3 November 2026
The United Nations said it had received a letter addressed to the Secretary-General from Wilson Joseph, who leads the 400 Mawozo gang based at Croix-des-Bouquets near Port-au-Prince. Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said receiving the letter did not mean the organisation endorsed its contents, acknowledged its author or took any position on it. The letter asked for dialogue with international forces and for a United Nations delegation to visit the group. Four Salvadoran soldiers serving with the Gang Suppression Force went missing in October during an attack by armed groups on the edge of Port-au-Prince, and El Salvador has since sent more than 2,000 troops; the United Nations said the great majority of them are not deployed under the Force. The Gang Suppression Force was created with Security Council backing to confront gangs, protect vital infrastructure and secure humanitarian aid, and it is authorised to have 5,500 personnel, far more than it has. Gangs control most of the capital, nearly 1.5 million Haitians have been driven from their homes and about 6.4 million people, more than half the population, need humanitarian assistance.
Authorised strength of the Force:
5,500 personnel
Salvadoran troops sent:
More than 2,000
Displaced in Haiti:
Nearly 1.5 million
People needing aid:
About 6.4 million
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are the Gang Suppression Force set up with Security Council backing in Haiti, its authorised strength of 5,500, the 400 Mawozo gang, and the scale of displacement and humanitarian need in Haiti.
UPSC
In plain words
GSF Gang Suppression Force — A force backed by the Security Council to act against armed gangs in Haiti.
3 November 2026
The International Organization for Migration has reported that more than 7,000 people have left their homes in Cabo Delgado province in northern Mozambique since late September, fleeing violence and the fear of attack by non-state armed groups. The agency counted 5,794 people displaced between 21 September and 13 October and another 1,235 between 14 and 27 October. Nearly 80 per cent of the recent arrivals are women and children, and the latest group includes 87 pregnant women, 58 older people, 18 people with disabilities and four children who arrived unaccompanied or separated from their families. The province already holds more than 205,000 displaced people spread across 84 sites, over half of them children. Food was named the most urgent need by 88 per cent of those assessed, followed by shelter at 71 per cent and healthcare at 44 per cent. Dana Graber Ladek, the agency's Chief of Mission in Mozambique, said host communities also need help, and the agency warned that falling funding is stretching its response.
Newly displaced since late September:
More than 7,000
Already displaced in the province:
More than 205,000 across 84 sites
Most urgent need:
Food, named by 88 per cent
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are Cabo Delgado as the northern province of Mozambique facing armed group violence, the International Organization for Migration as the agency that tracks displacement, and the figure of more than 205,000 already displaced across 84 sites.
UPSC
In plain words
IOM International Organization for Migration — The United Nations agency for migration, with its headquarters at Geneva.
3 November 2026
NASA and the company Starfish Space have concluded that the spacecraft Otter, flying the Small Spacecraft Propulsion and Inspection Capability demonstration, cannot be recovered. Operators made first contact after the 1 October launch but lost it during commissioning and were unable to restore two-way communication. Troubleshooting traced the trouble to the fault protection software, which is wrongly keeping the spacecraft's radio switched off. The demonstration was to approach and inspect inoperable objects of United States origin in low Earth orbit while testing propulsion, guidance, navigation and control, together with an articulating robotic boom. Its wider purpose was to mature industry technology for servicing, assembly and manufacturing in space, and to gather data on orbital debris. NASA funded the mission through the Advanced Research and Technology Division of its Research and Technology Mission Directorate, while support was managed by the Small Spacecraft and Distributed Systems programme at Ames Research Center in California.
Spacecraft:
Otter
Operator:
Starfish Space
Cause identified:
Fault protection software keeping the radio off
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are the full form of SSPICY, the spacecraft Otter and its operator Starfish Space, the mission's purpose of inspecting inoperable objects in low Earth orbit, and the role of Ames Research Center.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
SSPICY Small Spacecraft Propulsion and Inspection Capability — A NASA-funded demonstration of close approach and inspection of dead objects in orbit.
ISAM In-space servicing, assembly and manufacturing — Work done on satellites while they are still in orbit.
