30 September 2026
King Mohammed VI appointed Fatima Zahra Mansouri, 50, as prime minister of Morocco on 29 September 2026. She is the first woman to hold the post in Morocco and the second in the Arab world after Tunisia's Najla Bouden. She belongs to the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), which won 97 of the 395 seats in the legislative elections held the previous week, short of the 198 needed for a majority. Mansouri was previously urban planning minister and mayor of Marrakesh. Her first task is to build a governing coalition.
Seats won by PAM:
97 of 395
Majority mark:
198
Why it matters for exams: First woman prime minister of Morocco: a standard pointer for world politics and women in leadership.
Kerala PSCUPSC
30 September 2026
Puntland authorities said security forces rescued the tanker MT Honour 25, which was hijacked off Somalia in April 2026. The Palau-flagged vessel was carrying 18,500 barrels of oil. The Puntland Information Ministry said the pirates on board killed five of the crew before the operation began. The deaths appear to be the first at the hands of Somali pirates in more than a decade. Experts attribute the revival of Somali piracy in 2026 in part to the effects of the war on Iran.
Crew killed:
5
Cargo:
18,500 barrels of oil
Why it matters for exams: Maritime security and piracy near key sea lanes recur in security and geography questions.
Kerala PSCUPSC
30 September 2026
A Russian drone struck the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine in the historic centre of Kyiv, near the German Embassy, killing at least two people. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko condemned the attack. Volodymyr Horbulin, a former secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defence Council, was slightly wounded and his assistant was killed. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at least nine people were killed in Russian drone strikes across the country. More than 80 people were wounded nationwide.
Killed at the Academy:
at least 2
Killed nationwide (Zelenskyy):
at least 9
Why it matters for exams: Tracks how the Russia-Ukraine war is going; attacks on cultural and scientific institutions are a recurring current-affairs theme.
Kerala PSCUPSC
30 September 2026
On 30 September 2026 the World Health Organization published 'Reducing alcohol-related harm: SAFER implementation handbook'. It gives practical guidance for countries, communities and institutions that want to put WHO's SAFER initiative into practice. SAFER sits under the Global alcohol action plan 2022-2030. The handbook covers the five SAFER intervention areas and the connected strategies of Implement, Monitor and Protect.
Action plan period:
2022-2030
SAFER intervention areas:
5
Why it matters for exams: WHO programmes and action-plan periods are common in health and international organisation questions.
Kerala PSCUPSC
30 September 2026
On 30 September 2026 WHO published the 120-page manual 'Prevention and management of heat-related illness at mass gatherings: considerations for implementation'. It treats extreme heat as a growing health, safety and operational risk for large public events. It sets out three health risk management phases: preparation, impact mitigation and recovery. A separate Risk Assessment Tool spreadsheet accompanies the manual. It applies where access to safe water, cooling, transport or medical care is limited.
Manual length:
120 pages
Risk management phases:
3
Why it matters for exams: Climate-linked health risks and WHO guidance are frequent in health and environment questions.
Kerala PSCUPSC
Background
The full name of INTERPOL is the International Criminal Police Organization, and it is an inter-governmental organization. It has 196 member countries and helps police in all of them work together, enabling them to share and access data on crimes and criminals and offering technical and operational support. The General Secretariat coordinates its day-to-day activities and is run by the Secretary General. The General Secretariat is staffed by both police and civilians and comprises a headquarters in Lyon, a global complex for innovation in Singapore and several satellite offices in different regions. In each country an INTERPOL National Central Bureau, or NCB, is the central point of contact for the General Secretariat and for other NCBs. An NCB is run by national police officials and usually sits in the government ministry responsible for policing. The General Assembly is the governing body of the organization and brings all countries together once a year to take decisions. All its actions are politically neutral and are taken within the limits of existing laws in different countries, which lets police work directly with their counterparts even between countries which do not have diplomatic relations.
