The world is inching closer to nuclear Armageddon, a group of prominent scientists and security experts said on Friday.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has kept a Doomsday clock since 1947 as a reminder of the dangers of nuclear proliferation.
The clock will be moved forward on Wednesday at simultaneous events in Washington and London whose speakers will include physicist Stephen Hawking, the Chicago-based periodical said in a statement.
The Bulletin warned that the world had entered a "Second Nuclear Age marked by grave threats."
Nuclear ambitions
It cited the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea; escalating terrorism; unsecured nuclear materials in Russia and elsewhere; the continuing "launch-ready" status of 2,000 of the 25,000 nuclear weapons held by the US and Russia; and "new pressure from climate change for expanded civilian nuclear power that could increase proliferation risks."
First set at seven minutes to midnight -- a phrase that has become part of pop culture -- the clock has been moved 17 times in response to global events.
Recent shift
The most recent shift was in 2002 when it moved two minutes forward because the US withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and terrorists were known to be seeking nuclear and biological weapons.
It currently stands once again at seven minutes to midnight, the closest to danger since the end of the Cold War.
Founded in 1945 by scientists who had helped develop the atomic bomb and were deeply concerned about the use of nuclear weapons, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists counts 17 Nobel laureates among its boards of directors and sponsors.
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