The United Nations is investigating reports of illegal mining for ice which poses threat to glaciers all over the world, citing a case of ice theft from the Jorge Montt glacier in Chile.

According to the UN International Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction, criminal gangs involved in illegal mining for ice is a major additional threat to glaciers across the globe and putting them at risk from climate change.

The UN lauded the campaign against the illegal activitiy, particularly the ice theft of some 5-1/2 tons of ice from Jorge Montt glacier, a 175-square-mile glacier that is part of the 5,000-square-mile Southern Patagonian Ice Field, the third-largest frozen land mass in the world after Antarctica and Greenland.

"The authorities in Chile are to be congratulated on clamping down on this illegal activity," said Margareta Wahlstrom, head of UNISDR.

Aside from giving protection to glaciers against illegal ice mining, scientists are also building artificial glaciers to combat the growing effect of climate change on natural glaciers.

Artificial glaciers are being built in the Himalayas where water supply is dwindling because of receding glaciers.

Scientist Chewang Norphel created the fake ice mounds in his village, where the water supply is dwindling because of receding glaciers by diverting seasonal runoff and trapping it in stone pens.

Extra water is necessary in the high-altitude desert where the disappearing glaciers are the primary source of water. However, although artificial glaciers may reduce the problem, these will not remedy the wider impact of global warming on Asia and nearly half the world's population, scientists said.

Glacier-fed rivers could ultimately dry up, they said.