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8th March 2012British English edition

Issue Number 166

Newsademic.comThe informative easy to read introduction to world news

In this issue

Measuring T. rex’s biteSouth Atlantic islands disputeRaspberry PiPermian Pompeii?Virus hits farm animalsAncient penguinsTrain accident in PolandInca discoveryStudying Ötzi’s genesNew sawfish studyTrial in IcelandExplosion in CongoProtests over Koran-burningNuclear offer from North KoreaAcidification of the oceansCassava: climate change championFebruary’s extra dayNew Mozart music foundGermany’s mystery benefactorGlossary Crossword and Wordsearch Puzzle

Vladimir Putin makes his victory speech standing next to Dmitry Medvedev, the current president of Russia

On 4th March a presidential election was held in Russia. That evening, Vladimir Putin made a victory speech. He stood in Manezhnaya Square, near the centre of Moscow, the capital city, and spoke to a waiting crowd of about 100,000 people. He said ‘I promised you we would win; we won. Glory to Russia.’

Before his speech, officials had an-nounced that with 64% of the votes Mr Putin had easily beaten the four other election candidates. Standing next to him in the square was Dmitry Medvedev, the current president. Both he and Mr Putin are members of the same political party, United Russia.

Mr Putin has been Russia’s president before. He was first elected in 2000, and re-elected for another four years in 2004. During this period he was a popular leader. Yet not all Russians were pleased he had decided to stand for election again. They

believe Mr Putin has too much power and that Russia, while he is in charge, will never be a fully democratic country.

The latest presidential election was only the sixth to have taken place since the Russian-led Soviet Union broke apart in 1991. Before that, Russia was a communist country and one of the world’s two superpowers. The other was the USA.

Although the USA and Russia fought on the same side in the Second World War (1939 – 1945), they became enemies after it ended. Russia took over many countries in Eastern Europe that had been occupied by Germany during the war. These then became part of the communist-run Soviet Union. Although few people live in its north and east, Russia is the biggest coun-try in the world. At that time many other countries feared it because of its size, weapons, and huge army.

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However, in the late 1980s Rus-sia began to run out of money. Many of its factories stopped working. Long queues formed at food shops. People in some Soviet Union coun-tries began to protest. Many broke away and declared independence.

In 1991 the communist system in Russia collapsed. Elections were held for the first time. Boris Yeltsin became Russia’s first democrati-cally elected president.

Yet the change to a new kind of government was difficult. The rou-ble, the Russian currency, lost most of its value. Many Russian people’s savings became worthless. There was little food in the shops, and even bread became very expensive. In many places law and order began to break down.

President Yeltsin was re-elected in 1996. Before his second term as president finished, he recommended that Mr Putin take over. At the time Mr Putin was not well known.

After winning the election in 2000 Mr Putin decided strong lead-ership was needed. To make the changes he wanted, he began to re-strict some of the freedoms that had only just appeared in Russia. For ex-ample, television news stations and newspapers were no longer allowed to criticise the government. Political protests and demonstrations were also banned.

Russia has huge supplies of oil, gas, and other valuable natural re-sources. As president, Mr Putin reformed the Russian oil and gas companies. The country began to earn large amounts of money from selling these resources to other countries. The lives of many ordi-nary Russians improved. Although some people complained that Russia was not a proper democracy, most admired their president.

When Mr Putin’s second four-year term came to an end in 2008 many people wondered what would happen. Then the Russian constitu-tion – the rules by which the coun-try was governed – said a person could not be elected again as presi-dent after two successive periods of four years.

Mr Putin recommended Mr Medvedev should become the next president. With Mr Putin’s support, Mr Medvedev won easily. It was then arranged for Mr Putin to be-come the country’s prime minister.

Although the Russian constitution meant Mr Putin couldn’t be president for more than two four-year periods in a row, it didn’t say he couldn’t step down for a gap of four years and then stand for election again. Some peo-ple suspected this was what Mr Putin was planning to do. They turned out to be right.

Last September, Mr Medvedev announced he would not stand for election as president for a second time. Instead, he said he would support Mr Putin’s campaign to be elected again. Mr Putin then declared that if he were to win, Mr Medvedev would become prime minister.

This made some Russians angry. They said it was wrong that the two men could just decide to ‘swap jobs’ without being challenged. What’s more, in 2008 the constitution was changed. This means a Russian president is now elected for six years and not four.

At the beginning of December elections were held for Russia’s parliament, called the state Duma. The United Russia party won over half of the seats. Many people were surprised by the result. Some insisted there had been cheating and votes for other parties were deliberately miscounted.

In bigger cities such as Moscow and St Petersburg large anti-gov-ernment demonstrations took place. These were the first big street pro-test since the collapse of the com-munist system over 20 years ago. Some demanded that the elections be held again.

Moscow

St Petersburg

RUSSIA

After the Duma elections, many suspected there would be cheating in the presidential election to make sure Mr Putin won. Before the elec-tion several demonstrations were held. For example, on 26th Febru-ary thousands of people stood side by side on a long circular road that goes around Moscow.

As a sign of protest many of those who have been taking part in these demonstrations have been wearing white ribbons. Some even describe the recent protests as the ‘snow revolution’. Some peo-ple worry that Mr Putin may even make it more difficult for people to hold political demonstrations in the future.

Some Russians estimated cheat-ing in the presidential election prob-ably increased the votes for Mr Putin by about 10%. This, they say, means even if there were no cheating, Mr Putin would still have got more than 50% of the votes.

Mr Putin will officially take over from Mr Medvedev on 7th May. The next presidential election will not be held until 2018. If Mr Putin were to win that one as well, he would con-tinue to be Russia’s president until 2024. �


T. REX’S BITE

Tyrannosaurus rex, or T. rex, is often called the ‘king of the dinosaurs’. Now scientists have used laser im-ages of a T. rex’s skull to work out the force of its fearsome bite.

Fossilised T. rex skeletons show some were 13 metres (43 feet) long. The dinosaur had a large skull and rows of very sharp teeth. In the past, scientists estimated its bite had a force of between 8,000 and 13,000 newtons. This is around the same strength as the jaws of a modern-day large crocodile. However, the scien-tists say their new study suggests a T. rex’s bite was much stronger.

‘Sue’ in the museum in Chicago

The scientists used a T. rex skull from a local museum and made a laser scan of it. Having created a 3D (three dimensional) image, they were able to add, or map, the mus-cles of the skull. By activating the computer image’s muscles around the jawbones, the scientists worked out how much force was in the dino-saur’s bite.

