News in Short

• India has initiated an anti-dumping probe against imports of a certain type of tiles, used for covering the floors in residential and commercial buildings, from China, Taiwan and Vietnam following a complaint by domestic players.
• The Commerce Ministry’s investigation arm Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) is probing the alleged dumping of “vinyl tiles other than in roll or sheet form”.
• If it is established that the dumping has caused material injury to the domestic players, the DGTR would recommend an anti-dumping duty on these imports.

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host the first India-Central Asia Summit to take ties to “newer heights”.
• The virtual event will see the participation of Presidents of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
• Apart from regional security and the Afghanistan issue, the key focus will be trade and connectivity, development partnership, culture, and people-to-people ties.

• China’s President Xi Jinping offered $500 million in assistance to the central Asia region and pledged to ramp up trade.
• Mr. Xi’s virtual summit with five countries was held “to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations”.
• The Chinese President pledged to “import more quality goods and agricultural products from countries in the region” and “strive to increase the trade between the two sides to $70 billion by 2030”.

• UK lifted most of the Covid-19 related restrictions including mandatory face masks. This happened as government's vaccine booster rollout successfully reduced serious illness and COVID-19 hospitalisations.
• The legal requirement for those infected to self-isolate for five full days remains, but measure will also end soon, to be replaced with advice and guidance for those infected to be cautious.
• Health officials are planning a longer-term, post-pandemic strategy that treats Covid-19 more like the flu.