The United Nations Office at Geneva
Multimedia Newsroom
“Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes to find places of greater safety, at any cost, and face abuses en route. But thousands remain trapped in residential areas where fighting has taken place, facing air strikes, shelling and use of heavy weapons, trying to use any period of calm to reach places of relative safety. People also continue to be forced from their homes by the RSF and suffer looting, extortion, acute shortages of food, water, electricity, fuel, and limited access to healthcare and cash due to the closure of banks, as well as limited communications,” she said.
“While a welcome ceasefire meant some reprieve in the fighting, clashes continued to be reported in densely populated areas of Khartoum, Bahri, Omdurman and towns in Darfur and North Kordofan. We are concerned at the serious risk of violence escalating in West Darfur as the hostilities between the RSF and SAF have triggered intercommunal violence. In El Geneina, West Darfur, deadly ethnic clashes have been reported, with an estimated 96 people killed since 24 April,” the spokesperson said.
“It is deeply alarming that inmates have been released from, or escaped from, a number of prisons. We are very worried about the prospect of further violence, amid a generalized climate of impunity,” Shamdasani said.
“We call on the parties to immediately end hostilities, and in particular to halt hostilities in residential areas and the targeting of civilian population and infrastructure. The protection of civilians must be paramount. International humanitarian law demands it,” she said.
“Following decades of repression, armed conflict and deprivation, the people of Sudan must not be subjected to further violations of their fundamental human rights. We call on all those with influence to use every possible means to de-escalate the situation and to stand in solidarity with the Sudanese people in their demands for a peaceful and democratic future,” the spokesperson said.
“The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, highlights the deep yearning and determination for freedom of the Sudanese people – who overthrew a military dictatorship of 30 years and resisted the subsequent military takeover with great courage. It is unfathomable that once again force is being used against them. The guns must be silenced, and reason must prevail,” she said.
END
For more information and media requests, please contact:
In Geneva
Ravina Shamdasani - + 41 22 917 9169 / ravina.shamdasani@un.org or
Liz Throssell + 41 22 917 9296 / elizabeth.throssell@un.org or
Jeremy Laurence + +41 22 917 9383 / jeremy.laurence@un.org or
Marta Hurtado - + 41 22 917 9466 / marta.hurtadogomez@un.org
In Nairobi
Seif Magango - +254 788 343 897 / seif.magango@un.org
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- Exterior shot: wide shotPalais des Nations
- Wide shot: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes to find places of greater safety, at any cost, and face abuses en route. But thousands remain trapped in residential areas where fighting has taken place, facing air strikes, shelling and use of heavy weapons, trying to use any period of calm to reach places of relative safety. People also continue to be forced from their homes by the RSF and suffer looting, extortion, acute shortages of food, water, electricity, fuel, and limited access to healthcare and cash due to the closure of banks, as well as limited communications.”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “While a welcome ceasefire meant some reprieve in the fighting, clashes continued to be reported in densely populated areas of Khartoum, Bahri, Omdurman and towns in Darfur and North Kordofan. We are concerned at the serious risk of violence escalating in West Darfur as the hostilities between the RSF and SAF have triggered intercommunal violence. In El Geneina, West Darfur, deadly ethnic clashes have been reported, with an estimated 96 people killed since 24 April.”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “It is deeply alarming that inmates have been released from, or escaped from, a number of prisons. We are very worried about the prospect of further violence, amid a generalized climate of impunity.”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “We call on the parties to immediately end hostilities, and in particular to halt hostilities in residential areas and the targeting of civilian population and infrastructure. The protection of civilians must be paramount. International humanitarian law demands it.”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “Following decades of repression, armed conflict and deprivation, the people of Sudan must not be subjected to further violations of their fundamental human rights. We call on all those with influence to use every possible means to de-escalate the situation and to stand in solidarity with the Sudanese people in their demands for a peaceful and democratic future,”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR): “The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, highlights the deep yearning and determination for freedom of the Sudanese people – who overthrew a military dictatorship of 30 years and resisted the subsequent military takeover with great courage. It is unfathomable that once again force is being used against them. The guns must be silenced and reason must prevail.”