Their calculations show the force was between 30,000 and 57,000 new-tons. One of the scientists described this force as ‘similar to being sat on by a medium-sized elephant’. The creature with the strongest bite liv-ing today is the Great White Shark. Its bite is about a third of the strength of a T. rex’s. Yet the scientists say it is difficult to make an exact compari-son between land creatures and those that live in the sea.

T. rex is one of the largest land carnivores, or meat-eaters, of all time. Some palaeontologists – sci-entists who study fossils and pre-historic life – are not sure whether it was a hunter or a scavenger. Most think the dinosaur was a fast-mov-ing predator that chased and caught smaller dinosaurs to eat. Others believe the T. rex lived mostly by eating the meat from the bodies of other animals that had already died or been killed. It’s possible the meat-eating dinosaur was both a hunter and a scavenger.

Fossilised T. rex skeletons are very valuable, especially ones that include nearly all of the bones. The most complete T. rex skeleton in the world was found in America. It has been nicknamed ‘Sue’, after the woman who discovered it in 1990. In 1996 Sue was sold for US$8.36 million (£5.3 million). It is now on display in a museum in Chicago, in the USA. �

SOUTH ATLANTIC DISPUTE

At the beginning of April both Ar-gentina and the UK plan to mark the 30th anniversary of the start of what is known to many as the Falklands War. As the anniversary gets closer, tensions between the countries have been rising.

Ms Fernández de Kirchner, president of Argentina

The Falklands are an archipela-go, or group of islands. In Argentina they are called the Malvinas. The islands are in the South Atlantic Ocean about 470 kilometres (290 miles) from the coast of Argentina. The government of the UK set up a naval base on the islands in 1840. Today, about 3,000 people live on the Falklands. Nearly all are de-scendants of people from the UK.

However, Argentina has always claimed it is the rightful owner of the Malvinas. In 1982 Argentina’s military government (or junta) sent an invasion force to the Falklands. Its soldiers quickly took over the islands. When they refused to leave the islands, the UK sent troops on several large ships to the South At-lantic. A war then broke out.

The Falklands War, or Guer-ra de Malvinas, lasted for about ten weeks. The Argentine forces were defeated and eventually sur-rendered. About 900 people were killed. Most of those who died were Argentine soldiers.

Soon after the end of the war the military junta in Argentina agreed

NEWSCASTVALUABLE DISCOVERY — Diamonds are the most valuable gems in the world – and one that has recently been found in Australia is causing a lot of excitement. Although dia-monds appear clear, many have a slight tint or colour. The gem dis-covered in Australia is a rare pink diamond, and, for a diamond, it’s very big. The diamond is 12.76 carats, which means it weighs just over 2.5 grams (0.08 ounces). The mining company says it has never found anything of such high qual-ity and size before. The pink dia-mond will now be sent to be cut and polished. It’s estimated that the polished diamond could be sold for as much as £20 million (US$31.5 million).


to hand over power. Elections were held both for a president and for oth-er political leaders. All of the coun-ty’s elected leaders have continued to insist that the Malvinas belong to Argentina.

During the last 12 months UK companies have been searching for oil and gas fields under the seabed close to the islands. More recently the UK government sent a new navy ship to the area. Argentina’s gov-ernment believes that any natural resources found close to the islands belong to Argentina. Cristina Fern-ández de Kirchner, the president of Argentina, made an official com-plaint to the United Nations (UN) about the navy ship.

Now large companies in Argen-tina have been told by their govern-ment not to buy goods from the UK. At the end of February two UK pas-senger ships were not allowed into ports in Argentina. They were told this was because both had just vis-ited the islands.

ARGENTINA

CHILE

PARAGUAY

URUGUAYBuenos Aires

Falkland Islands(Islas Malvinas)

SOUTHATLANTIC

OCEAN

PACIFICOCEAN

Only one airline company, from Chile, flies its planes to the Falkland Islands. The UK and Argentine gov-ernments agreed over ten years ago that these flights could take place. The flights go between the islands and Chile once a week. These planes have to fly over Argentina to get to Chile.

On 1st March Ms Fernández de Kirchner proposed that an Ar-gentine airline company should organise these flights instead. The planes, she said, would fly between the islands and Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. Yet some peo-ple living on the islands are suspi-cious. They worry Argentina could threaten to stop the flights if its rela-tionship with the UK gets worse in the future.

Owning an area of land or region is often known as sovereignty. The UK says it will be willing to dis-cuss sovereignty of the Falklands with Argentina only if the people who live on the islands agree. So far nearly all of them say they want to remain part of the UK. �

RASPBERRY PI

On 29th February an unusual mini-computer was launched in the UK. Called the Raspberry Pi, it has been designed to get young people inter-ested in learning how to write com-puter programmes.

The tiny computer, with dimen-sions of 8 x 5 centimetres (3 x 2 inches), is like a small circuit board. The Raspberry Pi Foundation de-signed it. This organisation is a charity. It therefore does not plan to make any money from selling its mini-computers.

The people who run the founda-tion say they think school children in the UK aren’t very interested in computing. Most have IT les-sons at school but these, the foun-dation says, only help students to use the software and computers without really understanding how they operate.

To get the Raspberry Pi to work, you have to create your own simple,

or basic, computer codes. This is meant to make users interested in writing their own software and un-derstanding how to do so.

Raspberry Pi

A Raspberry Pi runs the Linux operating system. It can be plugged into a television, which can then be used as a screen. A keyboard and mouse can be attached via a USB connection. So it is simi-lar to a PC, but small enough to be carried around in a student’s pocket. The Raspberry Pi does not have a very fast processor, but in-cludes one similar to those used in a smartphone.

The mini-computers, which are made in China, cost £22 (US$35). The foundation hopes this low price will encourage schools to buy one for each of their students.

Two UK companies are selling the Raspberry Pi. On the day they were launched, the first 10,000 sold out almost immediately. The foundation said this was ten times faster than they had expected. One company said gov-ernment officials from another country had contacted it because they were in-terested in buying the computers. Al-though the company did not say where the government officials came from some think it is likely to have been a country in the Middle East. The of-ficials said they wanted to give every female student a mini-computer. This, they said, would help girls to find a job after they left school. �


If you want to know what some of the Earth’s ancient forests were like, scientists from China and the USA have the answer. After studying an area of northern China, they have created pic-tures of what one forest, which existed 300 mil-lion years ago, would have looked like.

