Nepal has urged the international community to provide financial support after devastating flash floods struck the country on August 26, while raising a broader question of climate justice: should major greenhouse gas emitters pay for disasters suffered by vulnerable nations?
The disaster began after a collapse of rock and ice near the Nepal-Tibet border sent a huge surge of water and debris into the Lhende Khola and then the Bhotekoshi and Trishuli rivers. Nepal Police reported 1,066 deaths and around 4,606 people missing as of Wednesday. China has recorded casualties separately.
Satellite imagery and preliminary assessments suggest that an ice avalanche, permafrost movement and a rockslide may have contributed to the disaster. Scientists, however, have cautioned against immediately attributing the mountain collapse entirely to climate change. Researchers say warming at high elevations may have weakened glaciers and surrounding rock, but establishing a direct link could require years of detailed scientific study.
Nepal's Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal has argued that countries with large historical contributions to climate change should help pay for the consequences. He specifically mentioned China, the United States and India, saying Nepal was seeking justice and compensation rather than simply asking for charity.
Prime Minister Balendra Shah has taken a more measured position. While thanking China and India for providing technical assistance and aerial reconnaissance, Shah said climate change had a global contribution and that responsibility for managing its effects also rested with the international community.
Nepal has formally approached the board of the Fund for responding to Loss and Damage, asking for urgent assistance. The letter, signed by Finance Minister Swarnim Wagle and Forests and Environment Minister Geeta Chaudhary, said the scale of the disaster had exceeded Nepal's capacity to respond.
Preliminary government estimates have placed the damage between $4 billion and $7 billion, although the formal request to the fund did not specify a final figure.
There is, however, a major obstacle. The loss and damage fund has never yet made a payment to any country. Its available resources are also far below Nepal's estimated losses.
The legal question is equally complicated. Under the Paris Agreement, loss and damage does not establish a direct basis for liability or compensation. The fund primarily provides grant finance, with countries contributing voluntarily.
However, Nepal has another potential route. In July 2025, the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion stating that states breaching their climate obligations could, where the necessary legal conditions are met, face a duty of full reparation. Establishing a direct and sufficiently certain connection between a state's conduct and a specific disaster would nevertheless be extremely difficult.
For now, Nepal's strongest immediate option appears to be securing emergency grant assistance rather than pursuing direct compensation from individual countries. Its case is strengthened by its status as a least developed country and by the scale of the disaster, but the loss and damage fund faces severe financial limitations.
The tragedy has therefore placed Nepal at the centre of a growing global debate over who should bear the financial burden of climate-related disasters in vulnerable countries.
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