From water systems to forests to farmlands, the United Nations (UN) has warned of devastating consequences that can last for decades.

Speaking at a UN Security Council debate on Thursday, Sierra Leone’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Francess Piagie Alghali, said her country’s own experience after its civil war showed how conflict harms the environment and livelihoods.

“When the guns fell silent in 2002 after a decade of conflict, our primary forests and savannahs also fell silent,” she said. “We witnessed loss of biodiversity, the forced migration of wildlife, and the abandonment of agricultural fields and swamps.”

The meeting, held under Sierra Leone’s Presidency of the Security Council, focused on the environmental impact of war and climate-related security threats, as armed conflicts reach their highest level since the Second World War, affecting an estimated two billion people worldwide.

UN Environment Programme Executive Director, Inger Andersen, said wars leave behind pollution, waste, and the destruction of vital ecosystems, with long-term effects on food and water security, health and economic stability.

“Environmental damage caused by conflicts continues to push people into hunger, disease and displacement,” she said.

She cited examples from Gaza, where two years of conflict have wiped out 97% of tree crops and 95% of shrubland, and from Ukraine, where the destruction of the Kakhova Dam in June 2023 flooded more than 600 square kilometres of land, destroying habitats and species.

Legal experts and humanitarian representatives called for stronger international laws and closer links between peacebuilding, humanitarian response and climate action.

Andersen urged increased investment in climate adaptation, saying rebuilding environmental management systems in war-torn nations was key to stability.

“Every fraction of a degree avoided means lower losses for people and ecosystems, and greater opportunities for peace and prosperity,” she said.

–UN/ChannelAfrica–