The remains of the forest were first discovered by a Chinese coal mining company. As the min-ers dug deeper into the ground, they realised they had uncovered something unusual. They stopped digging. Then they contacted palaeobota-nists – scientists who study fossilised plants and trees – at a Chinese university.

The scientists were amazed by what the miners had found. They believe the lower part of the forest had been buried in ash from an erupting volcano. This ash, they say, probably fell over a few days to a depth of about one metre (three feet).

As the ash fell and collected on tree branches, they became too heavy. The branches broke off and fell to the ground. Some smaller trees fell over because of the weight of the ash. Many of the things found within the layer of ash have been well preserved. This includes the fallen branches and the bases, or stumps, of the trees. Some of the fallen branches still even had leaves attached to them.

One of the leaders of the team of scientists said it was as if this part of the forest had been ‘frozen’ in time. He explains this is similar to what happened in Pompeii.

Pompeii was a Roman city in what we now call Italy. In the year 79, Mount Vesuvius, a nearby volcano, erupted. The city, as well as other towns close by, was completely buried in a thick layer of ash and pumice, a type of volcanic rock. When the eruption began, thousands of people rushed to

leave the towns around Mount Vesuvius. Yet many were killed as poisonous gasses and superheated clouds of ash sped down the sides of the volcano.

The city of Pompeii was accidentally rediscov-ered about 400 years ago. Over the last 100 years archaeologists have uncovered much of the city, as well as Herculaneum, a nearby town. As both were buried so suddenly, many buildings are well preserved. The discoveries at Pompeii have helped historians to understand and imagine how Ro-

man people lived nearly 2,000 years ago.

Thanks to the work of the palaeobotanists in China, we can now imagine what it would have been like to stand in a 300 million-year-old forest too. You would have been stand-ing in water up to your ankles. There were two layers of plants and trees. The lower one was made up of ferns

and other plants. Growing above these were taller trees, which had lots of cones and thin green leaves. Many of the plants and trees were very different from those we see today.

Millions of years ago the world’s continents were in different places from where they are now. The 300 million-year-old forest was growing at the beginning of a geological period known as the Per-mian. At that time the continents were slowly mov-ing closer together. Then the part of China where the ancient forest was found was much closer to the equator than it is today. This means the an-cient forest would have been hot and humid.

If you had been standing in the forest before the nearby volcano erupted, there would have been no danger from large dinosaurs. This is be-cause the forest was covered in volcanic ash mil-lions of years before they existed. The first dino-saurs are not believed to have evolved for another 70 million years, or about 230 million years ago.

300 MILLION-YEAR-OLD FOREST

One of the pictures showing what the forest would have looked like


NEW FARM ANIMAL VIRUS SPREADS

Last November a new virus was dis-covered. Called the Schmallenberg virus, it affects some farm animals. It has now spread to animals in sev-eral European countries, including The Netherlands, Germany, Bel-gium, France, and Luxembourg. Recently, it was confirmed that the virus had arrived in the UK.

Sheep and lambs

The virus’s name comes from the town in Germany in which it was first detected. Scientists think it may have originated there. The virus seems to affect cattle, sheep, and goats.

The virus causes some adult ani-mals to suffer from flu-like symp-toms. Yet it has a much worse effect on their babies. Sheep suffering from the virus can give birth early to dead, or stillborn, offspring. Of those lambs that survive many have badly deformed or bent legs. Thou-sands of sheep in the areas affected by the virus have given birth to still-born or deformed lambs.

Nobody is yet sure how the virus spreads. Small flying blood-sucking insects such as midges are known to transmit other farm animal viruses. Many therefore think this is how the Schmallenberg virus has been spreading too.

Government officials in the UK say sheep with the virus have been found on just over 120 farms. They

believe midges being blown by the wind are the likely reason for it spreading over the sea from other European countries. Others, though, suspect the midges have arrived in the UK inside trucks carrying farm ani-mals from different parts of Europe.

At this time of year many lambs are born in northern Europe. Most calves (baby cows) and kids (baby goats) are born later in the year. So nobody knows yet whether the offspring of cows and goats will be affected in the same way as lambs are. Experts think the virus probably infected the sheep last autumn, be-cause midges are not active during the coldest winter months.

Scientists are now studying the virus in the hope of producing a vaccine. This could then be given to farm animals to stop them getting the disease in the future. Yet it could be several years before a vaccine is found and tested.

Another question is whether the Schmallenberg virus can be trans-mitted from one farm animal to another. If so, especially after this year’s spring lambs have been born, the virus could spread far more quickly. Scientists say the virus is not a danger to human health. This is because it is not a zoonosis, or an infectious disease that can be passed from an animal to a human. �

ANCIENT PENGUIN

Palaeontologists – scientists who study fossils – from New Zealand and the USA have just completed a project that began a long time ago. They have managed to make a mod-el of an ancient penguin from fos-sils discovered in 1977. This type of penguin lived around 25 million years ago.

The penguin fossils were discov-ered in New Zealand. One of the scientists who made the model was the person who found the fossils in 1977. At the time he was a student. To complete their model the scien-tists used fossils from another an-cient penguin. Their knowledge of modern-day penguins and how they move also helped.

The scientists have named this type of penguin Kairuku. This is a Maori word that roughly translates as ‘diver who returns with food’. The Maori are the indigenous peo-ple of New Zealand.

The scientists say 25 million years ago, at the time that Kai-ruku lived, there were five species of penguin living in what we now know as New Zealand. At that time New Zealand looked very different from today. Much of the land was under the sea, so it was just a series of several rocky islands. This meant it was a good place for penguins to live. There was plenty of food in the surrounding seas and on the rocky

NEWSCASTSHARK SURPRISE — A woman in Malaysia had a surprise when she cut up a baby shark for her fam-ily’s lunch. She had bought it at a local market. Inside the shark’s stomach was a metal medallion. It looked very old. On one side it was possible to see a cross and on the other, a person’s head. The woman took it to a local histo-rian. He said the medallion was from Portugal and was about 700 years old. He thinks a Portuguese soldier who came to Malaysia in the 16th century must have lost it. The woman’s husband decided not to eat the shark as he was wor-ried it would bring bad luck.


islands the penguins were safe from predators.

