BJP's Kerala unit chief Rajasekharan sworn in as Mizoram Governor

Washington, Jul 16: Actor Chris Evans, better known as 'Captain America', made a six-year-old boy's day by sending him a personalised video message lauding his heroic act of saving his younger sister from a dog attack.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the aunt of the young boy (Bridger Walker from Cheyenne) posted on Instagram the story of how the boy saved his sister on July 9 and was horribly injured in the process.

She shared the story on the photo-sharing platform on Sunday and also posted few photos featuring the brother-sister duo as well as pictures of the injuries on Walker's face.

"After receiving 90 stitches (give or take) from a skilled plastic surgeon, he's finally resting at home," wrote the aunt (Nikki Walker).
"We love our brave boy and want all the other superheroes to know about this latest hero who joined their ranks," she added.

Moved by the young boy's story, Evans made a direct video message appreciating the boy for what he did, and how he is no less than a superhero.

He also promised to send the young kid an authentic 'Captain America' shield as a reward for his selfless, heroic act.

Evans' video message to the young boy was shared by the aunt on her Instagram profile.
In the video, Evans is saying, "Pal, you're a hero, what you did was so brave, so selfless -- your sister is so lucky to have you as a big brother.

Your parents must be so proud of you," Evans said in a video message that the family shared Wednesday. "Keep being the man you are, we need people like you. Hang in there, I know recovery might be tough, but based on what I've seen, I don't think there's much that can slow you down."

Towards the end, the 39-year-old actor told the boy he was sending the 'Captain America' shield to him, as the world needs more bravehearts like the little boy.

United Nations, Jun 30: India accounts for 45.8 million of the world's 142.6 million "missing females" over the past 50 years, a report by the United Nations said on Tuesday, noting that the country along with China form the majority of such women globally.

The State of World Population 2020 report released on Tuesday by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the world organisation's sexual and reproductive health agency, said that the number of missing women has more than doubled over the past 50 years - from 61 million in 1970 to a cumulative 142.6 million in 2020.

Of this global figure, India accounted for 45.8 million missing females as of 2020 and China accounted for 72.3 million.

Missing females are women missing from the population at given dates due to the cumulative effect of postnatal and prenatal sex selection in the past, the agency said.

Between 2013 and 2017, about 460,000 girls in India were missing' at birth each year. According to one analysis, gender-biased sex selection accounts for about two-thirds of the total missing girls, and post-birth female mortality accounts for about one-third, the report said.

Citing data by experts, it said that China and India together account for about 90-95 per cent of the estimated 1.2 million to 1.5 million missing female births annually worldwide due to gender-biased (prenatal) sex selection.

The two countries also account for the largest number of births each year, it said.

The report cites data by Alkema, Leontine and others, 2014 National, Regional, and Global Sex Ratios of Infant, Child, and under-5 Mortality and Identification of Countries with Outlying Ratios: A Systematic Assessment' from The Lancet Global Health.

According to their analysis, India has the highest rate of excess female deaths, 13.5 per 1,000 female births, which suggests that an estimated one in nine deaths of females below the age of 5 may be attributed to postnatal sex selection.

The report notes that governments have also taken action to address the root causes of sex selection. India and Vietnam have included campaigns that target gender stereotypes to change attitudes and open the door to new norms and behaviours.

They spotlight the importance of daughters and highlight how girls and women have changed society for the better. Campaigns that celebrate women's progress and achievements may resonate more where daughter-only families can be shown to be prospering, it said.

The report said that successful education-related interventions include the provision of cash transfers conditional on school attendance; or support to cover the costs of school fees, books, uniforms and supplies, taking note of successful cash-transfer initiatives such as Apni Beti Apna Dhan' in India.

It said that preference for a male child manifested in sex selection has led to dramatic, long-term shifts in the proportions of women and men in the populations of some countries.

This demographic imbalance will have an inevitable impact on marriage systems. In countries where marriage is nearly universal, many men may need to delay or forego marriage because they will be unable to find a spouse, the report said.

This so-called "marriage squeeze", where prospective grooms outnumber prospective brides, has already been observed in some countries and affects mostly young men from lower economic strata.

"At the same time, the marriage squeeze could result in more child marriages, the report said citing experts.

Some studies suggest that the marriage squeeze will peak in India in 2055. The proportion of men who are still single at the age of 50 is forecast to rise after 2050 in India to 10 per cent, it said.

The UN report said that every year, millions of girls globally are subjected to practices that harm them physically and emotionally, with the full knowledge and consent of their families, friends and communities.

At least 19 harmful practices, ranging from breast ironing to virginity testing, are considered human rights violations, according to the UNFPA report, which focuses on the three most prevalent ones: female genital mutilation, child marriage, and extreme bias against daughters in favour of sons.

