General Awareness Updates – November 2009

Places in News

A suicide bomber blew up his car outside the compound of the Indian Embassy in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, killing at least 17 people and leaving 83 wounded, including three ITBP jawans, in a fiery blast that was later claimed by the Taliban. The powerful blast blew up the mission watch tower, destroyed vehicles and left a trail of death and destruction. The Afghan envoy to the U.S. has claimed that Pakistan’s intelligence agency ISI was behind the attack on the Indian embassy.

Authorities in China’s restive north-western Xinjiang region have approved a bill making it a criminal offence for people there discuss separatism on the Internet. The bill bans people in the region from using the Internet in any way that undermines national unity, incites ethnic separatism or harms social stability. The bill did not specify what punishment offenders would face, but its apparent aim is to allow authorities to arrest individuals behind e-mails, web postings and sharing of media within the region that they deem to be a threat.

Several media sites and social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are already blocked in China and the country’s web censors often do not allow search engines to display results for politically sensitive topics. The bill said terrorists, separatists and religious extremists used the Internet, telephones and mobile text messages to spread rumours and hatred as violence erupted in the region’s capital Urumqi.