Turkish Parliament approved a motion to extend Turkish armed forces troops' stay in Afghanistan as part of NATOs support mission, state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

According to the report, Parliament on Tuesday empowered the government to continue Turkish troops' presence in Afghanistan for two more years under the NATO mission starting on January 6.

A legislation put into effect on January 1, 2015, allowed the Turkish government to send troops to Afghanistan to support the NATO-led mission Resolute Support.

As the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force ended its 13-year combat mission in Afghanistan at the end of 2014, the mission evolved into training and advising of the nascent Afghan security forces.

Around 12,000 foreign troops from 28 NATO allies and 14 other partner nations agreed to support the NATO mission in Afghanistan.

The Tukish legislation that was passed in 2015 also grants the government authority to permit foreign army personnel to be transported to and from Afghanistan through Turkey.

A new technology can wireless charge almost any device including those without in-built wireless charging capabilities, such as Apple's iPhone and iPad.

The wireless charger developed by a French start-up, called Energysquare, was witnessed by CNET during the on-going CES trade show in Las Vegas.

Energysquare consists of a charging pad and a sticker that is placed on the back of a device. The sticker sports two electrodes along with a Micro-USB, USB-C or Lightning connector that is plugged into the device's charging port.

Once the device is placed on the pad, it starts charging.

One of the limitations of the sticker is that it blocks the device's charging port and if you want to charge the device normal way, the sticker needs to be removed — a flaw the company has acknowledged and promised that the upgraded version will include a port on the backside as well.

"Unlike other wireless chargers, which use electromagnetic induction, Energysquare relies on electric conduction. This allows for multiple devices to charge at once and at speeds that are comparable to a normal charge," the report noted.

Energysquare is priced at $89 and comes with a charging pad and five stickers.

According to a report on CNET on Tuesday, the company launched a Kickstarter campaign in May 2016 and is promising to ship the product in the coming months.

An Assam Rifles jawan has been killed and a civilian injured in an encounter with suspected militants at Khunthak village in Ukhrul district of Manipur.

The encounter took place in the hill district when the paramilitary forces were on a foot patrol on Tuesday, Assam Rifles sources said on Wednesday.

The jawan has been identified as 42-year-old Bhupal Singh, the sources said.

The troops retaliated but the militants escaped by taking advantage of the hilly terrain.

Real estate stocks led the front on Wednesday as traders continued to bid up construction companies in an otherwise dull market where volumes were missing. Local stocks ignored a strong close in most Asian markets as they took cues from flat to weak equities in Europe.

Trading action was concentrated in few sectors and that, too, mostly on the sell side. Bit gains were seen on capital goods companies, auto shares and fundamentally strong mid cap companies. Banking futures remained the favourite sell items along with FMCG counters and MNC companies in today's trade.

The Nifty shut shop at 8,193 points, mostly unchanged from its previous close. The index retraced from its intra-day high of 8,218 points

Here are the major highlights of Wednesday's trade:

* Real Estate stocks were on fire with their main index rising for the 7th session in a row. The NSE Realty Index traded at its highest level in nearly 2 months as heavy buying was seen in front line sectoral shares such as JP Associates, DLF, Indiabulls Real Estate and Sobha Developers. Eight out of 10 stocks making up the real estate index rose between 0.1-5.7 per cent.

* The Sensex closed with losses of 8 points at 26,635 points. Bharti Airtel was the top gainer. ICICI Bank was the top loser and HDFC was the most traded stock on the index.

* Bosch, Kotak Bank, Reliance Industries, ACC and Ambuja Cement fell 1.4-3.2 per cent and were among 24 shares that slipped on the Nifty.

* Bharti Infratel, Bharti Airtel, HCL Technologies, Bajaj Auto and BHEL rose between 2-3.2 per cent on the index and were among 27 gainers on the Nifty.

*Jubilant Lifesciences, Bharat Financials, Maruti and HDFC were the top traded shares by value on the NSE.

