the Mediterranean experienced its highest daily temperature on Monday, according to the Spanish maritime institute

2023-07-25 20:50:57

In Algeria, at least 34 dead in violent fires

Firefighters were still hard at work on Tuesday to put out violent fires that hit northern and eastern Algeria and caused at least 34 deaths, including ten soldiers, since Sunday. “Until 8:30 a.m. this morning (9:30 a.m. in Paris), out of 97 declared fires, only 15 remain”including two in Béjaïa, the wilaya (prefecture) most affected by these fires, Civil Protection information officer Karim Belhafsi told national television on Tuesday.

The fires affected more than fifteen prefectures, especially those of Bouira, Jijel and Béjaïa, areas already affected in the past two years by serious fires in which nearly 130 people had died.

Wounded, in an undetermined number but some of them seriously burned, are to be deplored, according to the governor of Béjaïa. More than 1,500 people had to be evacuated from some villages as fire tornadoes approached their homes. Coastal seaside resorts popular with summer visitors were also destroyed by the flames.

The affected villages, a good part of which are located in the mountainous region of Kabylie, are heavily wooded and have been subjected for weeks to an intense heat wave with peaks that reached 48 ° C on Monday. The heat wave dried out the vegetation, making it even more vulnerable to the slightest outbreak of fire.