Reuters on the fires in Albania: There was one victim, entire forest areas are burning

2025-08-13 08:28:00, Aktualitet CNA

Reuters on the fires in Albania: There was one victim, entire forest areas are

Reuters has dedicated an article to the fires in Albania and other European countries.

Firefighters across Spain, Portugal, Greece, Turkey and the Balkans are battling wildfires after another heatwave sent temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius in parts of Europe.

Global warming is causing the Mediterranean region to experience hotter, drier summers, scientists say, with fires increasing every year and sometimes turning into "whirlpools".

"They are boiling us alive, this cannot continue," said a mayor in Portugal, Alexandre Favaios, as three fires were active.

On the outskirts of the Spanish capital, Madrid, a fire caused one victim.

There was also one victim from the fire in Albania, while a 61-year-old Hungarian seasonal worker is suspected of dying from heat-related causes while picking fruit in Lleida, in the eastern Catalonia region of Spain.

In the mountainous Kuci area of Montenegro, northeast of the capital Podgorica, one army soldier was killed and another was seriously injured when a water tanker they were driving overturned, the Defense Ministry said.

In Tarifa, at the southernmost tip of the Iberian Peninsula, beachgoers and celebrity chef Jose Andres filmed flames and black smoke rising from the hills above whitewashed villas.

More than 2,000 people were evacuated as the fire, believed to have started in eucalyptus and pine forests, spread, officials said. Helicopters doused the flames with seawater.

Authorities in Albania, Montenegro, Germany, Spain, Italy and France issued various types of heat warnings.

In Spain, temperatures reached 44 degrees Celsius (111 degrees Fahrenheit) in some regions, according to the AEMET meteorological service, with minimal rainfall and windy conditions expected to worsen the fire risk.

Spain's Interior Ministry has put national services on alert, while almost 1,000 members of the armed forces are already supporting the firefighting efforts.

The country's rail operator said trains between northwestern Galicia and Madrid were stopped due to a fire.

In Spain's largest region, Castile and Leon, more than 1,200 firefighters battled 32 fires on Tuesday and thousands of residents were told to leave their homes.

Meanwhile, police said they had arrested a firefighter near the walled city of Avila northwest of Madrid who had confessed to starting a fire two weeks ago because of the potential income from putting it out.

In northern Portugal, more than 1,300 firefighters supported by 16 aircraft were battling three major fires. One of them, in the Vila Real area, has been burning for 10 days.

In Albania, large areas of forests and agricultural land have been scorched by fires over the past week and 30 separate fires continue to burn, fueled by strong winds.

The Defense Ministry said four military helicopters and 80 soldiers were assisting firefighters. It also reported the death of a man suspected of starting a fire in his yard that spread to a wider area.

In Montenegro, authorities supported by helicopters from Serbia and Croatia controlled a large fire near Podgorica on Tuesday, with the capital shrouded in smoke. In Gornja Vrbica, residents helped firefighters stop a blaze that was reaching a local church and cemetery, the daily Pobjeda reported.

More assistance was expected from Austria, Slovenia and Italy under the EU civil protection mechanism.

Dragana Vukovic, whose house in southeastern Piperi was reduced to rubble, told Reuters: "Everything that can be paid for and bought will be compensated, but the memories that were burned in these four rooms and the attic cannot be compensated."

In Greece, on the southernmost tip of Europe, fires in some cases fanned by strong winds forced the evacuation of several villages and a hotel on the tourist islands of Zakynthos and Cephalonia in the Ionian Sea, along with four other parts of the mainland.

A huge fire in the southern Greek region of Achaia forced residents of five villages near an industrial area to evacuate, as 85 firefighters and 10 aircraft tried to stop a blaze from reaching homes near the western Greek town of Vonita.

The picture was similar in Turkey, where a large fire in the northwestern province of Canakkale burned for the second day in a row, prompting the evacuation of hundreds of residents./ CNA