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For years, there have been conspiracy theories floating around about countries stealing other countries' rain by taking their clouds.
And these rumors have been making a bit of a comeback.
The Middle East has had a long period of drought, although there has been a bit of rain recently.
And this happened at the same time as the Israeli war with Iran.
So people have been speculating.
One Iraqi MP claimed that the reason Iraq has had some rain
is because the US has been distracted by fighting Iran
and therefore has stopped stealing clouds.
There is no evidence for this claim.
But today we're going to unpack where this idea of stealing clouds comes from and if you can change the weather.
I'm Hannah and this is What in the World from the BBC World Service.
So let's break this down now with the BBC's climate disinformation reporter Marco Silva.
Hi Marco. Hello.
So Marco, can you actually steal rain or clouds from another country?
Well, the short answer is no.
We approached Iraq's meteorological authorities and they told us, a spokesperson told us,
that these claims are neither scientific nor logical.
And for the past two three days, I've been speaking to several scientists.