Greece races to tackle wildfires as winds set to resume

VOLOS, Greece: Greek fire crews on Thursday scrambled to douse deadly wildfires raging for two weeks around the country before strong winds forecast for the day rekindled blazes.

Hundreds of firefighters backed by European Union reinforcements were struggling to contain the flames on the islands of Rhodes, Corfu and Evia, in addition to a new front that erupted Wednesday in central Greece.

“These are difficult and very sad days,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said. Mitsotakis said Greece was “mourning four fellow citizens, the two aircraft pilots... and two who could not distance themselves from the inferno in time.”

Five bodies have been recovered from fire-stricken areas this week, but a police source told AFP that a cattle farmer found burned on the island of Evia on Tuesday had disappeared before the fire and was not listed among the wildfire casualties.

Around the Mediterranean, fires this week also flared in Croatia and Italy, and flames killed 34 in Algeria in extreme heat that has left landscapes tinder dry.