3 November 2026
NASA's Earth Observatory has described Typhoon In-fa, which reached super typhoon strength near the Mariana Islands, as an annular storm. Such a storm is nearly circular and lacks the prominent outer rainbands of a standard tropical cyclone, and it has an unusually large eye: the eyes of annular storms average about 45 kilometres across, against about 25 kilometres for a standard tropical cyclone. Annular storms are rare, making up about 4 per cent of tropical cyclones in the western North Pacific. In-fa was the fifth typhoon to affect the Mariana Islands this year. Typhoon Champi, in the same set of images, peaked with maximum sustained winds of nearly 300 kilometres an hour and, though it narrowly skirted Taiwan and Guam, brought damaging winds and heavy rain to both as well as to parts of China and Japan, before its remnants underwent extratropical transition and approached Alaska, the fourth ex-typhoon to reach Alaskan waters this year. The Northwest Pacific had recorded 25 named storms by late October, and a strong El Nino is a likely contributor to the activity. The pictures came from the Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera aboard the DSCOVR satellite and from the MODIS instrument on Terra.
Average eye of an annular storm:
About 45 km across
Typical cyclone eye:
About 25 km
Share of annular storms in the western North Pacific:
About 4 per cent
Champi peak winds:
Nearly 300 km an hour
Named storms in the basin:
25 by late October
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are what an annular tropical cyclone is, that such storms are rare with eyes averaging about 45 km against about 25 km for a standard cyclone, the Mariana Islands as the chain In-fa passed, the instruments EPIC on DSCOVR and MODIS on Terra, and the extratropical transition that carries ex-typhoons to Alaska.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
EPIC Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera — A camera on the DSCOVR satellite that images the sunlit face of the Earth.
MODIS Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer — An imaging instrument carried on NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites.
3 November 2026
New figures from the International Telecommunication Union show that the median price of a basic mobile data plan in landlocked developing countries and in small island developing States has fallen below the internationally agreed affordability target of 2 per cent of average income. It is the first time either group has crossed that mark. Some 6.3 billion people now use the internet — 76 in every hundred people alive — against 6.1 billion counted a year ago. About 2 billion are still not connected at all. Prices are still high in the least developed countries, where a basic plan costs 6.1 per cent of average income, and three in ten economies meet neither the mobile nor the fixed broadband affordability target. Fifth-generation mobile networks reach 86 per cent of people in high-income countries but only 4 per cent in low-income countries. An average mobile user in a low-income country gets through 3.4 GB of data a month, about six times less than a user in a richer country. Secretary-General Doreen Bogdan-Martin said that in an age of artificial intelligence, being offline means being shut out of a great many opportunities.
Affordability target:
2 per cent of average income
People online:
About 6.3 billion, or 76 per cent
Cost in least developed countries:
6.1 per cent of income
5G coverage, low-income countries:
4 per cent
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are the 2 per cent of average income affordability target used by the International Telecommunication Union, the 6.3 billion people counted as online, the 6.1 per cent figure for least developed countries, and the ITU as the UN agency that publishes these figures.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
ITU International Telecommunication Union — The UN agency at Geneva for telecommunication standards, spectrum and connectivity data.
SIDS Small Island Developing States — A United Nations grouping of low-lying island countries with shared development problems.
2 November 2026
The Home Office has set out new rules under which the wait for indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom will turn on a migrant's earnings and record rather than being granted almost automatically after five years. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood called it an earned settlement model. The default waiting period becomes ten years. The highest earners may settle after three years, while those earning above £50,271 and some public service workers such as doctors, nurses and teachers keep a five-year route; care workers who met their visa conditions and earned at least £25,000 a year also keep five years. People who have breached immigration rules will wait at least twenty years, and those who arrived by small boat or clandestinely face a further ten years on top of that. Four conditions apply to everyone: a clean criminal record, English to a high standard, no debt owed to the taxpayer and a record of sustained National Insurance contributions. Settled status already granted will not be withdrawn. Present routes stay open for the relatives of British citizens, for Hong Kong British Nationals (Overseas) and for those serving in the armed forces. More than 500,000 people are expected to wait longer than five years as a result.
