wind resource have been traditional demand centres and are responsible for most of the installations to date.
• However, project activity has declined in the last two years, following the introduction of central auctions.
• Though solar PV had its own set of associated risks, these were not as severe as those pertaining to land availability for wind energy projects.

BusinessLine

Fin Whales

• Marine biologists are investigating the deaths of at least six whales found washed up on France’s western shores with no apparent sign of having been hit by a ship or caught in a trawler’s net.
• Researchers used a mechanical digger and long knives to dissect a fin whale, the second largest species of whale after the blue whale, taking samples they believe might reveal evidence of a viral pathogen.
• The common fin whales have all died within the past six weeks. All have been malnourished and shown evidence of hemorrhaging in the cardiac and respiratory systems.

The Hindu

New Species of Vine Snakes Discovered

• A team of researchers from the Centre for Ecological Sciences (CES), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), after extensive sampling across peninsular India, have discovered new species of vine snakes in the region.
• Vine snakes are known to be among the most common snakes in peninsular India, found even in many peri-urban areas wherever there is some greenery, and in the Western Ghats.
• It belong to the genus Ahaetulla and the recently described Proahaetulla.
• They found four distinct small-bodied and short-nosed species:
  • • the Northern Western Ghats vine snake (Ahaetulla borealis),
    • Farnsworth’s vine snake (Ahaetulla farnsworthi),
    • Malabar vine snake (Ahaetulla malabarica) and
    • Wall’s vine snake (Ahaetulla isabellina) in the Western Ghats rainforests alone.
• These species were superficially similar in their morphology, but separated by geographic or ecological barriers.
• The team also delineated the Travancore vine snake (Ahaetulla travancorica), separated by morphology and a geographic barrier from the Gunther’s vine snake (Ahaetulla dispar).
• They recognised morphological distinctions between the brown vine snake in the Western Ghats and the one found in Sri Lanka, and gave the Western Ghats form a new name (Ahaetulla sahyadrensis).
• There are now six species of vine snakes endemic to the Western Ghats.

THE HINDU

Que-    Which South American country, fifth president in five years, Manuel Merino, was forced out of power recently, just five days after taking office?

a) Paraguay

b) Peru

c) Bolivia

d) Colombia

Ans-     (b)

Que-    Which island nation is planning to ban the use of Facebook for an indeterminate period after inflammatory critique of the government was aired on the social media platform.

a) Kiribati

b) Maldives

c) Madagascar

d) Solomon Islands

Ans-     (d)