<table> </table> <strong><span class="subhead">Food help to Pakistan</span></strong></p><p><strong>From the<em><strong> Dawn</strong></em>, Karachi, Pakistan</strong></p><p>At its annual meeting in Madrid recently, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) promised to provide $2 billion in loans in 2008 and 2009 to finance agricultural infrastructure projects such as rural roads and irrigation systems to help boost farm output in countries that already had a large food deficit.</p><p>The World Bank at its last annual meeting made similar commitments. These offers of concessional assistance have opened a new window of opportunity for Pakistan, which is facing the prospect of coping with high food prices while millions of its citizens are already going hungry.</p><p><strong><span class="subhead">Russian revolution</span></strong></p><p><strong>From <em><strong>The Korea Herald</strong></em>, Seoul</strong></p><p>Something of a political Alice in Wonderland tale is being written in Moscow, where Vladimir Putin is turning over the presidency to Dmitry Medvedev, his deputy for nearly two decades. A constitutional amendment will be made &#8212; with more than a two-thirds majority secured by the ruling United Russia Party and its allies &#8212; to extend the presidential tenure to seven years from the present four. That would allow the next president to remain in office until 2026.</p><p>If everything goes as he apparently wishes, Putin will have to remain in his new office for only two years before returning to the presidency.