The riskiest places to travel in 2025 because of war, crime and more

While the travel industry has seen further significant recovery in 2024 from the downturn triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic, it has been affected by instability in various parts of the world. From attacks on railway lines during the Paris Olympics to conflicts in the Middle East and the war in Ukraine, the year has been fraught with challenges. It is against this backdrop that the international security and medical services provider Global Guardian recently released its 2025 Global Risk Map. Published annually, the map is meant to help travellers better understand the current global risk landscape. In order to develop its guidance, experts at Global Guardian assess a long list of country-specific security risk factors and indicators, including crime, health, natural disasters, infrastructure, political stability, civil unrest and terrorism. For 2025, Global Guardian’s assessment results underscore the reality that disruption globally and domestically continues to increase, and now more than ever travellers need to be prepared when exploring the world. As part of the latest assessment, Global Guardian highlighted regions at particular risk of destabilisation over the next year and beyond. Here is a closer look at those regions: Israel’s existential battle against Iran is set to continue into 2025, says the Global Guardian report. There are over 100 conflicts across the globe Dale Buckner, CEO of Global Guardian “In July 2024, Israel assassinated Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in an Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) safe house in Tehran, and Iran has pledged revenge,” the report explains. “This comes as Iran and its web of regional proxies took their war on Israel out of the shadows and into the open following October 7, 2023, with seven live fronts.” Global Guardian predicts that Israel’s regional war will shift from Gaza to the West Bank and Lebanon in the year ahead, heightening tensions with Hezbollah, while attacks by Houthi rebels based in Yemen on commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean will persist. The report adds that as “we enter 2025, Israel may assess that its strategic window to prevent a nuclear Iran is rapidly closing and choose to act”. The ongoing civil war in Sudan between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces is also of concern, according to Global Guardian’s risk analysis. The conflict “has created a dire humanitarian situation with ethnically motivated violence on the rise”, says the report. Several countries received an extreme or high-risk designation on the new Global Guardian risk map for 2025, including more than a few that are popular with leisure travellers or tourists. Extreme-risk countries are those that Global Guardian says are “actively engaged in conflict, while also experiencing severe criminal activity and civil unrest”. “These countries are insecure; state institutions are too weak to manage militant groups or large-scale disasters,” it says. They include Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Lebanon, Mali, Niger, Somalia, Ukraine and Yemen. Israel’s West Bank and Gaza are also classified as extreme risk. The current list of high-risk countries, those that experience regular conflict, criminal activity or civil unrest and have not effectively managed those risks, includes Bangladesh, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Honduras, Iraq, Israel, Jamaica, Kenya, Libya, Mexico, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, South Sudan, Uganda and Venezuela. Global Guardian chief executive Dale Buckner, a retired US Army colonel, maintains that the world is a more risky place heading into 2025. The challenges in the Middle East and Ukraine are at the forefront of the instability, but are hardly the only cause for concern. “Israel has now gone to Gaza and cleaned out Hamas, they’re now moving north into Lebanon, and we are convinced Israel will strike Iran,” Buckner says. “If that occurs you are going to see violence across the Middle East.” “But there are over 100 conflicts across the globe,” Buckner says. When you combine that reality with other challenges the world is currently grappling with, including the destabilising influences of climate change, there are plenty of risks for travellers to bear in mind when planning a journey for the coming year. He wraps up by offering a few tips for travellers, a checklist of sorts, to work through when planning or considering travel to a specific country in 2025: Firstly, if you do not know who to call or how you are going to negotiate if someone is kidnapped, you should not go there. Secondly, consumers need to read the fine print on travel insurance because it does not cover war zones, terrorism or natural disasters, says Buckner. And travellers are often surprised and find out too late that these types of events are not covered. And, finally, if you get stuck or stranded, if you do not know who you are going to call to get you out of that situation, know what organisations locally or internationally are available to help you.

The riskiest places to travel in 2025 because of war, crime and more

From Israel to Myanmar, Pakistan and Kenya, the countries travellers should avoid, according to Global Guardian’s 2025 Global Risk Map