- Cut aways: Briefing room
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New data showing that rivers were at their lowest level for decades last year provides further evidence that the climate crisis is real and countries must act immediately to protect themselves from the increasing threat to communities and livelihoods, the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Thursday.
The key findings from WMO’s State of Global Water Resources 2025 report covering the hydrological cycle and extreme events in the five-year period to last year:
- 2025 was one of driest years for river discharge in 35 years
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- Water storage on Earth’s land surface has decreased in past decade
- Widespread glacier loss across all regions for fourth consecutive year
- Asia and Africa are regions most affected by water-related disasters
- Water data availability has improved, but gaps remain in hard-hit areas
Highlighting the long-term decline in the Earth’s freshwater storage and glacier melt, WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo explained that the planet’s water reserves used to act as a planetary “savings account” that absorbed the occasional dry season, avoiding a water crisis. “One of the central stories of the 2025 report is what is happening to that savings account? And the simple answer is that we are depleting it,” she told journalists in Geneva.
Groundwater reserves are equally stretched and have been in decline since 2014, WMO’s report states, with nearly two-thirds of monitored wells worldwide showing levels lower than the historical norm and indicating a shift “further toward deficit…not recovery”.
“At the same time, we are seeing more water-related disasters,” Ms. Saulo said, while also stressing that the currently strengthening El Niño “will increase the risk of drought in some areas, and flooding in others”.
Glaciers disappearing
In 2025, for the fourth consecutive year, every major glaciated region on Earth lost ice mass, leading to short-term hazards including floods and long-term water insecurity, according to WMO.
Responding to a question about whether the changing global water cycle might have contributed to the deadly Nepal-China flooding disaster, Ms. Saulo explained that melting ice and rock was just one factor in the chain of events that ultimately sent a massive and deadly wall of water and debris downstream on 26 August, killing at least 1,367 people.
“You asked if it could happen again? Absolutely; the problem in this region is that there’s 63,700 glaciers at the last count,” she told a Press Conference in Geneva. “Even if you’re looking with remote sensing with satellites at these glaciers, you might see some faults, you might see some slight shifting, that does not mean necessarily catastrophic collapse. So, in order to plan for this, it’s very, very difficult. But the international community is looking very hard at ways in which we can bring people together to solve some of these monitoring issues.”
Data indicates that glaciers shrank between 2023 and 2025 with cumulative losses of 1,400 gigatonnes of water – or about one third of annual fresh water needs.
Every major glacier region on Earth lost ice for the fourth consecutive year.
“All 19 glacier regions around the globe lost ice; in Central Asia, Iceland, the Russian Arctic and western Canada and the United States, it was among the three worst years on record,” said Wayne Jenkinson, WMO’s Director of Hydrology and Cryosphere.
Some regions with smaller glaciers such as Central Europe, the Caucasus, the western Canada and the United States may already have reached “peak water”, Mr. Jenkinson warned.
“After this point, the glacier gives less meltwater each year simply because there is less ice left to melt. That matters for every community downstream that relies on water during hot, dry summers,” he explained.
Narelle van der Wel, WMO’s Head of Cryosphere Monitoring, Predictions and Services, stressed that while some further glacier loss is unavoidable, the eventual scale of the decline is not predetermined.
“Some glacier loss is inevitable, but total loss of glaciers is not yet inevitable,” she said, pointing to emissions reductions as central to limiting future losses.
Preparing for moving baselines
The report does not attribute every observed change to climate change alone. WMO says pressure on water resources and natural variability also contribute.
Mr. Jenkinson said governments need to prepare for “moving baselines” as historical patterns become less reliable.
“The situation 30 years ago is not where we are today,” he said. Countries, he added, need to prepare “for those changes that have really already arrived”.
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