Athens [Greece], August 23: Greek wildfires in the past days have obscured the sun with a thick smoke, as strong winds fuelled the massive forest fires which have so far resulted in 20 deaths, including 18 suspected migrants whose bodies were discovered on Tuesday.
Rescuers found 18 burned bodies in a hut in the Dadia national park, where a large forest fire is burning.
"Since no one was declared missing, we are working on the assumption that they are illegal migrants," fire service spokesman Giannis Artopoios told the public broadcaster ERT.
The body of another suspected migrant was found earlier in the woods on Tuesday. He presumably died of smoke inhalation. A shepherd died on Monday while trying to bring his animals to safety.
The migrants were reportedly found in a hut near the village of Avas. An investigation has been launched.
In the forest area of Dadia, migrants who illegally entered Greece from Turkey via the border river Evros hide again and again. From there, they hope to continue on to Central Europe. How many migrants still in the region who could be at risk is unknown.
Fires have been raging in the north-eastern area of Greece for days, as well as in other parts of the country.
Migrants who have secretly entered Greece from Turkey via the Evros border river are often found hiding in the Dadia forest area.
Given the deaths and countless fires, Greeks all over the country are worried. At least five fires are very large and not under control. In the affected areas, firefighters and residents fought to exhaustion. In the hard-hit port city of Alexandroupolis they have been battling blazes for four days now.
"The extent of the fires in Alexandroupolis exceeds any fire-fighting mechanism," a fire brigade spokesman told the Skai radio station. In other words, the goal now is to first save lives and then bring the fires under control.
"Human lives are the top priority," Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told journalists on Tuesday. Only then would property and the environment be considered. He pointed out that the rapid evacuations were successful, as countless villages near all major fires had been evacuated in the past few days as a precaution.
In addition to the Dadia fires, TV images showed desperate people fighting orange-lit walls of fire at night on the island of Euboea and crying residents whose houses had burned down.
In Alexandroupolis, around 175 people had to be brought to safety from the university hospital - some of them on a ferry that later left for Kavala, the rest to hospitals in the surrounding area.
Deep black clouds of smoke also enveloped the capital Athens - where there was a fire on Tuesday in the municipality of Aspropyrgos, about 15 kilometres away. This Athens suburb has hardly any vegetation, but large rubbish dumps, industrial halls and mountains of car tyres that caught fire.
Meanwhile, international aid for Greece was once again on its way.
The European Union announced that it was sending five additional planes, a helicopter and more firefighters in addition to two fire-fighting planes from Cyprus and firefighters from Romania, JanezLenarcic, the EU commissioner responsible for crisis management said.
The help comes from Germany, Croatia, Sweden and the Czech Republic. In Germany, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser expressed her support and sympathies for the Greek fires.
Source: Qatar Tribune