Full name:
International Criminal Police Organization
Member countries:
196
General Secretariat headquarters:
Lyon
Global complex for innovation:
Singapore
Governing body:
General Assembly, which brings all countries together once a year
National point of contact:
INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB)
Why it matters for exams: Questions on this organisation turn on its full name, its headquarters, its membership figure and the National Central Bureau through which a country's police must route a request, and candidates often wrongly assume it has officers who can make arrests abroad.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
Background
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST, or Webb) is a joint project between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). It has a segmented primary mirror with a diameter of 6.5 metres that collects almost six times more light than the Hubble Space Telescope. The wavelength range covered by its scientific instruments is about 0.6 μm to 28 μm (visible to mid-infrared light), while the Hubble Space Telescope observes at 0.1–2.5 microns. Webb carries four science instruments: the MIRI mid-infrared camera and spectrograph, the NIRSpec near-infrared spectrograph, the NIRCam near-infrared camera, and the FGS-NIRISS combined fine guidance sensor and near-infrared imager and slitless spectrograph. The observatory operates approximately 1.5 million kilometres from Earth, in an orbit around the second Lagrange point of the Sun-Earth system, L2. A giant, five layered shield of 22×12 metres keeps the telescope and its instruments permanently in the shade, where they cool down to –233 °C; MIRI is cooled further, to –266 °C. The telescope launched on 25 December 2021 on an Ariane 5 ECA rocket from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana. The mission honours NASA's second administrator, James E. Webb, and was previously known as the Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST). In return for Europe's contributions, European scientists get a minimum share of 15% of the total observing time.
Primary mirror diameter:
6.5 metres, segmented
Wavelength range:
about 0.6 μm to 28 μm
Operating position:
approximately 1.5 million kilometres from Earth, around L2
Launch mass:
6200 kg
Partners:
NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA)
Why it matters for exams: Space observatories are a standing question area, and examiners ask which telescope works in infrared, how far out L2 lies and why a sunshield is needed.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
Background
The carbon dioxide data on Mauna Loa constitute the longest record of direct measurements of CO2 in the atmosphere. They were started by C. David Keeling of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in March of 1958 at a facility of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA started its own CO2 measurements in May of 1974, and they have run in parallel with those made by Scripps since then. The Mauna Loa data are being obtained at an altitude of 3400 m in the northern subtropics, and may not be the same as the globally averaged CO2 concentration at the surface. Every monthly mean is the average of daily means, which are in turn based on hourly averages, but only for those hours during which background conditions prevail. Data are reported as a dry air mole fraction, the number of molecules of carbon dioxide divided by the number of all molecules in air after water vapor has been removed, expressed as parts per million (ppm): 0.000400 is expressed as 400 ppm. Due to the eruption of the Mauna Loa Volcano, measurements from Mauna Loa Observatory were suspended as of Nov. 29, 2022, observations from December 2022 to July 4, 2023 are from a site at the Maunakea Observatories, approximately 21 miles north of the Mauna Loa Observatory, and Mauna Loa observations resumed in July 2023. The CO2 data are now on the WMO X2019 scale.
Record begun:
March of 1958, by C. David Keeling of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Observatory altitude:
3400 m, in the northern subtropics
NOAA measurements begun:
May of 1974, in parallel with Scripps
Unit of reporting:
dry air mole fraction in parts per million (ppm)
Why it matters for exams: Climate change questions turn on where the evidence comes from, and this record is the standard example of a continuous atmospheric measurement series and of the units in which greenhouse gases are reported.
Kerala PSCUPSC
Background
In 1988, the World Health Assembly adopted a resolution for the worldwide eradication of polio, marking the launch of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), a global public-private partnership. Cases due to wild poliovirus have decreased by over 99% since 1988, from an estimated 350 000 cases in more than 125 endemic countries, to two endemic countries. Endemic transmission of wild poliovirus is continuing in areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Polio is a highly infectious viral disease that invades the nervous system; it is transmitted mainly through the faecal-oral route and multiplies in the intestine. Polio mainly affects children under 5 years of age, one in 200 infections leads to irreversible paralysis, and among those paralysed 5–10% die when their breathing muscles become immobilized. There is no cure for polio, it can only be prevented, and two vaccines are available: oral polio vaccine and inactivated polio vaccine. The WHO Region of the Americas was certified polio-free in 1994, followed by the WHO Western Pacific Region in 2000 and the WHO European Region in June 2002; on 27 March 2014 the WHO South-East Asia Region was certified polio-free, a bloc of 11 countries stretching from Indonesia to India, and in 2020 Africa became the fifth region to be certified wild poliovirus-free. Eradication would make polio the second human disease eradicated globally, after smallpox in 1980.
