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'Doomsday clock' moves closer to midnight

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have moved their clock one minute closer to midnight, the first change since 2010. (UPI Photo/Roger L. Wollenberg)
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have moved their clock one minute closer to midnight, the first change since 2010. (UPI Photo/Roger L. Wollenberg) | License Photo

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists says it has moved the hands of its famous "Doomsday Clock" a minute closer to midnight.

The clock now stands at five minutes to midnight because of inadequate progress on nuclear weapons reduction and proliferation and ongoing inaction on climate change, the bulletin Tuesday said in a statement.

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It is the first change for the clock since the minute hand was moved back from five minutes to six minutes before midnight in 2010.

"Two years ago, it appeared that world leaders might address the truly global threats that we face. In many cases, that trend has not continued or been reversed. For that reason, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is moving the clock hand one minute closer to midnight, back to its time in 2007," the statement said.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project.

The Doomsday Clock was created in 1947 using the imagery of apocalypse -- a countdown to midnight -- to convey the level of threats to humanity and the planet.

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