Kairuku was about 1.4 metres (4.5 feet) tall. The largest modern penguin is the Emperor penguin. Adult Emperor penguins grow to a height of about one metre (three feet). Kairuku looked quite different from modern penguins. It had much longer flippers and short thick legs. Its beak was also longer and thinner than those of modern penguins. The scientists think it was able to swim for a longer time and to dive more deeply than today’s penguins can.

Emperor penguin

However, Kairuku isn’t the largest penguin ever to have lived. The New Zealand Giant Penguin, also known as Pachydyptes ponderosa, was even bigger. This penguin lived between about 37 million and 34 million years ago. Palaeontologists estimate this type of penguin grew to a height of 1.6 metres (five feet). �

TRAIN CRASH IN POLAND

Two passenger trains crashed into each other in Poland on 3rd March. The accident was the worst train crash in the country for over 20 years.

The collision happened late in the evening, about 193 kilometres

(120 miles) from Warsaw, the capi-tal city. One train was travelling towards the city. The other, an ex-press train, which was going about 96 kilometres (60 miles) per hour, was heading in the opposite direc-tion. The express train was on the wrong track. There were about 350 passengers on board the two trains.

People living close to where the crash happened rushed to help. Rescue workers arrived soon af-terwards. They immediately began searching through the wreckage. Many of the carriages at the front of the trains were torn apart. Later, of-ficials confirmed 16 people had died in the accident and 58 others had been seriously injured. Both drivers survived the crash.

Head-on collisions, where two trains are going in opposite direc-tions on the same track, are unusual. Normally there are many safety pro-cedures to stop this from happening. At the time of the crash, though, one part of the track had been closed for repair and maintenance work. One of the trains should have been moved, or diverted, onto a third track to allow the other to pass. But this did not happen.

The day after the crash an inves-tigation began to find out what had happened. Like aircraft, the trains had ‘black boxes’. These record a train’s speed and any communica-tion between the drivers and train controllers. Black boxes are very strong and are designed so they are not damaged by fire or water. Inves-tigators recover, or find, these box-es. They then study the recordings for clues as to what was the cause of an accident.

Many people suspect the reason has nothing to do with a mechani-cal problem. Instead they think the rail controllers may have made a

mistake. This is often described as ‘human error’.

Donald Tusk, the prime minis-ter of Poland, said the accident was the country’s worst train disaster for many years. Poland’s president, Bronisáaw Komorowski, visited the site of the collision a day af-ter it happened. He too said it was likely the accident was caused by human error.

Train crash in Poland

On 5th March it was announced there would be two days of mourn-ing in the country. Sports matches and other types of entertainment were cancelled. Polish flags on gov-ernment buildings were also flown at half-mast. This means the flag is raised only halfway up the flagpole instead of to the top. It is done as a way of showing respect and remem-bering the dead. �

LAST INCA EMPEROR

Archaeologists in Ecuador have discovered the remains of an Inca site, or complex. They believe the site may solve the mystery of what happened to the body of Atahualpa, the last Inca emperor, after he was murdered in 1553.

The Inca civilisation was cen-tred around modern-day Peru. At its most powerful, the Inca Empire included parts of what we now call Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and Argentina.


By the early 1500s European ex-plorers and soldiers had crossed the Atlantic Ocean and arrived in North and South America. Spanish sol-diers – called Conquistadors – heard rumours of cities built of gold. They wanted to find the cities and take the gold back to Spain.

The Spanish Conquistador Fran-cisco Pizarro was given permission by the Queen of Spain to attack the Incas. He arrived in Peru with fewer than 200 men in 1532. He and his soldiers easily defeated the Inca armies. They had better weapons and horses, which the Incas had not seen before. Many Incas also died of diseases the Conquistadors brought with them, such as smallpox. These diseases were new to this part of the world and quickly spread through-out the Inca Empire.

Drawing of Atahualpa

Spanish soldiers managed to cap-ture the Inca ruler, Atahualpa, and a group of his followers. Atahualpa was kept as a hostage and his fol-lowers were killed. Soon afterwards, Atahualpa offered to have a large room filled with valuable items for his captors. Most historians think this was to persuade them not to kill him. Gold and silver was collected

from all over the Inca Empire and taken to the place where Atahualpa was being held. The Spanish were amazed by the amount of treasure collected.

Ŷ Area covered by the Inca Empire

ARGENTINA

BOLIVIA

COLOMBIA

PERU

CHILE

ECUADOR

SOUTHATLANTIC

OCEAN

PACIFICOCEAN

However, the gold and silver did not save Atahualpa. The Spanish thought keeping him captive was causing them too many problems. They feared Atahualpa’s supporters were planning attacks to free him. Eventually, the Spanish decided to kill the Inca ruler and he was stran-gled. It is not known what happened to his body. After Atahualpa’s death, the Inca Empire began to fall apart.

The recently discovered Inca ruins, called Malqui-Machay, are about 72 kilometres (45 miles) from Quito, the capital of Ecuador. They include the remains of stone build-ings, walls, walkways and stairs. The location of the ruins has sur-prised some people. This is because the Incas were thought to live most-ly high up in the Andes Mountains. Malqui-Machay is quite low down on the east side of the mountains.

It’s likely the Spanish never found this Inca site. It may have

been a place that was kept secret. The archaeologists plan to start in-vestigating the old buildings during the summer months. In the local language, Machay means burial. This is one reason the archaeolo-gists think the last Inca emperor’s body may have been taken here and buried after he was killed. �

ICEMAN’S GENES

Ötzi is the nickname given to a Stone Age man whose body was found, preserved almost perfectly in ice, in 1991. Scientists believe the ‘iceman’ lived about 5,300 years ago. A recent study of his full genome has revealed several new things about Ötzi.

Genomes are also known as ge-netic blueprints. Each living thing has its own genome, made up of thousands of genes. Genes control the characteristics of living things. The whole genome is made of DNA, and each gene is a portion of that DNA.

Ötzi, when he was first discovered

Ötzi was discovered by two peo-ple walking in the mountains. They noticed his body in a patch of melt-ing ice and snow. They called the local police, who decided to open a murder investigation. The body was so well preserved the police thought it was someone who had died re-cently. But when they noticed his clothes and the tools he was carrying,


they called a team of archaeologists to investigate.

The iceman was nicknamed Ötzi because he was found at the top of the Ötz Valley, in the Italian Alps near the border with Switzer-land. Scientists estimate he was 46 years old when he died. He had an arrowhead made of flint stuck in his shoulder, and a deep wound on one hand. Most experts believe he survived these attack wounds, but died of the cold high in the moun-tains. For these reasons, some de-scribe Ötzi’s death as the world’s oldest murder.