* Real estate stocks dominated the most active list of shares with hectic volume seen on IB Real Estate, HDIL and DLF apart from the daily presence of JP Associates and Unitech.

*Broader markets slipped with the Nifty 100, 200 and 500 indices ending marginally lower.

* All four banking benchmarks lost between 0.7-0.9 per cent. Metals and Pharma indices slipped as well while the IT index was the top gainer, up 1.3 per cent, apart from the Real Estate benchmark that surged 2.3 per cent.

* Bulls made their presence felt on stocks such as Titan, Ashok Leyland, NMDC, Indigo and Havells.

* Stocks that came under selling pressure included Cummins India, Hindustan Zinc, Divis Labs and housing finance companies LIC and Indiabulls.

* The most tracked benchmarks may have ended flat to negative, but bulls retained control of sentiment on Dalal Street where 935 shares gained versus 654 that fell.

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday asked the Centre and a city-based TB hospital whether it can make available to a patient, suffering from an extensively drug resistant variant of the disease, a new medicine which is not available in the market and is only supplied by the manufacturer.

Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva asked the Lal Ram Swarup (LRS) TB hospital to file an affidavit stating whether the 18-year-old female patient meets the requirements under the WHO guidelines and Revised National TB Control programme for being treated by Bedaquiline, made by US drug company Johnson and Johnson.

The court asked the hospital to also respond to the contention, by an expert in the field of TB treatment, that it was not following the guidelines by calling for further drug sensitivity tests before administering the drug, which according to the patient's father is the last option for her.

The father, Kaushal Tripathi, has sought that if the hospital was not willing to take the risk of administering the drug without further tests then he be provided the medicine and he will get it administered by some other hospital or doctor.

The hospital, in its defence, said that it was following the protocols put in place for administering the drug and same cannot be flouted by it.

The court, however, said that sometimes in the medical profession judgement calls are made after informing the patient about the risk and same can be done in the instant case.

It said that in the case the patient was willing to take the risk.

It also said that either the drug would cure her or will speed up the end-result of the illness.

The court asked the central government and the hospital to file their affidavits within three days and listed the matter for hearing on January 9.

Tripathi in his plea has also sought easier access to the medicine as it is available only at the six TB centres in India.

According to the petitioner, there is a second drug — Delamanid by Japanese drugmaker Otsuka Pharma — but it is not available in India and would need to be imported.

Srinagar recorded the first snowfall of the season as most areas in the Valley and its plains received overnight snow and rains that provided much-needed relief from the intense cold as the mercury rose due to cloud cover.

Srinagar recorded snow and rains equivalent to rainfall of 12.4 mm during the last 24 hours, an official of the Meteorological Department here said.

The city registered a minimum temperature of minus 0.1 degrees Celsius – up by half a degree from minus 0.6 degrees Celsius on Tuesday, the official said.

Gulmarg, the star attraction for tourists visiting the Valley during winter, recorded about 40 cm (15.7 inches) of snow since Tuesday morning, the official said.

He said the famous ski-resort registered a low of minus 3.6 degrees Celsius, same as that of the previous night.

The official said around two feet of snow was recorded in the peripheral areas of the resort including in the areas of Khilanmarg, Kongdoori and Apperwath.

Due to the cloudy sky, the night temperature at most places in Kashmir division rose, providing relief to the people from the intense cold conditions.

The other areas which witnessed snowfall included Ganderbal, Keran, Machil, Karnah, Gurez, Shopian, Sonamarg and Amarnath cave along with surrounding areas.

Leh, in the frontier region of Ladakh, continued to remain the coldest place in the state with a low of minus 7.7 degrees Celsius – up from the previous night's minus 10.5 degrees Celsius.

Kupwara, in north Kashmir, recorded 9 cm snow, while the night temperature there settled at a low of minus 0.9 degrees Celsius.

The famous health resort of Pahalgam in south Kashmir, which serves as a base camp for the annual Amarnath Yatra, received 12.5 cm snow, the official said, adding that the resort recorded a low of 0.2 degrees Celsius.

