India's 'wet desert' hit by global climate change: scientists

0 Comments | AFP, March, 2007

SHILLONG, India (AFP) — Rainfall in the unique "wet desert" of India's northeast has become unpredictable and the dry season longer in a disturbing sign of major changes in global weather patterns, scientists say.

Cherrapunji, in northeast India's tiny Meghalaya state, has long been a top contender for the world's wettest spot, with approximately 12 metres (40 feet) of rainfall annually, most of it in the summer monsoon season.

But a group of Polish and Indian scientists who have been studying the unusual ecosystem -- it falls on a latitude known for some of the world's driest areas, including the Sahara and Gobi deserts -- said that was changing.

Rainfall steadily lessened in the last half of the 20th century, they said.

At the same time,...