Model of how Ötzi may have looked

The recent study of Ötzi’s ge-nome shows he had brown eyes and brown hair. He was also lac-tose intolerant. This means he was not able to digest foods made with milk. Archaeologists think most people who lived at that time were lactose intolerant. This is thought to have changed after farming became more common, and people began to domesticate animals such as cows and goats.

Ötzi’s genes also show he was likely to suffer from cardiovascular illnesses, such as heart disease and hardening of the arteries. This was surprising, as these medical prob-

lems are often thought of as mod-ern-day illnesses. It’s believed that being overweight, eating the wrong types of food, smoking, and a lack of exercise causes these illnesses. Yet Ötzi’s genes suggest there may be other causes.

The study also shows Ötzi’s ancestors probably came from the Middle East. Today, his closest ge-netic relatives are people who live on the Mediterranean islands of Corsica and Sardinia. �

SAWFISH STUDY

Marine scientists in Australia have completed a new study on sawfish. In the past, sawfish were thought to feed on small fish and crustaceans on the bottom of the sea. Yet the scientists’ work shows the fish use their ‘saws’ both to find and to kill the fish on which they feed.

Sawfish live in the warmer parts of oceans, close to coastlines. Some types are also found at the mouths of rivers (where the rivers flow into the sea). Sawfish are related to sharks. Some fully grown ones can be as long as seven metres (23 feet). The most noticeable thing about a saw-fish is its rostrum, or nose or snout, which can be one metre (three feet) long. It is shaped like a saw. Down each side are denticles – bits that stick out and look like teeth.

Scientists once thought sawfish spent much of their time lying on the seabed, and used their rostra like rakes to dig up things to eat. How-ever, the marine scientists did some experiments that seem to show the sawfish use their ‘saws’ in a very different way.

The scientists studied several saw-fish kept in a large tank. Pieces of dead fish were tied to a line. These

were dropped into the water and dragged along to make it look as if the fish were swimming. The sawfish at-tacked them by quickly moving their saws from side to side in a slashing motion. Some of the pieces of fish were cut in half. Others became stuck, or impaled, on the saws’ denticles. This suggests the saws are not a rake for digging in the seabed, but are used as a weapon for killing prey.

Although the experiment was done in a tank, the scientists are sure saw-fish do the same thing in the sea. This is because the fish in the tank were re-cently caught from the wild, and had not got used to being in captivity like sawfish in an aquarium might.

Sawfish have poor eyesight. So their saws also help them to find their prey. A sawfish’s rostrum contains lots of tiny sensors, or re-ceptors. These alert the sawfish to movements in the water made by other fish swimming past.

The scientists also tested these sensors. They made weak elec-tric fields in the tank as a way of

NEWSCASTROCK ART — Workers in the USA are undertaking a super-giant, super-slow project to create an unusual work of art. Called ‘Levi-tated Mass’, it will be set up at a museum in the city of Los Ange-les. The artwork is an enormous rock, or boulder, which will be suspended in mid-air so visitors can walk underneath it. The artist found the boulder he wanted to use over 160 kilometres (100 miles) away from the museum. The huge granite rock weighs around 340 tonnes. It is being taken to the museum on a truck that has 196 wheels and takes up two lanes of the road.


copying the movements in the wa-ter that would be made by live fish. This caused the sawfish to try to slash at something, because they thought prey was near.

Sawfish

Sawfish are an endangered spe-cies. In the past many have been caught and put in aquariums. Oth-ers have been killed for their saws, which can sell for a lot of money. The teeth on their saws can also eas-ily get caught up in fishing nets. In many countries it is now illegal to catch sawfish. �

FORMER PRIME MINISTER ON TRIAL

On 5th March, the trial of Geir Haarde, Iceland’s former prime minister, began. Mr Haarde is ac-cused of negligence, or not doing enough to save the country from its financial problems in 2008.

Iceland is a small country with a population of about 320,000. Tra-ditionally Iceland made most of its money from fishing. This began to change in the late 1990s. Three of the country’s banks began to in-crease in size. Each borrowed mon-ey from other banks and financial companies in different countries.

Iceland’s banks used this money to set up businesses in other coun-tries. The banks also lent large sums of money to several company bosses in Iceland. These people used these loans to buy or take over companies

in other countries. They planned to pay back the loans using money they made from these companies. Financial services such as banking and investing money became an im-portant part of Iceland’s economy.

At the end of 2008 a financial crisis began in the USA. Banks no longer wanted to lend money to other banks. This was because they were worried it would not be paid back. This caused many problems.

The banking problems spread to European countries, including Iceland. Iceland’s banks suddenly found it difficult to keep borrow-ing money. Some of this money was needed to pay back previous loans. Eventually, as the three Icelandic banks couldn’t repay their debts, they collapsed.

Geir Haarde, former prime minister of Iceland

The collapse of the three banks caused many problems in Iceland. Many companies and people could no longer take out the money they kept in the banks. Companies couldn’t afford to pay workers, so thousands lost their jobs. Many people no longer had enough to pay their mortgages – the monthly re-payments you make after borrowing the money to buy a house or flat.

The local currency, the Icelan-dic króna, suddenly became less valuable compared with currencies from other countries. This meant anything brought in, or imported, from outside Iceland became much more expensive.

Many people in Iceland were very angry. There were large dem-onstrations. Eventually, at the be-ginning of 2009 Mr Haarde agreed to stand down. He had been prime minister since 2006.

In 2010 a team was set up to in-vestigate why the country’s three biggest banks all collapsed. Its re-port criticised Mr Haarde and three other government ministers. The Althing, or Iceland’s parliament, voted that Mr Haarde would have to appear before a special court.

Mr Haarde insists the collapse of the banks was not his or his govern-ment’s fault. The trial is expected to last for several weeks. If Mr Haarde is found guilty, he could be sent to prison for two years. �

CONGO EXPLOSIONS

At around eight o’clock in the morn-ing on 4th March, a loud explosion was heard in Brazzaville, the capi-tal of Congo. A fire had started in an arms depot, a place where large amounts of ammunition and weap-ons are stored. This then caused a huge explosion.

At first people living nearby thought a war had begun. Many be-gan to run to other parts of the city. Several more explosions followed the first one. These continued for about five hours. The exploding am-munition caused more fires. These started to spread through the north-ern part of the city.