Kokernag town in south Kashmir registered a minimum of 0.1 degrees Celsius and recorded 2.4 mm of rains, the official said. Qazigund the gateway town to Kashmir valley recorded 3.2 mm of rainfall and the night temperature there settled at a low of 0.6 degrees Celsius.

The five-month long dry spell in Kashmir, the longest in nearly four decades, ended yesterday as high altitude areas, including Gulmarg, experienced snow while most of the plains were lashed by rains.

The Met office has forecast wet weather over the next five days with widespread to fairly widespread snowfall or rains between Wednesday and Saturday.

Srinagar recorded the first snowfall of the season as most areas in the Valley and its plains received overnight snow and rains that provided much-needed relief from the intense cold as the mercury rose due to cloud cover.

Srinagar recorded snow and rains equivalent to rainfall of 12.4 mm during the last 24 hours, an official of the Meteorological Department here said.

The city registered a minimum temperature of minus 0.1 degrees Celsius – up by half a degree from minus 0.6 degrees Celsius on Tuesday, the official said.

Gulmarg, the star attraction for tourists visiting the Valley during winter, recorded about 40 cm (15.7 inches) of snow since Tuesday morning, the official said.

He said the famous ski-resort registered a low of minus 3.6 degrees Celsius, same as that of the previous night.

The official said around two feet of snow was recorded in the peripheral areas of the resort including in the areas of Khilanmarg, Kongdoori and Apperwath.

Due to the cloudy sky, the night temperature at most places in Kashmir division rose, providing relief to the people from the intense cold conditions.

The other areas which witnessed snowfall included Ganderbal, Keran, Machil, Karnah, Gurez, Shopian, Sonamarg and Amarnath cave along with surrounding areas.

Leh, in the frontier region of Ladakh, continued to remain the coldest place in the state with a low of minus 7.7 degrees Celsius – up from the previous night's minus 10.5 degrees Celsius.

Kupwara, in north Kashmir, recorded 9 cm snow, while the night temperature there settled at a low of minus 0.9 degrees Celsius.

The famous health resort of Pahalgam in south Kashmir, which serves as a base camp for the annual Amarnath Yatra, received 12.5 cm snow, the official said, adding that the resort recorded a low of 0.2 degrees Celsius.

Kokernag town in south Kashmir registered a minimum of 0.1 degrees Celsius and recorded 2.4 mm of rains, the official said. Qazigund the gateway town to Kashmir valley recorded 3.2 mm of rainfall and the night temperature there settled at a low of 0.6 degrees Celsius.

The five-month long dry spell in Kashmir, the longest in nearly four decades, ended yesterday as high altitude areas, including Gulmarg, experienced snow while most of the plains were lashed by rains.

The Met office has forecast wet weather over the next five days with widespread to fairly widespread snowfall or rains between Wednesday and Saturday.

Storage and data management company NetApp leads in the All Flash Array (AFA) Storage category for third quarter of the 2016, the company said on Wednesday.

An all-flash array is a solid state storage disk system that contains multiple flash memory drives instead of spinning hard disk drives. 

According to the market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC), NetApp has grown faster than the All Flash Array market as a whole and has an overall market share of 28 per cent in India.

"With data centers going mainstream, the All Flash Array market in India is gaining significance and Flash solutions are revolutionising the enterprise IT industry," said Anil Valluri, President, NetApp India and SAARC, in a statement.

NetApp's All Flash Array Storage enables customers to accelerate their business without compromising efficiency, reliability, or IT flexibility, he added.

Welcoming the single-phase poll plan and the imposition of the Code of Conduct by the Election Commission in the state, Punjab Congress President Captain Amarinder expressed the confidence that the party would win more than 70 seats to emerge the clear winner in the Assembly polls, scheduled for Feb 4.

Dismissing any competition from either the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) or the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Captain Amarinder described drugs, corruption and the misgovernance of the Badal government as the key issues in these polls, which he said would be determined by the anti-incumbency factor against the Badals and the total collapse of AAP as a movement that had earlier inspired people.