Harmful practices against girls cause profound and lasting trauma, robbing them of their right to reach their full potential, says UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem.

This year, an estimated 4.1 million girls will be subjected to female genital mutilation. Today, 33,000 girls under age 18 will be forced into marriages, usually to much older men and an extreme preference for sons over daughters in some countries has fuelled gender-biased sex selection or extreme neglect that leads to their death as children, resulting in the 140 million missing females.

The report said that ending child marriage and female genital mutilation worldwide is possible within 10 years by scaling up efforts to keep girls in school longer and teach them life skills and to engage men and boys in social change.

Investments totalling USD 3.4 billion a year through 2030 would end these two harmful practices and end the suffering of an estimated 84 million girls, it said.

A recent analysis revealed that if services and programmes remain shuttered for six months due to the COVID-19 pandemic, an additional 13 million girls may be forced into marriage and 2 million more girls may be subjected to female genital mutilation between now and 2030.

The pandemic both makes our job harder and more urgent as so many more girls are now at risk, Kanem said.

Mar 3: Just hours after the ending of a week-long “reduction” in violence that was crucial for Donald Trump’s peace deal in Afghanistan, the Taliban struck again: On Monday, they killed three people and injured about a dozen at a football match in Khost province. This resumption of violence will not surprise anyone actually invested in peace for that troubled country. The point of the U.S.-Taliban deal was never peace. It was to try and cover up an ignominious exit for the U.S., driven by an election-bound president who feels no responsibility toward that country or to the broader region.

Seen from South Asia, every point we know about in the agreement is a concession by Trump to the Taliban. Most importantly, it completes a long-term effort by the U.S. to delegitimize the elected government in Kabul — and, by extension, Afghanistan’s constitution. Afghanistan’s president is already balking at releasing 5,000 Taliban prisoners before intra-Afghan talks can begin — a provision that his government did not approve.

One particularly cringe-worthy aspect: The agreement refers to the Taliban throughout  as “the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan that is not recognized by the United States as a state and is known as the Taliban.” This unwieldy nomenclature validates the Taliban’s claim to be a government equivalent to the one in Kabul, just not the one recognised at the moment by the U.S. When read together with the second part of the agreement, which binds the U.S. to not “intervene in [Afghanistan’s] domestic affairs,” the point is obvious: The Taliban is not interested in peace, but in ensuring that support for its rivals is forbidden, and its path to Kabul is cleared.

All that the U.S. has effectively gotten in return is the Taliban’s assurance that it will not allow the soil of Afghanistan to be used against the “U.S. and its allies.” True, the U.S. under Trump has shown a disturbing willingness to trust solemn assurances from autocrats; but its apparent belief in promises made by a murderous theocratic movement is even more ridiculous. Especially as the Taliban made much the same promise to an Assistant Secretary of State about Osama bin Laden while he was in the country plotting 9/11.

Nobody in the region is pleased with this agreement except for the Taliban and their backers in the Pakistani military. India has consistently held that the legitimate government in Kabul must be the basic anchor of any peace plan. Ordinary Afghans, unsurprisingly, long for peace — but they are, by all accounts, deeply skeptical about how this deal will get them there. The brave activists of the Afghan Women’s Network are worried that intra-Afghan talks will take place without adequate representation of the country’s women — who have, after all, the most to lose from a return to Taliban rule.

But the Pakistani military establishment is not hiding its glee. One retired general tweeted: “Big victory for Afghan Taliban as historic accord signed… Forced Americans to negotiate an accord from the position of parity. Setback for India.” Pakistan’s army, the Taliban’s biggest backer, longs to re-install a friendly Islamist regime in Kabul — and it has correctly estimated that, after being abandoned by Trump, the Afghan government will have sharply reduced bargaining power in any intra-Afghan peace talks. A deal with the Taliban that fails also to include its backers in the Pakistani military is meaningless.

India, meanwhile, will not see this deal as a positive for regional peace or its relationship with the U.S. It comes barely a week after Trump’s India visit, which made it painfully clear that shared strategic concerns are the only thing keeping the countries together. New Delhi remembers that India is not, on paper, a U.S. “ally.” In that respect, an intensification of terrorism targeting India, as happened the last time the U.S. withdrew from the region, would not even be a violation of Trump’s agreement. One possible outcome: Over time the government in New Delhi, which has resolutely sought to keep its ties with Kabul primarily political, may have to step up security cooperation. Nobody knows where that would lead.

The irresponsible concessions made by the U.S. in this agreement will likely disrupt South Asia for years to come, and endanger its own relationship with India going forward. But worst of all, this deal abandons those in Afghanistan who, under the shadow of war, tried to develop, for the first time, institutions that work for all Afghans. No amount of sanctimony about “ending America’s longest war” should obscure the danger and immorality of this sort of exit.