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ISLAMABAD: Cloudbursts are causing chaos in mountainous parts of India and Pakistan, with tremendous amounts of rain falling in a short period of time over a concentrated area. The intense, sudden deluges have proved fatal in both countries.

As many as 300 people died in one northwestern Pakistani district, Buner, after a cloudburst. The strength and volume of rain triggered flash flooding, landslides and mudflows. Boulders from steep slopes came crashing down with the water to flatten homes and reduce villages to rubble.

The northern Indian state of Uttarakhand had a cloudburst earlier this month. Local TV showed floodwaters surging down a mountain and crashing into Dharali, a Himalayan village. In 2013, more than 6,000 people died and 4,500 villages were affected when a similar cloudburst struck the state.

WHAT TO KNOW

They are complex and extreme weather events.

A cloudburst occurs when a large volume of rain falls in a very short period, usually more than 100 millimeters (about 4 inches) within an hour over a localized area, around 30 square kilometers (11.6 square miles).
Cloudbursts are sudden and violent, with devastating consequences and widespread destruction, and can be the equivalent of several hours of normal rainfall or longer. The event is the bursting of a cloud and the discharge of its contents at the same time, like a rain bomb.

Several factors contribute to a cloudburst, including warm, moist air rising upward, high humidity, low pressure, instability and convective cloud formation.

Moist air is forced to rise after encountering a hill or mountain. This rising air cools and condenses. Clouds that are large, dense and capable of heavy rainfall form.

Hills or mountains act like barriers and often trap these clouds, so they cannot disperse or move easily. Strong upward currents keep moisture suspended inside the clouds, delaying rainfall.

When the clouds cannot hold the accumulated moisture anymore, they burst and release it all at once.

IDEAL CONDITIONS IN INDIA, PAKISTAN

Cloudbursts thrive in moisture, monsoons and mountains. Regions of India and Pakistan have all three, making them vulnerable to these extreme weather events.

The Himalayas, Karakoram and Hindu Kush mountain ranges are home to the world’s highest and most famous peaks, spanning multiple countries including India and Pakistan.

The frequency of cloudbursts in these two South Asian nations has been steadily rising due to a warming atmosphere, because a warmer air mass can hold more moisture, creating conditions for sudden and intense downpours.

The South Asian region has traditionally had two monsoon seasons. One typically lasts from June to September, with rains moving southwest to northeast. The other, from roughly October to December, moves in the opposite direction.

But with more planet-warming gases in the air, the rain now only loosely follows this pattern.

This is because the warmer air can hold more moisture from the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean, and that rain then tends to get dumped all at once. It means the monsoon is punctuated with intense flooding and dry spells, rather than sustained rain throughout.

The combination of moisture, mountains and monsoons force these moisture-laden winds upward, triggering sudden condensation and cloudbursts.

HARD TO PREDICT

It’s difficult to predict cloudbursts because of their size, duration, suddenness and complex atmospheric mechanisms.

Asfandyar Khan Khattak, a Pakistani official from the northwest province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, said there was “no forecasting system anywhere in the world” that could predict the exact time and location of a cloudburst.

The Pakistani government said that while an early warning system was in place in Buner district, where hundreds of people died after a cloudburst, the downpour was so sudden and intense that it struck before residents could be alerted.

Community organization SOST, which is also the name of a border village in Pakistan’s northern Gilgit-Baltistan region, says precautions are possible.

It advises people to avoid building homes right next to rivers and valleys, to postpone any travel to hilly areas if heavy rain is forecast, to keep an emergency kit ready, and to avoid traveling on mountainous roads during heavy rain or at night.

It recommends afforestation to reduce surface runoff and enhance water absorption, and regular clearing and widening of riverbanks and drainage channels.

CLIMATE CHANGE FUELS FREQUENCY

Experts say cloudbursts have increased in recent years, partly due to climate change, while damage from associated storms has also increased due to unplanned development in mountain areas.

Climate change has directly amplified the triggers of cloudbursts in Pakistan, especially. Every 1°C rise allows the air to hold about 7 percent more moisture, increasing the potential for heavy rainfall in short bursts.

The warming of the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea pushes more moisture into the atmosphere. Melting glaciers and snow alter local weather patterns, making rainfall events more erratic and extreme. Environmental degradation, in the form of deforestation and wetland loss, reduces the land’s ability to absorb water, magnifying flash floods.

Climate change has been a central driver in the destruction seen in Pakistan’s northern areas.

“Rising global temperatures have supercharged the hydrologic cycle, leading to more intense and erratic rainfall,” said Khalid Khan, a former special secretary for climate change in Pakistan and chairman of climate initiative PlanetPulse.

“In our northern regions, warming accelerates glacier melt, adds excessive moisture to the atmosphere, and destabilizes mountain slopes. In short, climate change is making rare events more frequent, and frequent events more destructive.”

NEW YORK: Russia agrees that any future peace agreement on Ukraine must provide security guarantees to Kyiv but Moscow also needs credible security assurances, Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s envoy to international organizations in Vienna, said early on Monday.

“Many leaders of #EU states emphasize that a future peace agreement should provide reliable security assurances or guarantees for Ukraine,” Ulyanov said on X.