Rollout of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime will be possible only by September as the GST Council is finding it tough to build a consensus over the issue of dual control of assesses, officials said on Wednesday.

“GST rollout looks more possible in September as consensus eludes over the issue of dual control of assesses,” Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Isaac told reporters here.

The issue of dual control or cross empowerment, which deals with assessee's jurisdiction, has been a major bone of contention between the Centre and the states, and the Council has been unable to find a common ground on it so far.

The Kerala Finance Minister on the issue of dual control said that the state is very firm that dealers and service providers below Rs 1.5-crore turnover should be entirely under the state's control.

Meanwhile, as the deadlock continues, the GST Council will meet again on January 16.

Welcoming the announcement of assembly polls for the state, Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Wednesday appealed the leaders and workers of all political parties to help the Election Commission (EC) for conducting the elections in a peaceful and fair manner, thereby respecting the ethos of peace, communal harmony and brotherhood.

In a statement issued here on Wednesday, the chief minister said that Punjabis have always upheld the lofty ideals and hoped that the glorious tradition would be maintained this time too.

The chief minister said that irrespective of political differences every party and leader has a right to disseminate their ideology and views to every household.

Badal said that the state government fully respects this and was committed to ensuring peaceful and fair elections.

Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane has said he will like central defender Pepe to sign a new contract with the club to continue playing in the Spanish football club next season.

Speaking ahead of Madrid's return to action against Sevilla in the King's Cup, Zidane explained that Pepe and Cristiano Ronaldo will both miss the game but he made special reference to Pepe, reports Xinhua.

The 33-year-old is out of contract with Madrid at the end of the current season and as of January 1 he has been able to negotiate a move to another club.

"He is a Real Madrid player and he is important for us as he has spent 10 years at the club and made history here. I would like him to continue," said Zidane.

He was also asked about out of favour forward James Rodriguez. The Colombian has been reduced to a bit-part role and showed his frustration in the World Club Cup when he openly discussed leaving the club.

"He is an important player for Real Madrid and I treat him just the same as anyone," said the Madrid coach, who said James was "in a complicated moment".

"When you don't play in a final you are angry. I know it can be difficult, but it is difficult for everyone," he added.

Zidane will complete his first anniversary as coach after replacing Rafael Benitez midway last season this week.

He admitted that when he stepped into the Madrid hot-seat he has been "stressed, but all of that is over now".

The Centre has asked state governments to ensure that no additional charges are levied on e-payments to urban local bodies and also consider rolling out incentives like cash back on utility bills paid through digital means.

"I request you to motivate all Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) in your state to switch over to electronic transactions for their payments as well as receipts," Union minister M Venkaiah Naidu said in letters to state urban development ministers.

He said ULBs can play "very important and motivational role" in the drive towards cashless economy by arranging awareness camps and opening accounts, among other steps.

The Urban Development Minister suggested ULBs to consider launching incentives like giving one per cent cash back on utility bills paid through various e-platforms.

"We must incentivise digital transactions and ensure that no additional fees, charges, etc, are levied for such transactions," he said.

He said ULBs on one hand can switch over to 100 per cent e-payment of all their incomes– like collection of taxes, charges, license fee, lease rent– and can ensure electronic payments for salaries, contractual obligations and other benefits like social security pensions.

Naidu said the Centre has launched a "massive drive" to promote payments through cards and digital means which will help India move towards a "less-cash economy", which will offer benefits like anywhere-anytime availability of services, real-time update of records and ease and transparency in transactions.

Earlier, the Urban Development Ministry had held a video conference with 4,041 cities and states officials to sensitise and motivate them to switch over to e-payments.

Hollywood star Ryan Reynolds says his wife Blake Lively brings him out from the moments of stress.

The "Deadpool" star, who is nominated in the best actor, musical or comedy category at Golden Globes 2017, said he almost had a nervous breakdown close to the premiere of the Marvel movie, reported Variety.

"By the time we were in (post-production), we'd been to Comic-Con, and people went crazy for it. The expectations were eating me alive. Blake helped me through that. I'm lucky to have her around just to keep me sane," Reynolds said.