A senior government official ap-peared on live television to explain what was happening. He said the fire that caused the explosion was an accident, and it was not a war or an attack.

The city of Brazzaville is on the River Congo. On the other side of


the river is Kinshasa. This is the capital city of the neighbouring country, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The explosions in Brazzaville were so strong that they broke the windows in several build-ings in Kinshasa.

KinshasaBrazzaville

ANGOLA

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Congo River

On hearing the huge explo-sions many people in Kinshasa also thought a war must have begun. The DRC government sent troops to the bank of the Congo River. The troops were ordered to return to their bases once the government found out what had happened in Brazzaville.

It took two days to put out all the fires. Many streets were cov-ered in debris from the explosions. A curfew was arranged. This meant everyone in the city had to stay in-doors during the hours of darkness. It’s thought that the explosions and fires have made around 5,000 peo-ple homeless.

Officials in Congo said the acci-dent had caused the deaths of at least 240 people. They say they expect to find many more bodies under col-lapsed buildings. Some reports said a church was destroyed while peo-ple were inside at a service.

Hundreds of people were injured. The hospitals in Brazzaville be-came overcrowded. The DRC sent a team of medical experts to the city. France and Morocco said they too had sent medical teams. Congo is a former French colony. It became an independent country in 1960.

Later government officials said they believed the fire in the arms de-pot was caused by an electrical prob-lem. They also announced all other army bases and arms depots will be moved to places outside the city.

Denis Sassou-Nguesso, the pres-ident of Congo, visited several of the hospitals to which many of the injured had been taken. He said eve-rything possible was being done to help those who had been affected by the explosions and fires. �

KORAN-BURNING PROTESTS

Many people took part in violent protests in towns and cities in Af-ghanistan over several days at the end of February. The protests began after a small group of American sol-diers set fire to some copies of the Koran, the holy book of the Islamic faith, and other religious writings.

American troops first arrived in Afghanistan in 2001, after a militant

group called al-Qaeda attacked buildings in two cities in the USA. At the time al-Qaeda was based in Afghanistan, which was then controlled by the Taliban. When the Taliban refused to hand over the al-Qaeda leaders the USA led an invasion of the country. The Taliban and its supporters then withdrew to mountainous areas of the country close to the border with Pakistan.

Protest outside Bagram Air Base

Later other NATO (North At-lantic Treaty Organization) mem-ber countries such as the UK, The Netherlands, France, and Germany sent troops to help the USA fight the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Now Afghanistan has an elected president, and a new army and police force. Fighting against the Taliban continues. About 130,000 American troops are still in Afghanistan. They, and other NATO troops, are all ex-pected to leave by the end of 2014.

Some Afghan workers at the Ba-gram Air Base discovered the burnt copies of the Koran. Bagram is one of the largest American military bases in Afghanistan. It is about 40 kilometres (25 miles) from Kabul, the capital city.

Inside Bagram is a large deten-tion centre, a prison where many captured Taliban supporters are held. The copies of the Koran that were burnt came from the prison library. Detention centre officials claim the prisoners had been writing

NEWSCASTSEAGULL SWITCH — A town by the sea in the UK has been having problems with some of its street-lights. On top of the lights is a sensor. The sensors can detect when there is daylight and when it is night-time. During the day, the sensors switch the light off. When it gets dark they turn it on. Howev-er, recently people noticed several lights were permanently on. They thought the sensors had broken - until they realised the streetlights have become favourite landing places for seagulls. The lights were staying on because the seagulls’ droppings had completely covered the sensors, so they were operating as if it were dark all the time.


messages and slogans on the pages of the Korans. This is why the books were taken from the library and thrown away. Much of the rub-bish from the base is incinerated, or burnt. Local Afghan workers then found some burnt pages from these Korans in a rubbish pit.

Muslims believe the Koran is the word of God. In many Muslim coun-tries people can be sent to prison for desecrating the Koran. When copies become worn out, they have to be treated in a special way and not just thrown away.

After hearing what the local workers had found crowds of pro-testers gathered outside Bagram Air Base. Over several days, other violent demonstrations took place throughout the country. Nearly all were outside other American and NATO military bases. At least 40 people were killed in the violence and many others were injured.

On 23rd February Barack Obama, the president of the USA, apologised to Hamid Karzai, Af-ghanistan’s president, for what had happened. The USA’s military commander in Afghanistan said he would make sure that all American troops in the country are told about the importance of treating the Koran with respect. �

NORTH KOREAN NUCLEAR OFFER

On 29th February North Korea made an announcement that surprised many people. It declared it will stop its uranium enrichment programme if the USA agrees to send it 240,000 tonnes of food aid. North Korea has been enriching uranium as part of a project to develop nuclear weapons.

North Korea is a very secretive country that is run as a dictatorship.

Much of the country’s money is spent on its army. Most people are very poor and many do not have enough to eat. North Koreans are not allowed to leave the country and few know what is happening in the rest of the world.

North Korea has been ruled by members of one family for 65 years. Last December the country’s leader, Kim Jong-il, died. He had been in charge since his father died in 1994. Soon after Kim Jong-il’s death, his son Kim Jong-un took over. Little is known about the new leader, but he is thought to be only about 30 years old.

North and South Korea became separate countries soon after the end of the Second World War (1939 – 1945). In 1950 the North invaded the South. This led to the Korean War, which lasted for three years. The United Nations (UN), with mainly American troops, helped the South. China supported the North.

JAPAN

CHINA

NORTHKOREA

SOUTHKOREA

East Sea(Sea of Japan)

YellowSea

DMZPyongyang

The border between the countries today is where the two opposing ar-mies ended up facing each other at the end of the war in 1953. The bor-der, called the De-Militarized Zone (DMZ), is a narrow strip of land covered in mines and barbed wire. Today thousands of soldiers still face each other across the DMZ. A peace treaty has never been signed.

Just over ten years ago it was discovered that North Korea had started a project to develop nuclear weapons. It began to enrich urani-um. This was done at a site called Yongbyon, about 90 kilometres (56 miles) from Pyongyang, the capital city. In 2006, North Korea tested its first nuclear weapon. Since then it has also test-fired several long-range missiles.

North Korea’s new leader, Kim Jong-un

Other nearby countries, especially Japan and South Korea, fear North Korea could use its nuclear weapons to threaten them. For many years the USA, China, and Russia have been trying to get North Korea to shut down its nuclear weapons programme.