Initiative launched:
1988, by a World Health Assembly resolution
Fall in cases:
over 99% since 1988, from an estimated 350 000 cases
Endemic countries:
areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan
Vaccines in use:
oral polio vaccine and inactivated polio vaccine
Only disease eradicated so far:
smallpox, in 1980
Why it matters for exams: Examiners ask which diseases have been eradicated, which regions are certified polio-free, which two countries still report endemic wild poliovirus and the difference between the oral and inactivated vaccines.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
Background
The Strait of Hormuz, located between Oman and Iran, connects the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea. Chokepoints are narrow channels along widely used global sea routes that are critical to global energy security, and the inability of oil to transit a major chokepoint, even temporarily, can create supply delays, raise shipping costs and increase world energy prices. In 2022, oil flow through the Strait of Hormuz averaged 21 million barrels per day (b/d), or the equivalent of about 21% of global petroleum liquids consumption. Flows through the strait in 2022 and the first half of 2023 made up more than one-quarter of total global seaborne traded oil, and around one-fifth of global liquefied natural gas trade also transited the Strait of Hormuz in 2022. Only Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have operating pipelines that can circumvent the Strait of Hormuz: Saudi Aramco operates the 5-million-b/d East-West crude oil pipeline, and the UAE links its onshore oil fields to the Fujairah export terminal on the Gulf of Oman with a 1.5 million b/d pipeline. The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that around 3.5 million b/d of effective unused capacity from these pipelines could be available to bypass the strait in the event of a supply disruption. The U.S. Energy Information Administration also estimates that 82% of the crude oil and condensate that moved through the Strait of Hormuz went to Asian markets in 2022. China, India, Japan, and South Korea were the top destinations for crude oil moving through the Strait of Hormuz to Asia.
Location:
between Oman and Iran, connecting the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea
Oil flow:
21 million barrels per day (b/d) in 2022
Share of world consumption:
about 21% of global petroleum liquids consumption
Bypass pipelines:
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) only; an estimated 3.5 million b/d of effective unused capacity
Destination of crude:
an estimated 82% went to Asian markets in 2022
Why it matters for exams: Maritime chokepoints are a repeated map-and-economy question, and the Strait of Hormuz links physical geography to oil prices, shipping routes and Asian energy security.
Kerala PSCUPSCBank
Background
The North Atlantic Treaty was signed on 4 April 1949 by 12 founding countries. NATO now has 32 members, the latest being Finland (4 April 2023) and Sweden (7 March 2024). Article 5 says an armed attack against one member is an attack against all. Article 10 lets any European State that can further the treaty's principles join. The headquarters is in Brussels. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia and Ukraine are listed as aspiring members.
Members:
32
Founding members:
12
Headquarters:
Brussels
Why it matters for exams: NATO's structure, membership and Article 5 are perennial questions on international organisations.
Kerala PSCUPSC
Background
The African Union was officially launched in July 2002 in Durban, South Africa. It succeeded the Organisation of African Unity, which operated from 1963 to 1999. The OAU was founded in May 1963 when 32 independent African states met in Addis Ababa. The AU has 55 member states, covering all countries of the African continent, and its headquarters is in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Its long-term framework is Agenda 2063, with 15 flagship projects.
Member states:
55
Headquarters:
Addis Ababa
Why it matters for exams: The AU's origin, headquarters and Agenda 2063 are standard international-organisation questions.
Kerala PSCUPSC