non-determined legal status territories and conflict zones (e.g., Greiner 2012; Daskin and Pringle 2018; Hanson 2018).

Moreover, weak governance and fragmented authority in non-determined legal status territories create additional complications. Conflicting territorial claims can undermine environmental protection and allow unchecked exploitation of natural resources. The institutional landscape in these areas often features competing authorities, which results in inconsistencies in law enforcement and resource management (Beckman, 2013). Although international interventions aim to foster stability, they frequently lack robust enforcement mechanisms. This instability can prolong conflicts, deepen socio-economic inequalities, and intensify environmental degradation (Buhaug et al., 2014).

In conflict zones, governance often collapses, making effective environmental protection nearly impossible. For instance, recent events in the Syrian Arab Republic and the Republic of Yemen have led to the collapse of public institutions, with attention shifting to immediate survival and security needs, leaving environmental concerns neglected (World Bank, 2011). To address these challenges, efforts to conserve biodiversity in affected regions must be preceded by the restoration of national and international cooperation to rebuild trust and establish shared conservation goals (Gaind et al., 2016).

While human conflict areas present significant challenges for biodiversity conservation due to governance gaps and instability, transboundary river basins also face complex issues—ranging from competing national interests to opportunities for cooperation—requiring coordinated efforts to address shared environmental concerns and manage resources sustainably across borders. Effective conservation in such areas requires objective, reliable, and comparable data from all riparian entities. In practice, weak governance and political or social instability often make it difficult for officially-designated institutions to collect the necessary data (Cohen and Arieli 2011). This is particularly true in regions with competing territorial claims, where data collection and conservation efforts are frequently obstructed. In this context, recent studies (Turner et al., 2015; Levin et al., 2019; Mobaied and Rudant 2019; Garzón and Valánszki 2020; Aung 2021) have emphasized the potential importance of remote sensing from satellite platforms. These technologies offer a promising solution by providing valuable and consistently collected real-time data from areas that may otherwise be inaccessible or where traditional monitoring is too challenging.

The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is also playing a critical role in overcoming these barriers. By acquiring and distributing data on species sightings from concerned organizations and individuals, the GBIF is providing essential information in areas where officiallysupported monitoring may be sparse or difficult to implement. This collaboration strengthens global conservation efforts by making vital data more accessible, even in fragile or conflictaffected regions.

To implement effective conservation strategies in such contexts, accurate, location-specific data are crucial. The importance of this data for identifying critical biodiversity areas and tracking 3