The world is witnessing a surge in state conflicts not seen since the conclusion of World War II, according to a troubling new study.
Researchers from the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP) have documented a staggering 65 state-involved conflicts in 2025 alone.
Alarmingly, the number of state-to-state conflicts has seen a sharp increase for the second consecutive year, doubling from two in 2023 to eight by the end of last year.
Among these were the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, as well as hostilities involving Iran and Israel, India and Pakistan, and Israel and Syria.
The study further identified that 13 of these conflicts escalated to the level of ‘wars,’ meeting the grim threshold of at least 1,000 battle-related deaths within a single year.
As a result, 2025 stands as one of the deadliest years recorded in modern history, with organized violence claiming the lives of more than 244,600 individuals.
That is the second highest number of deaths for soldiers and civilians since the Rwandan Genocide in 1994.
Therese Pettersson, senior analyst and project leader at UCDP, says: ‘It’s not just a matter of more conflicts, but also of very high levels of deadly violence.’
2025 was one of the bloodiest years in human history, with over 244,600 people killed in organised violence around the world (illustrated)
The war in Ukraine accounted for 65 per cent of battlefield deaths in 2025, with at least 97,400 fatalities. Pictured: Ukrainian soldiers fire artillery at Russian positions
In the last few decades, the number of open conflicts between states has been trending downwards.
While violence involving states was still common, it became far rarer for two nations to engage in open violent conflict.
However, the latest data now shows a ‘clear increase’ in these violent confrontations.
Magnus Öberg, Director of UCDP and senior lecturer at Uppsala University, told the Daily Mail: ‘The increases in interstate conflict and internationalised intrastate conflict have been going on for over a decade now and are accelerating.
‘This reflects a breakdown of the world order established after WWII. Russia, China, and now also the United States are abandoning it or challenging it outright.’
The biggest of these interstate conflicts is the war between Russia and Ukraine, which has been locked in a stalemate since fighting began in 2022.
This is the largest and bloodiest conflict in Europe since the end of World War II and shows little sign of slowing.
In 2025, researchers estimate that there were at least 97,400 fatalities on both sides.
Africa (red) was the site of the most state-based armed conflicts in 2025, followed by Asia (grey) and the Middle East (yellow)
This staggering number makes up 62 per cent of all battlefield deaths worldwide last year.
While researchers say the increase in state–on–state conflict increases the risk of World War III, the chances of a truly global war remain relatively slim.
Co–author Shawn Davies, Senior Analyst at UCDP, told the Daily Mail: ‘While more conflicts heighten the risk of spillovers that could pull more countries into conflict, World Wars are themselves very specific and rare events.
‘The rise in interstate conflicts carries a greater risk of igniting a broader war, though a truly global war remains a fairly distant possibility.’
Mr Davies also points out that the weakening of commitment to NATO’s mutual defence agreement makes a world war less likely.
However, it does make ‘the risks of regional great power wars, including the possibility of nuclear war, more likely.’
But it is not just soldiers who have been killed by the thousands, as researchers report a startling rise in violence against non–combatants.
So–called ‘one–sided violence’ led to the deaths of around 76,500 unarmed civilians last year.
Civilian casualties hit their highest level since the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, with 76,500 killed in ‘one-sided’ conflicts
Civilian casualties hit their highest level since the 1994 Rwandan Genocide; this was driven largely by the massacres carried out by RSF forces at the Sudanese city of El Fasher. Pictured: An RSF fighter named Abu Lu (left) accused of executing civilians
That represents a 400 per cent increase from 2024 and the highest number of one–sided fatalities since 1994, when 500,000 to one million Rwandans were massacred in a genocide.
Ms Pettersson says: ‘Above all, we see a dramatic increase in violence targeting civilians, especially in Sudan.’
A significant amount of this violence was centred around the city of El Fasher, the capital of Sudan’s North Darfur region.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a Sudanese paramilitary group, besieged the city for 500 days, systematically cutting off civilians from food, water, and medical supplies.
A recent UN report concluded that the eventual RSF takeover had the ‘hallmarks of genocide’, with documented evidence of mass killings, widespread rape, and calls to eliminate non–Arab populations.
Survivors cited RSF fighters as saying: ‘Is there anyone Zaghawa among you? If we find Zaghawa, we will kill them all’; and ‘We want to eliminate anything black from Darfur.’
After the city fell in mid–October, the researchers estimated that 60,000 civilians had been killed by the end of December.
‘Civilians have been subjected to very extensive violence during the war in Sudan since 2023, but the events in El Fasher in 2025 stand out even in a historical perspective,’ says Ms Pettersson.
Syria was another hotspot for civilian fatalities, with an estimated 2,100 deaths in 2025 after the fall of the Assad regime. Pictured: A member of the army stands guard in Damascus, Syria
‘They are the major reason why the number of deaths from one–sided violence reached the highest level in more than 30 years.’
Syria was another hotspot for civilian fatalities, with an estimated 2,100 deaths in 2025 after the fall of the Assad regime left the transitional government struggling to control local militias.
Despite this, the number of non–state conflicts fell last year, hitting the lowest level since 2013 with 14,500 deaths.
However, the researchers note that this reduction is almost entirely due to changes in patterns of violence in Latin America, particularly between drug cartels in Mexico.
