• National

Govt sets up a tribunal for adjudicating ban on LTTE

• The Union government has constituted the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Tribunal to adjudicate whether/ not there is enough cause for declaring the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as an unlawful association.
• The Tribunal is comprised of sitting Judge of Delhi High Court Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal.
• Earlier, the Home Ministry had issued a notification extending ban on LTTE in India for a further period of five years.
• Government of India under the provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 declares LTTE as an unlawful association.
• LTTE was banned in India after the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.

• International

PM Modi To Host Xi Jinping For An Summit

• PM Modi will host Chinese President Xi Jinping this year for an informal summit, a foreign ministry spokesman said after meeting several times over the past year to try to defuse tension.
• The two held their first informal summit in Wuhan in April 2018 and at that meeting President Jinping had accepted PM Modi’s invitation to come to India for a second meeting.

• International

Papua New Guinea PM resigns

• Papua New Guinea’s embattled Prime minister stepped down capping a months-long political crisis and calling a multi-billion-dollar French and US-backed gas deal into question.
• Apart Facing a string of cabinet resignations and a vote of no confidence he looked sure to lose, veteran leader Peter O’Neill told parliament he had handed his letter of resignation to the country’s governor general.

• International

Scott Morrison sworn in as Australia's Prime Minister

• Scott Morrison has been sworn in as Australia’s Prime Minister.
• He was sworn in by Queen Elizabeth’s official representative in Australia, Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove, at a ceremony in the capital, Canberra.
• Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack was also sworn in.
• Morrison’s revamped Cabinet, which includes a record seven women, and Australia’s first Aboriginal federal Cabinet member had also taken the oath.

• Sports

Ivo is the oldest man to win at Roland

• Croatia’s Ivo Karlovic became the oldest man to win a match at the French Open for 46 years, as he beat Spain’s fellow veteran Feliciano Lopez in a first-round duel.
• Karlovic became the oldest man to win, since Torben Ulrich in 1973 at the age of 44.
• He is also the oldest male player to win a Grand Slam match since Ken Rosewall, also 44, did so at the 1978 Australian Open.

• Appointments

IIT-Madras alumni appointed new CTO of Walmart

• Suresh Kumar’s appointment comes as Walmart is undertaking major investments in its e-commerce business.
• Suresh Kumar was associated with Google where he was serving as vice president and general manager of display, video, app ads and analytics.
• He holds a Bachelor of Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, and a PhD in engineering from Princeton University.

• Appointments

BS Dhanoa will be Chairman of COSC

• Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal Birender Singh Dhanoa received the baton of Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee from outgoing Chairman COSC
• Air Chief Marshal Birender Singh Dhanoa, an alumnus of Rashtriya Indian Military College and the National Defence Academy, was commissioned in the Flying Branch of Indian Air Force in June 1978.

• Important Days

29 May - International Day of UN Peacekeepers,

• The first UN peacekeeping mission was established on 29th May 1948.
• The objective is to pay tribute to the invaluable contribution by the uniformed and civilian personnel and to honour more than 3,800 peacekeepers who have lost their lives while rendering peacekeeping services.
• The theme of 2019 is “Protecting Civilians, Protecting Peace”.

• Obituaries

Nobel prize winning Physicist Murray Gell-Man passes away

• Nobel laureate and American physicist, Murray Gell-Mann (89-years) passed away at his home in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
• Gell-Mann transformed physics by devising a method for sorting subatomic particles into simple groups of eight based on an electric charge, spin and other characteristics.
• He called his method the “eightfold way” after the Buddhist Eightfold Path to enlightenment.
• Mann received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1969 for his work on the theory of elementary particles.

• States

Madhya Pradesh’s Orchha makes it to the tentative list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites

• The architectural heritage of Orchha town in Madhya Pradesh has been included in UNESCO’s tentative list of world heritage sites following a proposal sent by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to the U.N. body.
• The architectural heritage of Orchha town depict the peculiar style of the Bundela dynasty.
• Orchha is situated on the banks of the Betwa river, located around 80 km away from Tikamgarh district in Madhya Pradesh.
• Orchha was built by king Rudra Pratap Singh of Bundela dynasty in the 16th century.

• Miscellaneous

Bailey launches Digital Dilemma in Hindi

• John Bailey, President of Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (popularly known as Oscar Academy), e-launched the Hindi translation of an Academy Publication, “Digital Dilemma”, in Delhi.
• John Bailey said that the translation of the Academy publication into Hindi is important in order to reach out to film fraternity in India.

• Agreements

Sri Lanka signs tripartite agreement with India and Japan

• Sri Lankan Government has signed a tripartite agreement with India and Japan for development of eastern terminal of Colombo port.
• The Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) was signed in Colombo by Sri Lankan ports minister Sagala Ratnayake, Indian high commissioner to Sri Lanka Taranjit Singh Sandhu and a Japanese representative.
• As per the agreement, Sri Lanka Port Authority (SLPA) will hold 51% majority stake in the port development while Japan and India will have combined stake of 49 percent.
• The joint project reflects the longstanding goodwill and cooperation among the three countries.