IS militants on a self-destructive mission blow up the ancient city of Nimrud

#ISIS #Nimrud #Assyrian #Mesopotamia #ancientartefacts #Mosul Those among the Islamist State militants who are masterminding the self-destructive missions by ruining ancient towns like Nimrud need to realize that their activities cannot last forever and that they are not invincible or immortal. When they are gone, so would have been reduced to rubble the ancient monuments that make up the history of any city and make the world feel proud of them.
In their latest act of vandalism, the Islamic State militants have blown up the ancient city of Nimrud as a part of their "cultural cleansing" of Iraq and Syria as reported in news.sky.com dated 12 April 2015. But – what will they replace it with? Do they have any plan to build another city which people thousand years hence would boast about?

To confirm their misdeed, they have posted a video online which apparently shows the terror group's fighters smashing artefacts at the 3,000-year-old site near Mosul in northern Iraq. In the video can be seen militants with large barrels of powder in a room lined with gypsum slabs, beautifully carved with representations of Assyrian figures.
As far as history of Mesopotamia goes, Nimrud was founded in the 13th century BC and contains one of the most famous archaeological sites in a country which has been dubbed to be the cradle of civilization. Due to its importance, it was on UNESCO's tentative list of world heritage sites.
During the destruction, there was a huge explosion and then, IS fighters hacked away at the statues with sledgehammers and carved them up with angle grinders.
In the opinion of Middle East expert Professor Fawaz Gerges, from the London School of Economics, the Islamic State is a "social epidemic" that is "culturally cleansing" an area the size of the UK and the video now released should be seen as a "powerful propaganda tool" to counter set-backs they are facing on the battlefield.

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Gradually diminishing Arctic Ice means rise in sea level and is not a good sign

#arcticocean #bobward #alaska #sealevelrise #climatechange Based on satellite records that have been maintained since 1979, it has been observed that sea ice in the Arctic Ocean has fallen to the lowest recorded level for the winter season. This is as per the US scientists of the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado in Boulder. This has been reported in bbc.com dated 19 March 2015.
The maximum ice this year was 14.5 million sq km and, it is found that the Arctic sea ice had thinned by 65% between 1975 and 2012.
This gradual disappearance of ice at the poles is not a healthy sign for the planet because it will have severe consequences for people, animals and plants not just in the polar regions but also around the world due to rise in sea level.
Thus is the caution sounded by Bob Ward of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics. In the opinion of scientists, an unusually warm February in parts of Alaska and Russia could have been a contributory factor for the dwindling sea ice.

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Global warming is for real – 2014 was hottest year since records began to be kept 1880

#globalwarming #climatechange #NOAA #NASA It is now a fact that global warming is no figment of the imagination but is for real and it would be a mistake to ignore it and its implications. US scientists have claimed that 2014 was the hottest year ever since 1880 when records have begun to be maintained.
It has been revealed that temperatures across the world averaged 0.8°C (1.4°F) above 20th century averages – thus, 2014 has become the warmest year in records dating back 134 years. In UK, the Met Office has already announced that 2014 was the hottest year for the UK since 1910 when records have started to be kept.
Several agencies have confirmed this trend. NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) scientists have released data that indicates that 2014 is the warmest on record. This has been endorsed by NASA scientists who claim that their analysis of surface temperature measurements suggests the long-term warming of the planet.
NOAA scientists have concluded that from 1880 onwards, the average surface temperature of planet Earth has warmed by about 0.8°C (1.4°F) over the 20th century average. This, in their opinion, was due to increase in carbon dioxide, apart from other man-made emissions into the atmosphere. And - the greater part of this global warming has taken place within the past three decades.
As Bob Ward, policy director of the Grantham Research Institute at the London School of Economics, has remarked – the latest findings completely exposes the myth that global warming has stopped and politicians cannot overlook the scientific evidence and insist that global warming is a hoax.