Nepal has called for a regional climate cooperation mechanism involving India and China, seeking joint action to tackle growing environmental threats across the Himalayas as glaciers retreat and extreme weather increases the risk of disasters.

Prime Minister Balendra Shah proposed a Himalayan Climate Resilience Mechanism at the United Nations General Assembly, urging the three countries to strengthen scientific cooperation, share disaster-related information and improve cross-border emergency response.

“Let the Himalayas become a laboratory of international co-operation rather than a frontier of fragmented information,” Shah said, recalling the devastating debris floods that hit Nepal in August.

The proposal comes as rising temperatures accelerate glacier melting and permafrost thaw across the Himalayan region, increasing the danger of landslides, avalanches, rockfalls and glacial lake outburst floods. Such disasters can affect communities across national borders, making timely information-sharing critical.

However, bringing India and China into a common framework will be difficult. The two countries have longstanding territorial disputes along their roughly 3,500-kilometre Himalayan frontier, while previous efforts to establish scientific cooperation and exchange river data have produced limited results.

A report released in March by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) found that glacier ice loss across the Hindu Kush Himalaya has accelerated, with the rate doubling since 2000 compared with the 1974–1999 period.

The scale of the changes is also evident on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, where glaciers have lost 24% of their area over the past six decades, according to Kang Shichang, director of the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment.

The plateau now contains more than 14,000 glacial lakes covering over 1,100 square kilometres, according to China's People's Daily Online.

Despite the growing risks, regional cooperation remains fragile. India and China agreed in 2009 to conduct joint research into the effects of global warming on Himalayan and Tibetan glaciers. The initiative, however, failed to progress beyond an initial meeting, according to an Indian expert involved in the effort.

Cooperation over river data has also weakened. Under agreements dating back to the early 2000s, China provided India with hydrological information during the flood season for the Brahmaputra and Sutlej rivers, both of which originate in Tibet.

Indian junior foreign minister Kirti Vardhan Singh told parliament in August 2025 that the agreements had expired. China stopped sharing Brahmaputra data in June 2023, while India had received no Sutlej data since 2022.

Still, some analysts believe improving political engagement between New Delhi and Beijing could create an opening for renewed cooperation, including on climate-related risks.

William Yang, a senior analyst for Northeast Asia at the International Crisis Group, said recent diplomatic developments suggested there could be greater scope for the three countries to explore joint climate initiatives.

Experts say cooperation could begin with practical measures that do not require countries to disclose sensitive strategic information.

Arun Bhakta Shrestha, a former senior specialist at ICIMOD, suggested that the countries start by sharing less sensitive information about disaster risks rather than attempting to establish comprehensive river-flow data exchanges.

Uday Kala, head of the Centre for Climate Change and Disaster Management at India's IIT Mandi, recommended jointly identifying high-risk glacial lakes, setting common monitoring standards and establishing protocols for rapid warnings during emergencies.

ICIMOD, based in Kathmandu, has spent more than three decades promoting regional cooperation, including through flood early-warning systems. However, disputes over data access and national interests have continued to constrain progress.

Nepal's proposal now puts the focus on whether the three neighbours can turn shared environmental risks into a basis for cooperation. With Himalayan disasters threatening lives, infrastructure and water security across the region, delays in coordination could leave vulnerable communities exposed to dangers that no single country can manage alone.

BOB Post