A preliminary assessment suggested the collapse of a high-altitude glacier in Nepal was behind the mudslides and floods along the Nepal-China border, China’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday (August 28, 2026).

“We noted that experts and official institutions of China and Nepal have made preliminary assessments on the cause of the disaster,” spokesperson Lin Jian said. “According to their analysis, the disaster may have been triggered by the collapse of a high altitude glacier in Nepal.”

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Chinese authorities said 555 tourists had been evacuated from Gyirong county in Tibet. As of Friday (August 28), Chinese authorities had confirmed three deaths but added that more than 550 people were still missing.

On whether there were tourists from India among those evacuated and among the missing, Mr. Lin said China was in touch with the Indian Embassy in Beijing and details of nationalities were being verified. “We have already notified the embassies of relevant countries and we will maintain communication with them,” he said.

Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday (August 28) chaired a rare emergency meeting of the Communist Party’s leadership “to deliberate and make arrangements on rescue and relief efforts”. A statement following the meeting, which began with a moment of silence, warned of the complications involved in rescue efforts, saying that operations were being carried out swiftly. China’s Premier and second-ranked leader Li Qiang arrived in Gyirong on Thursday (August 27) to oversee rescue efforts and meet with those displaced.

“The disaster occurred in a severely cold plateau region with steep valleys, variable weather, many surrounding glaciers and glacial lakes, as well as potential geological hazards, which poses significant challenges to emergency rescue operations,” the statement said, adding that “every effort should be made to search for and rescue all missing Chinese and foreign nationals”. The statement said China will provide emergency aid to Nepal and carry out “international rescue cooperation”.

A glacial collapse caused seismic activity and “catastrophic” downstream impacts in Nepal and Tibet, the U.S. Geological Survey said on Thursday (August 27, 2026).

The agency said seismic activity initially reported as an earthquake “was instead a glacial collapse and debris flow” that “caused subsequent catastrophic impacts downstream”.

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At least 160 people were killed by torrents of water and debris that crashed downstream on either side of the Nepal-Tibet border, with hundreds reported missing in both areas.

The cause of the disaster was not immediately clear in the hours after it occurred early on Wednesday (August 26, 2026), but Nepal’s Foreign Minister Shishir Khanal had said an earthquake likely triggered a landslide, in turn blocking a river and sending water gushing downstream.

Other theories advanced included a glacial lake flood – when a fragile debris wall holding back glacier melt collapses -or an ice avalanche.

USGS said “a magnitude 5.2 seismic event occurred near the border between Nepal and China on Aug 26 at 8:37 a.m. local time.”

“This event was initially reported as a magnitude 4.4 earthquake. Additional analysis of nearby seismic stations, long period seismic waves, and satellite imagery led to the determination that the seismic event was instead a glacial collapse and debris flow, and that no earthquake had occurred.”