Some people think the recent announcement shows Kim Jong-un wants to start changing things in his country. In return for the food aid North Korea has also agreed that In-ternational Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors can go to Yong-byon. The IAEA works closely with the UN. By visiting Yongbyon, the inspectors will be able to check that North Korea has halted, or suspend-ed, its nuclear programme.

In the past Kim Jong-un’s father also offered to shut down the Yong-byon plant. Then it was in return for large amounts of food and fuel aid from the USA. Yet soon after the aid was handed over North Korea disagreed with the way in which the USA wanted to check what was hap-pening at Yongbyon. It then started


This map shows countries to which news stories refer in this issue. Visit www.newsademic.com for more detailed world maps.

USA

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MALAYSIA

ITALYITALY

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enriching uranium again. Some peo-ple now wonder if his son intends to do the same thing after the food aid has arrived. �

OCEAN ACIDIFICATION

An international team of scientists has just released a report about the oceans. It says the world’s oceans are becoming more acidic, or acidi-fying, faster than they have done for at least the last 300 million years.

Liquids and solutions can be described as either acids or bases. Whether a solution is an acid or a base depends on its chemical make-up. Pure water is neutral, because it is neither acidic nor basic. The liquid inside the human stomach is slightly acidic. This helps us to di-gest our food. Other common weak acids are vinegar and orange juice.

Stronger acids can be dangerous. For instance, if you get a strong acid on your hands it can burn your skin. Strong acids can corrode surfaces with which they come into contact.

Oceans absorb some of the car-bon dioxide in the air. Yet the at-mosphere now contains around 30% more carbon dioxide than it did 200 years ago. It is this extra carbon di-oxide, scientists say, that is making the seas more acidic.

It was about 200 years ago that some countries first began burn-ing large amounts of coal to power factories and machinery. More re-cently other fossil fuels, such as oil and gas, have been used for making electricity, transport, heating, and cooking. When fossil fuels are burnt they release carbon dioxide. Nearly all scientists agree that this is the cause of the extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. They also say it

is one of the main reasons average world temperatures have increased over the last 200 years.

Corals

Trees and plants absorb some of the carbon dioxide in the air. The more carbon dioxide the oceans take in the more acidic they become. This is known as acidification, which can kill corals and have a bad effect on small marine creatures such as molluscs.

Scientists know that millions of years ago there were times when large increases of carbon dioxide oc-curred in the atmosphere.


They study these for clues about what could happen to the oceans to-day if the amount of carbon dioxide in the air continues to rise.

One such event happened about 250 million years ago. It’s thought that huge volcanoes released so much carbon dioxide into the at-mosphere that many living things died off, both in the sea and on land. Yet this happened over a long period of time – around one million years. It then took many millions of years for life to recover.

Another happened about 56 mil-lion years ago, though it isn’t known what caused it. This event is known as the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM). Carbon dioxide in the air increased over a period of about 20,000 years. Scientists esti-mate this caused world temperatures to rise by around 6ºC (11°F). Life in the seas, they believe, was very bad-ly affected. Yet most things living on the land seemed to have been able to adjust to the warmer temperatures.

The scientists think today’s acidi-fication could be similar to the PETM.

But they warn the current increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is happening much faster than it did 56 million years ago. They estimate that today the oceans are acidifying ten times more quickly than they did during the PETM. �

AMAZING CASSAVA

Climate researchers have written a report about a tropical plant called cassava. They say the crop could help to prevent possible future food supply problems that might be caused by climate change.

Cassava is a shrub that origi-nally comes from South America. It is now grown in many African countries and tropical parts of Asia. Today, the world’s biggest producer of cassava is Nigeria. The shrub can grow to a height of around four me-tres (13 feet). Its roots, called tubers, are dark brown.

Cassava tubers

Cassava roots and leaves can be eaten in many different ways. The tubers can be dried to make a type or flour or sliced and cooked like pota-toes. Cassava is eaten by at least 500 million people every day around the world. Like potatoes, cassava is a good source of carbohydrates. How-ever, if you planted two areas of land, of exactly the same size, with cassava and potatoes, you would get a greater amount of both food and nutrition from the cassava.

What’s interesting about cassava, the researchers say, is it can grow well even in dry, hot conditions. The re-searchers did a study to find out how different crops would grow in very dry conditions and in poor soil. This is because in parts of Africa, these are the conditions in which farmers may have to grow their crops if world tem-peratures continue to rise.

Cassava shrubs

The researchers compared cassava with other food crops such as beans, millet, and maize (or corn). Another advantage of cassava over the other crops is that it can survive if there isn’t much water. In a drought, the shrub seems to have a way of ‘shut-ting down’ and waiting until rain ar-rives. Many other food crops would die during a long drought.

So if the climate gets warmer in the future and there is less rain, cas-sava will produce a lot more food than the other crops. In the past, farmers and scientists have worked to increase the yield, or amount of food, certain plants such as wheat can produce. The researchers suggest similar work should now be done on cassava plants. They say this could further increase cassava yields.

One problem with cassava is that plant diseases can easily af-fect it. Certain insects that destroy crops can also attack the shrubs. The researchers believe it should be possible for plant scientists to find ways of making cassava plants more resistant to these things. �

NEWSCASTBOMB OR MOM — Passengers fly-ing between two cities in the USA got a shock when their pilot made an announcement. Many thought he said there was a bomb on the plane. The pilot had actually said that there was a ‘mom’ (mum) on board. When some passengers be-gan to panic, the other crew mem-bers told the pilot that many people had misheard ‘mom’ and thought it was ‘bomb’. The pilot then made another announcement to explain. What he had done was to wish happy birthday to the mother of an air traffic controller. The woman was on board their flight.


LEAP DAY

This year, 2012, is a leap year. It has 366 days instead of 365. A leap year usually happens every four years. The extra day is added at the end of February. So in leap years February has 29 days instead of the normal 28. Some people call the extra day, 29th February, ‘Leap Day’.

The reason for leap years is the time it takes the Earth to orbit, or travel around, the Sun. One orbit is one year. Yet the Earth’s orbit of the Sun is not an exact number of days. The exact time our planet takes to complete its journey around the Sun is 365.242 days, or 365 days, five hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds. This means if every year were 365 days long, our 12-month calendar would be short by almost six hours.

Over a long time these periods of six hours would add up to days, weeks and then months. This is what happened a long time ago. Fortunately, the Romans understood this problem.

