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On the eve of the 75th anniversary of the UN Charter, young researchers discuss the future of Sports, Culture and Tourism with top international officials
Around the world, the United Nations’ 75th birthday on the 26th of June is providing the backdrop for a global discussion about the future of the organization and the role multilateralism can play in resolving today’s challenges.
The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic has brought a new urgency to this discussion, highlighting even more the benefits of cooperation across borders, sectors and generations but also the impacts it has on culture, sports and tourism – the focus of an event today in Geneva, the UN’s European hub, in which young researchers exchanged views with top representatives of the key international agencies in these areas.
“Multilateralism has always been an interplay of national and shared global concerns and it is increasingly so as we are now more interdependent, more interconnected than ever. Culture, tourism and sports, be it in different forms, have all served as inspiring expressions of national identity and pride, ” said Fabrizio Hochschild-Drummond, Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General, addressed the audience in an inaugural video message.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has brought us to a pivotal moment. Although many are longing to get back to normal, now it’s precisely the time to end ‘business as usual’, he said.
“Now, it’s the time to put into practice the commitment to future generations that it is central to the UN charter and to make progress on the future we want. That is the spirit in which the UN75 anniversary is conceived of by the Secretary-General last year.”
The UN75 event was organized by UN Geneva, in cooperation with the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, the University of Geneva and foraus, the Swiss Think Tank on Foreign Policy. In addition to hosting many UN agencies, Switzerland is also home to a number of international sports organizations, such as the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Covid-19 had had a massive impact on large sports events, and has led to such as the postponement of the Olympic Games in Tokyo this year.
“This UN dialogue comes at an important and most appropriate time. The world is looking for new ways to better understand and to address the far-reaching consequences” said Thomas Bach, President of the IOC, in a video message in which he stressed sport as a school of life that can teach values.
“The first lesson we all learn from this crisis is: we need more solidarity. Solidarity within societies and solidarity among the nations of this world. Solidarity is at the heart of the Olympic games which unite the world in all our diversity. In these difficult times, we need the Olympic values of excellence, friendship, respect and solidarity more than ever,” Bach said.
In a post-Covid-19 world, the relationship with culture is being increasingly mediated through the digital interface. However, this relationship continues to be fraught with several socio-economic, as well as legal-ethical tensions.
For Paras Arora, a Master's degree candidate at the Graduate Institute “the virus has entered our cultures now, right. That is it ok for us, to attend for example the death of a very close relative, a Sunday sermon for that matter through Zoom. How is that impacting our religious engagement with, you know, ourselves? So, to treat cultural changes at this point of time as deeply ethical changes with herself is also extremely important. And that can only happen with a more multilateral engagement across borders and across levels of governance”.
Tourism, a complex sector of the economy was badly hit by the pandemic. Beyond a spectacular drop at the international and national scales, local impacts of the crisis are very difficult to quantify. For Raphael Languillon-Aussel, Researcher at the Université de Genève "it is difficult to synthesize the diversity of impacts that tourism has at the local level and it is true that local actors are a little invisible behind major events and large international groups that focus their attention on the media, they focus people's attention”.
Sports can work toward multilateralism in many aspects particularly through the Sustainable Devleopment Goals (SDGs). “If we think about multilateralism and also our SDG’s, actually I think it is number 5 and number 10 that are talking about gender equality and also to reduce all kinds of inequalities”, said Yalan Liu, Graduate Institute, Swiss Forum on Foreign Policy (Foraus). “We think sports can have a strong social impact for increasing this kind of social inclusion. We want to gather people, like both female and male of all ages, of all kind of race, to be together to have the strong solidarity to overcome this global health crisis and we believe sports can play a role in building back strong”.
- Wide shot: Auditorium at Graduate Institute, Geneva, Switzerland
- SOUNDBITE (EN) – Fabrizio Hochschild-Drummond, Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General: “Multilateralism has always been an interplay of national and shared global concerns and it is increasingly so as we are now more interdependent, more interconnected than ever. Culture, tourism and sports, be it in different forms, have all served as inspiring expressions of national identity and pride”.
- Close up, student listening
- SOUNDBITE (EN) - Fabrizio Hochschild-Drummond, Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General: “The Covid-19 pandemic has brought us to a pivotal moment. Although many are longing to get back to normal, now it’s precisely the time to end ‘business as usual’. Now, it’s the time to put into practice the commitment to future generations that it is central to the UN charter and to make progress on the future we want. That is the spirit in which the UN75 anniversary is conceived of by the Secretary-General last year.”.
- Close up: Student listening
- SOUNDBITE (EN) – Thomas Bach, President of International Olympic Committee (IOC): “This UN dialogue comes at an important and most appropriate time. The world is looking for new ways to better understand and to address the far reaching consequences”.
- Medium shot: Audience listening
- SOUNDBITE (EN) – Thomas Bach, President of International Olympic Committee (IOC): “The first lesson we all learn from this crisis is: we need more solidarity. Solidarity within societies and solidarity among the nations of this world. Solidarity is at the heart of the Olympic games which unite the world in all our diversity. In these difficult times, we need the Olympic values of excellence, friendship, respect and solidarity more than ever”.
- Close up: Cameraman
- SOUNDBITE (EN) – Paras Arora, Master's candidate & Hans Wilsdorf Scholar, The Graduate Institute, Geneva: “The virus has entered our cultures now, right. That is it ok for us, to attend for example the death of a very close relative, a Sunday sermon for that matter through Zoom. How is that impacting our religious engagement with, you know, ourselves? So, to treat cultural changes at this point of time as deeply ethical changes with herself is also extremely important. And that can only happen with a more multilateral engagement across borders and across levels of governance”.
- Close up: Young man looking at screen
- SOUNDBITE (FR) - Raphael Languillon-Aussel, Researcher, Université de Genève : « Il est difficile de synthétiser la diversité des impacts que le tourisme a au niveau local et c’est vrai que les acteurs locaux sont un peu invisibilisées derrière les grands événements et les grands groupes internationaux qui eux focalisent l’attention des médias, ils focalisent l’attention des populations ». "It is difficult to synthesize the diversity of impacts that tourism has at the local level and it is true that local actors are a little invisible behind major events and large international groups that focus their attention on the media, they focus people's attention”.
- Medium shot: Moderators in auditorium
- SOUNDBITE (EN) – Yalan Liu, Graduate Institute, Swiss Forum on Foreign Policy (Foraus): “If we think about this multilateralism and also our SDG’s, actually I think it is number 5 and number 10 that are talking about gender equality and also to reduce all kinds of inequalities. We think sports can have a strong social impact for increasing this kind of social inclusion. We want to gather people, like both female and male of all ages, of all kind of race, to be together to have the strong solidarity to overcome this global health crisis and we believe sports can play a role in building back strong”.
- Wide shot, auditorium
- Various shots, audience
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As world’s water reserves change, countries must prepare for a new reality: WMO
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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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.
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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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