New Delhi, Feb. 5 : The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the proposal to set up two AIIMS-like institutions in Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal in the second phase of Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY).

The proposed institutions on the lines of the All India Institution of Medical Sciences will have a 960-bedded hospital intended to provide healthcare facilities in 39 speciality or super-speciality disciplines for each.

New Delhi - Indian Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon has said Pakistan's spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence was linked to the perpetrators of the Mumbai terrorist attacks, an official statement said Thursday.

"The perpetrators planned, trained and launched their attacks from Pakistan, and the organizers were and remain clients and creations of the ISI," Menon said in a speech in Paris as reported in New Delhi.

This is the first time the Indian government has directly named the Pakistani agency over the Mumbai carnage in which 173 people including 26 foreign nationals were killed.

New Delhi, Feb. 5 : Former Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kalyan Singh on Thursday took upon himself the "total" responsibility for Babri Masjid's demolition, as the then chief minister of Uttar Pradesh in 1992.

"I want to state that the incident that took place on December 6, 1992 in Ayodhya... I own total responsibility for it. I had even resigned from chief minister post on the same day," Kalyan Singh told media after a three-hour meeting with SP leaders Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh at his residence here.

New Delhi, Feb. 5, : United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday complimented the Health Minister Dr. Anbumani Ramadoss for his leadership in the health sector and described him as a public health champion.

Ban Ki-moon, who is in Delhi to attend Sustainable Development Summit, will also be presented Sustainable Development Award.

Ban Ki-moon discussed a wide gamut of health related issues with Dr. Ramadoss including National Rural Health Mission, impact of global financial crisis on health and climate change.

New Delhi, Feb. 5 : Commonwealth Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma has underlined the urgency to reform the international institutions and collective action by all governments to deal with the economic downturn.

Sharma, who is currently on a week-long visit to India, was addressing here today a conference on ''India and the Commonwealth: A transforming partnership.'

On the 60th anniversary of the Commonwealth, Sharma dwelt on the current global economic crisis, saying that the meltdown is all pervading which will affect one and all, as every sector of the economy will come in its grip.

New Delhi - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday called for a comprehensive agreement to tackle the climate change crisis while stressing that developed countries should reduce emissions by setting ambitious targets.

The UN chief was speaking at the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, organized to discuss the impact of climate change and global warming.

The summit with "Towards Copenhagen: an Equitable and Ethical Approach" as its theme comes ahead of negotiations in the Danish capital in December, which aim at cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions after the Kyoto protocol expires in 2012.