To allow for the six-hour differ-ence, the Roman Emperor Julius Caesar introduced leap years about 2,000 years ago. Every fourth year was 366 days long instead of 365. Yet this did not fully solve the prob-lem. One year, or the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, is about 11 minutes shorter than 365.25 days. So over hundreds of years these 11-minute

amounts added up and the calendar began to ‘slip’ again. For every 400 years the calendar slipped by about three days.

In 1582, the pope, or leader of the Catholic Church, altered the cal-endar again. It was moved forward by ten days to correct the problem. Then new rules for leap years were introduced. If the year can be di-vided by 100, it is not a leap year – except when the year can also be divided by 400. So, for example, the year 2000 was a leap year, but 2100 won’t be one. The pope who intro-duced these new rules was Gregory the Thirteenth. This is why today’s calendar is often called the Grego-rian calendar.

People born on 29th February get a ‘real’ birthday only every four years. Of course, they still have a birthday (normally on 28th Febru-ary) and get a year older each year in between. But if a 16-year-old tells you he or she is only four, you can be sure he or she was born on 29th February!

One four-year old child in the USA celebrated her ‘first’ birthday on 29th February. Unusually, her mother was also a ‘Leap Day’ baby. So, on the same day, at the age of 32, the child’s mother had her eighth ‘real’ birthday. �

NEW MOZART

A university lecturer in Austria made an amazing discovery when she found a handwritten piece of piano music in an old notebook. Experts have confirmed that the piece was written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Many people consider Mozart (1756 – 1791) to be one of the world’s greatest composers. During

his short life he wrote more than 600 pieces of music. These include operas, music for choirs, piano con-certos, and chamber music. The Magic Flute is one of Mozart’s best-known operas.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Mozart was born in the city of Salzburg, in what is now Austria. His father, who was also a musi-cian, taught him and his older sis-ter Maria Anna (known as Nan-nerl) to play music and to speak foreign languages.

The music notebook in which the piece was found is thought to date to about 1780. Although Mozart com-posed the music it is not in his hand-writing, so someone else must have written it down. But music experts say there are notes on the paper that show Mozart was the composer. They also say the style of the music is exactly the same as Mozart’s. Ex-perts believe he wrote the ‘rediscov-ered’ piece of piano music in around 1756. This was just before he went on a three-year trip to Italy when he was 13 years old.

Mozart first began composing music when he was only five. At a very young age he was invited to play music for kings and queens. As well as being able to write


music he was also able to play many different instruments.

Several other famous composers said they were influenced by Mo-zart’s music. These include Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827), the famous German composer. Joseph Haydn (1732 – 1809), another well-known Austrian composer, was a good friend of Mozart’s. He was also one of Beethoven’s teachers.

The house where Mozart lived in Salzburg now belongs to the Interna-tional Mozarteum Foundation. This organisation looks after places as-sociated with the composer, collects items that belonged to him, and en-courages people to study his music.

For the first time in over 200 years the previously unheard and unknown piano piece will be played in a concert on 23rd March at Mo-zart’s old house in Salzburg. �

MYSTERY DONOR

Since November, a mystery person in the German city of Braunschweig has been delivering envelopes con-taining a surprise. Inside are 20 €500 banknotes, or €10,000 (£8,400). Wrapped around the money in the envelopes are recent stories, or

cuttings, from the local newspaper. These cuttings show to which per-son or organisation the donor wants the money to be given.

The first mystery envelope was delivered last November. It arrived at a victim support group, an organi-sation that helps people affected by crimes. The envelope was placed in the group’s letterbox. The newspa-per cutting inside was a story about a woman being helped by the sup-port group. Her handbag had recent-ly been stolen. The group therefore gave the money to the woman who had been affected by the crime.

Since November, other mystery envelopes full of money have been found. For example, one arrived at a museum, and another at a daycare centre for young children. A hospice also received one. This is a place that looks after patients who have an illness for which there is no cure.

Braunschweig

Most of the hand-delivered en-velopes have been placed in let-terboxes. However, some have ar-rived in other ways. One was left between the pages of a prayer book in a church. Another was put under a mat outside a front door.

The latest envelope arrived at the local newspaper’s offices. The newspaper cutting inside was about a 14-year-old boy. He had been bad-ly disabled in a swimming accident. The boy’s name was underlined, as a way of showing to whom the newspaper should give the money.

Nobody knows who the mystery donor, or benefactor, is. He or she has now given away about €190,000 (£159,000). The person seems to know about German tax laws. In Germany, anyone who receives a donation of more than €10,000 has to pay some tax to the government. If the gift is €10,000 or less, no tax needs to be paid.

Now some people and organisa-tions from other places in Germany, which are trying to raise money, have contacted the Braunschweig newspaper. They want it to print their stories in the hope that the mystery person will give them a similar gift.

Some people think the benefac-tor may be an elderly person who wants to make sure his or her money is used for good causes before he or she dies. Others think it might be someone who has stolen money, or made a lot of money from crimi-nal activity. This, they say, would explain why he or she wants to be anonymous.

The boss of the newspaper has told reporters not to try to find out who the mystery person is. He says if they do, the donor might stop giving away the money to help others. �

Newsademic.comEditor: Amber Goldie

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ISSUE 166 GLOSSARY PUZZLE

INSTRUCTIONS: M Complete the crossword. The answers are highlighted in orange in the news stories. There are 25 words highlighted and you need 20 of them to complete the crossword. N Once you have solved the crossword go to the word search on the next page F

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11 Verb To bring animals or plants under human control for transport, food, power or companionship

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15 Noun (Plural) Feelings of anger or fear among groups or countries that do not trust each other

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18 Noun Keeping something, often a road, building or machine, in good condition

19 Adjective Able to withstand something and not be harmed or affected

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done, or time set aside, to express this sadness 7 Noun (Plural) Animals that live in water and have a hard outer

shell and jointed limbs 8 Adjective With the name of the person responsible being unknown 9 Verb Squeezed a person’s throat hard enough to stop him or her

from breathing and cause death 10 Verb Deliberately spoiling or ruining a religious item or special or

sacred place 12 Noun (Plural) Plans, models or templates, usually for building

something 14 Noun A place, especially a group of buildings, made up of a

number of interconnecting parts 16 Noun (Plural) Easily remembered and frequently repeated

phrases, often ones that represent a set of beliefs, a group or a political party


ISSUE 166GLOSSARY PUZZLE CONTINUED

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newsademic british english edition 166 - wikispaces issue 166 b.pdf... · 8th march 2012...

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