The wave that swept across Nepal and Tibet together

It will take time to establish the exact cause of the disaster. What is certain, however, is that the flash flood which struck the border between Nepal and Tibet yesterday is one of the worst natural disasters to hit the region in recent years. At the time of going to press, the death toll confirmed by the Nepalese authorities stands at ninety-five, but this figure is set to rise: there are hundreds of people missing, and the images circulating online are harrowing. The flood of mud and debris struck suddenly shortly before nine o’clock yesterday morning, when the streets of the towns in Rasuwa District, along the Bhotekoshi River, and further downstream in Nuwakot were already crowded. The most dramatic footage comes from the Gyirong Pass on the Tibetan side: a mass of water, mud and debris sweeps away the Chinese immigration control centre in a matter of seconds. In the video, people can be seen trying to reach safety, before the camera is swept away by the shockwave. The flooding has destroyed roads, bridges and infrastructure and cut off communications in the border area.

As for why that mass swept through such a fragile and highly sensitive area as the border between Nepal and the Tibet Autonomous Region, however, accounts differ. In the hours immediately following the disaster, the US Geological Survey (USGS) had recorded a 4.4-magnitude earthquake in the area, speculating that it might have triggered the collapse of part of the glacier. The USGS subsequently revised its interpretation of the data, attributing the seismic signal to a massive landslide of ice and rock – equivalent to a 5.2-magnitude earthquake – which had broken away and poured into the Lhende River, causing the river to burst its banks with tremendous force. As is often the case in such situations, Beijing immediately confirmed the event in its Tibetan region, whilst instructing the state media to focus on certain politically significant details: firstly, the name of the region – the word ‘Tibet’ is no longer considered politically correct; the leadership now wants it referred to as ‘Xizang’ – and Chinese state media, from Xinhua to CCTV, have repeatedly referred to a ‘landslide on the Nepalese side’ as the cause of the disaster that reached the Gyirong Pass. This distinction serves to place the origin of the disaster outside Chinese territory. Leader Xi Jinping has “issued important instructions” regarding the search and rescue of those missing – a formula designed to reassure citizens of the Party leader’s direct involvement – but the area is particularly sensitive: Gyirong is one of the main land corridors between China and Nepal, a commercial and strategic gateway through the Himalayas, and in July last year the same pass had already been devastated by a flood, which destroyed the border bridge and cut off connections for months.

The border between Nepal and Tibet – a region that for decades has been subject to one of China’s most stringent systems of political and social control – is where Beijing tends to maintain obsessive surveillance over access and information. For the Chinese leadership, natural disasters (just like food scandals) are also a matter of legitimacy: if citizens do not feel safe, the structure of the single ruling party collapses. As is the case every year, the months of July and August – the season of rains, monsoons and typhoons – combined with climate change, have triggered a rapid succession of crises. In mid-July, there was the major landslide in Pengshui (Chongqing), which claimed around 51 lives. Then came the floods and landslides in Gansu at the end of July, with at least 25 fatalities; the heavy rains in Sichuan, leading to the evacuation of over 20,000 people in a single day and more than a million since the start of the season; and finally, the damage caused by Typhoons Maysak and Narra in Guangxi, Hainan and Guangdong, which left tens of thousands displaced and caused widespread flooding.

International solidarity is already underway: Nepal, which has a poor economy heavily reliant on remittances from migrant workers, tourism and international aid, is extremely vulnerable when it comes to its infrastructure. The government in Kathmandu is torn between growing Chinese influence and traditional Indian influence, but it is primarily Beijing that has invested heavily in Nepalese infrastructure in recent years. It is precisely via the Gyirong Pass that the multi-billion-dollar Kerung–Kathmandu cross-border railway project, proposed as part of the Silk Road initiative, is due to pass. However, many of these projects have stalled in recent years because the Nepalese government has raised doubts and concerns regarding costs, debt to Beijing, as well as transparency and their economic viability. Yesterday’s disaster is the first real emergency test for Prime Minister Balendra “Balen” Shah, the former rapper who became prime minister at the age of 35 just five months ago, ushering in a new political generation in Nepal. Yesterday, in a video posted on social media, he called for national unity. The United States, the European Union and the World Bank are now rallying round him, having offered aid to a poor country strategically caught between New Delhi and Beijing.