Default wait:
Ten years
Fast route for highest earners:
Three years
Care worker route:
Five years with at least £25,000 a year
Expected to wait longer:
More than 500,000 people
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are the name of the earned settlement model, the ten-year default wait for indefinite leave to remain, the Home Office as the department behind it, and the four conditions that apply to every applicant.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
ILR Indefinite leave to remain — Permanent residence status in the United Kingdom, short of citizenship.
3 November 2026
Nepal's National Planning Commission sat down with its Ministry of Youth, Labour and Employment at Nagarkot on 30 and 31 October. Over two days they drafted the country's road map under the Global Accelerator on Jobs and Social Protection for Just Transitions, and worked on two draft policies: a National Employment Policy and a National Care Economy Promotion Policy. The International Labour Organization and UN Women gave technical support. Nepal is a Pathfinder Country under the Global Accelerator, an initiative of the United Nations Secretary-General in which the Resident Coordinator's Office, the ILO, UNDP, UNICEF, UN Women and the World Bank take part. Participants named agriculture, tourism, construction, the care economy and digitalisation as the sectors to work on. Nepal's population aged 60 and above is projected to pass 7.1 million by 2051, which with continuing migration will push up the demand for care services. The proposals cover better coordination of vocational training across all three tiers of government, work on the National Qualifications Framework, and extending contributory social security to micro and small enterprises and to temporary and part-time workers. Both policies are to be finalised within 100 working days.
Nepal's status:
Pathfinder Country
Policies being drafted:
National Employment Policy and National Care Economy Promotion Policy
Population aged 60 and above by 2051:
More than 7.1 million
Deadline set:
100 working days
Why it matters for exams: The durable facts are the Global Accelerator on Jobs and Social Protection for Just Transitions as a Secretary-General's initiative, Nepal's status as a Pathfinder Country, the two policies being drafted, and the UN bodies that take part.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
ILO International Labour Organization — The UN agency at Geneva where governments, employers and workers sit together.
NPC National Planning Commission — Nepal's central planning body, which leads the Global Accelerator work there.
Background
Juice is the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, a spacecraft of ESA. It is to look closely at Jupiter and at three of the planet's big moons that are thought to hold oceans under their ice - Ganymede, Callisto and Europa. The craft lifted off on 14 April 2023 on an Ariane 5 from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana. Sunlight is weak that far out, so it carries solar wings of 85 square metres. Instead of flying straight there it is using gravity assists: a Moon-Earth pass, a swing by Venus, an Earth pass in September 2026, and a fourth, a further Earth pass, due in January 2029. ESA says the craft reaches Jupiter in July 2031 and will then make repeated close passes of the Jovian moons. The aim is to treat those moons as worlds in their own right and ask whether they could be habitats.
Launch:
14 2023, Ariane 5
Arrival at Jupiter:
2031
Moons studied:
Ganymede, Callisto, Europa
Why it matters for exams: Jupiter mission names, the moons they target and their launch vehicles are standard science questions in competitive papers.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
In plain words
Juice Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer — The ESA spacecraft sent to study Jupiter and its icy moons.
Gravity assist Gravity assist — A close pass by a planet or moon that changes a spacecraft's speed and direction without using fuel.
ESA European Space Agency — The space agency run jointly by European countries.
Background
Euclid is a space telescope of ESA built to study what the agency calls the dark Universe. It observes billions of galaxies to build a three-dimensional map of how matter is spread across space and time, reaching out to 10 billion light-years and covering more than a third of the sky. From that map astronomers hope to learn how the Universe expanded and what dark energy and dark matter actually do. The telescope went up on 1 July 2023 from Cape Canaveral in Florida on a SpaceX Falcon 9. It works from the Sun-Earth Lagrange point 2, about 1.5 million km from Earth. Its survey data is released to scientists in stages. In October 2026 ESA reported that Euclid had also picked up a new comet in its images.
Launch:
1 2023, Falcon 9
Station:
Sun-Earth Lagrange point 2
Sky covered:
more than 1/3 of the sky
Why it matters for exams: Dark energy, dark matter and the Lagrange points are frequently asked, and Euclid is the mission attached to them.