The star also opened up about his struggle with anxiety.

"I have three older brothers. Our father was tough. He wasn't easy on anyone. And he wasn't easy on himself. I think the anxiety might have started there, trying to find ways to control others by trying to control myself. At the time, I never recognised that. I was just a twitchy kid," he said.

Acknowledging that he is not a "miracle-maker", the new UN chief Antonio Guterres has said that conflicts in the world are multiplying and interlinked and have triggered "a new phenomenon of global terrorism".

Speaking to his staff on his first day at the UN headquarters after taking over the world body's reins from Ban Ki-moon, 67-year-old Guterres said his election as the UN chief has generated a lot of expectations but he cautioned that there are no miracles.

"I think we should have no illusions. We are facing very challenging times. On one hand, we see everywhere in the world conflicts that multiply, that are interlinked, that also have triggered this new phenomenon of global terrorism, conflicts in which international humanitarian law is not respected, situations in which we see massive human rights violations, even refugee law is no longer as respected as it was few years ago," he said.

"I am sure I am not a miracle-maker. And the only way for us to be able to achieve our goals is to really work together as a team, and to be able to deserve to serve the noble values enshrined in the Charter (of the United Nations)," he said.

The former Portuguese prime minister said "nations are failing to recognise that there is a unifying factor in everything we do." 

"And that factor is people. People is undivided. And when we look at the different areas of action in the UN, we need to integrate them, because people integrate them on the receiving end," he said.

Guterres also stressed on the need to ensure that "we are able to reform the UN development system as Member States have asked us, and we need to try to get rid of this straight jacket of bureaucracy that makes our lives so difficult in many of the things we do.

"This requires a lot of effort from ourselves, but this also requires a lot of discussion and dialogue and mutual understanding with Member States and we need to overcome many of the divides that still exist within the organisation." 

Guterres called for teamwork, saying it is not enough to the "do the right thing, we need to earn the right to do the right thing." 

"It is important for us to recognise our achievements but we also need to recognise our shortcomings, to recognise our failures and where we are not able to deliver as we should," he said, outlining the multitude of challenges ranging from complex conflicts to global terrorism confronting the world.

Guterres' first day at UN Headquarters as Secretary General began with the laying of a wreath at the Memorial Wall.

Shortly after taking office two days ago, he made an appeal for peace. "Let us make 2017 a year in which we all citizens, governments, leaders strive to overcome our differences," Guterres said Sunday morning, urging people to share his New Year's resolution: "Let us resolve to put peace first."

Trinamool Congress activists on Wednesday protested in front of the CBI office here to denounce the arrest of two of its MPs in connection with the Rose Valley group chit fund scam.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has brought two MPs – Tapas Pal and Sudip Bandyopadhya – to Bhubaneswar after arresting them in Kolkata.

Party workers led by TMC MLA Akhil Giri staged a demonstration in front of the CBI office here.

They also announced a mega rally on January 10 in Bhubaneswar.

They alleged that the arrests were politically motivated and was a conspiracy of the central government.

"The BJP has hatched a vain plan to eliminate our party after Mamata Banerjee took out a nationwide movement against demonetisation. The allegations against our MPs are completely baseless", Giri said.

The Union Cabinet, at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday, approved the signing of an MoU between India and Kenya on agriculture and associated areas, said an official release.

"The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between India and Kenya on bilateral cooperation in the field of agriculture and allied sectors," said a Cabinet release.

A Joint Working Group would be constituted, with representatives from both countries, to develop programmes for execution of the MoU and will also monitor their implementation, the release said.

The MoU would cover various activities in the field of agricultural research, animal husbandry and dairy, livestock and fisheries horticulture, natural resource management, soil and conservation, water management, irrigation farming systems development and associated fields.

"The MoU shall enter into force on the day of signing and shall remain valid for a period of five years and shall automatically be renewed for a subsequent period of five years unless either Party notifies the other in writing, six months before the expiry of the validity period of the intention to terminate it," the release added.