The National Defence Council Foundation of United States identified Nepal as one of the serious conflict zones of 2000 in a report released on 31 December 2002. Bangladesh, India and Pakistan are other South Asian countries on the list. The council has added 15 new countries in 1999 and twelve have been delisted.

Conflict in 2000 was up to 68 from 65 in 1999?one of the highest in the history of the report. It claims the level of conflict globally is far higher than at the end of the Cold War, when the total was about 35. The report also says the distribution of conflicts around the world has stayed mostly stable. The most conflict-prone areas are in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, which together account for nearly half of all conflicts. The most significant change in geographical distribution is the rise of conflict in South and Central Asia, which has gone from six in 1997 to 10 in 2000.