Kerala PSCUPSC
In plain words
Dark energy Dark energy — The unknown cause of the speeding up of the Universe's expansion.
Lagrange point Lagrange point — A point where the pull of two bodies lets a spacecraft keep station with little fuel.
ESA European Space Agency — The space agency run jointly by European countries.
Background
BepiColombo is the ESA mission sent to orbit Mercury, the least explored planet of the inner Solar System. ESA calls it the second and most complex mission ever to orbit the planet, because a spacecraft close to the Sun is harder to place than one sent to Saturn. It travelled as three joined parts: the Mercury Planetary Orbiter, the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter and the Mercury Transfer Module that carried both. It lifted off on 20 October 2018 on an Ariane 5 from Europe's Spaceport, and has taken years of looping flybys to slow into place. ESA's schedule puts arrival at Mercury in December 2026, with routine science from April 2027. Among the puzzles it is to settle are the ice in the polar craters of a scorched world, why so small a planet has a magnetic field, and what the hollows on its surface are. Mercury is a small desert world and the answers are expected to say something about the whole Solar System.
Launch:
20 2018, Ariane 5
Arrival at Mercury:
2026
Orbiters:
Mercury Planetary Orbiter, Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter
Why it matters for exams: Mercury, its magnetic field and the missions sent there are standard planetary science questions.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
In plain words
Magnetosphere Magnetosphere — The region around a planet where its magnetic field controls charged particles.
ESA European Space Agency — The space agency run jointly by European countries.
Background
Solar Orbiter is an ESA spacecraft sent to watch the Sun from closer than any craft before it. ESA calls it the most complex scientific laboratory ever sent to the Sun, and it is the first to look at the Sun's polar regions, which cannot be seen from the plane in which the planets move. It carries ten science instruments, some looking straight at the Sun and others measuring the gas and magnetism that flow past the craft. At its nearest it comes within 42 million kilometres of the Sun, and it climbs to about 33 degrees above the solar equator. It left Earth in February 2020, returned its first images in July 2020 and began routine science in November 2021. The questions set for it are what drives the Sun's 11-year cycle of activity, what heats the corona to millions of degrees, and how the solar wind forms and speeds up. Those answers matter on Earth, because the same solar wind drives the storms that disturb satellites and power lines.
Closest approach:
42 million kilometres
Above solar equator:
about 33 degrees
Routine science from:
2021
Why it matters for exams: The solar cycle, the corona and the solar wind are repeat questions, and this is the mission tied to them.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
In plain words
Corona Corona — The outer atmosphere of the Sun, far hotter than its visible surface.
Solar wind Solar wind — The stream of charged particles blowing out from the Sun across the Solar System.
ESA European Space Agency — The space agency run jointly by European countries.
Background
Hera is the ESA spacecraft sent to survey an asteroid that human beings have already moved. Its target is Dimorphos, the small moonlet going round a larger asteroid called Didymos, the pair forming a binary asteroid system. NASA's DART spacecraft was deliberately crashed into that moonlet to see whether a strike can shift an asteroid's path. Hera is to make the detailed survey after the impact, so that a one-off experiment becomes a technique that can be repeated and understood. ESA describes it as the first probe to rendezvous with a binary asteroid system, and as the flagship Planetary Defender of Europe. The craft also tests new technology, from steering itself around an asteroid to working in very weak gravity, and it releases two CubeSats of its own. The moonlet it is studying is about 151 metres across, and ESA has set the rendezvous for November 2026.
Target:
Dimorphos, moonlet of Didymos
Rendezvous:
2026
CubeSats carried:
2
Why it matters for exams: Planetary defence, the asteroid deflection test and the names of the two bodies involved are now standard science questions.
Kerala PSCUPSCSSC
In plain words
Binary asteroid Binary asteroid system — Two asteroids bound together, one going round the other.
CubeSat CubeSat — A very small satellite built in standard cube-shaped units.
ESA European Space Agency — The space agency run jointly by European countries.