“Russia agrees with that. But it has equal right to expect that Moscow will also get efficient security guarantees,” he added.

Ulyanov's statement confirmed Trump envoy Steve Witkoff's earlier statement that Putin agreed at his summit with President Donald Trump that the United States and its European allies could offer Ukraine a security guarantee resembling NATO’s collective defense mandate as part of an eventual deal to end the war.

Witkoff, who took part in the talks Friday at a military base in Alaska, said it “was the first time we had ever heard the Russians agree to that” and called it “game-changing.”
“We were able to win the following concession: that the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO,” Witkoff told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Witkoff offered few details on how such an arrangement would work. But it appeared to be a major shift for Putin and could serve as a workaround to his deep-seated objection to Ukraine’s potential NATO membership, a step that Kyiv has long sought.
It was expected to be a key topic Monday as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and major European leaders meet with Trump at the White House to discuss ending the 3 1/2-year conflict.

“BIG PROGRESS ON RUSSIA,” Trump said Sunday on social media. “STAY TUNED!”
On Sunday night, however, Trump seemed to put the onus on Zelensky to agree to concessions.
“President Zelensky of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,” he wrote. “Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!“
Hammering out a plan for security guarantees
Article 5, the heart of the 32-member transatlantic military alliance, says an armed attack against a member nation is considered an attack against them all.
What needed to be hammered out at this week’s talks were the contours of any security guarantees, said Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who also participated in the summit. Ukraine and European allies have pushed the US to provide that backstop in any peace agreement to deter future attacks by Moscow.
“How that’s constructed, what we call it, how it’s built, what guarantees are built into it that are enforceable, that’s what we’ll be talking about over the next few days with our partners,” Rubio said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
It was unclear, however, whether Trump had fully committed to such a guarantee. Rubio said it would be “a huge concession.”
The comments shed new light on what was discussed in Alaska. Before Sunday, US officials had offered few details even as both Trump and Putin said their meeting was a success.
Witkoff also said Russia had agreed to enact a law that it would not “go after any other European countries and violate their sovereignty.”
“The Russians agreed on enshrining legislatively language that would prevent them from — or that they would attest to not attempting to take any more land from Ukraine after a peace deal, where they would attest to not violating any European borders,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”
Europe welcomes US openness to security guarantees
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, speaking in Brussels alongside Zelensky, applauded the news from the White House as a European coalition looks to set up a force to police any future peace in Ukraine.
“We welcome President Trump’s willingness to contribute to Article 5-like security guarantees for Ukraine and the ‘coalition of the willing’ — including the European Union — is ready to do its share,” she said.
Zelensky thanked the US for signaling that it was willing to support such guarantees but said much remained unclear.
“There are no details how it will work, and what America’s role will be, Europe’s role will be and what the EU can do — and this is our main task: We need security to work in practice like Article 5 of NATO,” he said.
French President Emmanuel Macron said the substance of security guarantees to secure any peace arrangement will be more important than whether they are given an Article 5-type label.
At the White House meeting, Macron said European leaders will ask the US to back their plans to beef up Ukraine’s armed forces with more training and equipment and deploy an allied force away from the front lines.
“We’ll show this to our American colleagues, and we’ll tell them, ‘Right, we’re ready to do this and that, what are you prepared to do?’” Macron said. “That’s the security guarantee.”
Defending Trump’s shift from ceasefire to peace deal
Witkoff and Rubio defended Trump’s decision to abandon a push for a ceasefire, arguing that the Republican president had pivoted toward a full peace agreement because so much progress had been made at the summit.
“We covered almost all the other issues necessary for a peace deal,” Witkoff said, without elaborating. “We began to see some moderation in the way they’re thinking about getting to a final peace deal.”
Rubio, appearing on several TV news shows Sunday, said it would have been impossible to reach any truce Friday because Ukraine was not there.
“Now, ultimately, if there isn’t a peace agreement, if there isn’t an end of this war, the president’s been clear, there are going to be consequences,” Rubio said on ABC’s “This Week.” “But we’re trying to avoid that.”
Rubio, who is also Trump’s national security adviser, also voiced caution on the progress made.
“We’re still a long ways off,” he said. “We’re not at the precipice of a peace agreement. We’re not at the edge of one. But I do think progress was made toward one.”
Land swaps are on the table
Among the issues expected to dominate Monday’s meeting: What concessions Zelensky might accept on territory.
In talks with European allies after the summit, Trump said Putin reiterated that he wants the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that make up the Donbas, European officials said. It was unclear among those briefed whether Trump sees that as acceptable.
Witkoff said the Russians have made clear they want territory as determined by legal boundaries instead of the front lines where territory has been seized.
“There is an important discussion to be had with regard to Donetsk and what would happen there. And that discussion is going to specifically be detailed on Monday,” he said.
Zelensky has rejected Putin’s demands that Ukraine give up the Donbas region, which Russia has failed to take completely, as a condition for peace.
In Brussels, the Ukrainian leader said any talks involving land must be based on current front lines, suggesting he will not abandon land that Russia has not taken.
“The contact line is the best line for talking, and the Europeans support this,” he said. “The constitution of Ukraine makes it impossible, impossible to give up territory or trade land.”