EU Offers Further Support for Sweden in Fighting Wildfires
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - The European Commission is coordinating further EU member-states' assistance to help Sweden battle vast forest fires across the country, the Commission said in a press release.
"EU coordinates further assistance to help Sweden fight forest fires… Earlier this week, the Commission mobilized firefighting aircraft from Italy and France through the EU's Civil Protection Mechanism, which has since been operating in the affected areas. Further EU support has now been offered by Germany, Lithuania, Poland and Denmark," the press release said.
According to the press release, EU countries have already provided Sweden with five planes, including one reconnaissance plane and water-carrying aircraft, six firefighting helicopters as well as with vehicles and firefighters, Sputnik reported.
Just been reported, that these forest fires are out of control. Unless it rains consistently for two weeks, they cannot be stopped entirely. Another heatwave is about to hit Scandinavia, by the way. This is happening in Sweden, not California.
The hot and dry weather, as well as poor rainfall in Sweden, have resulted in extensive forest fires across the country, which broke out earlier in July.
According to local media, the total number of fires in the country has decreased from 80 on Friday night to just over 40 on Saturday morning and might further go down as rains are expected to fall later in the day.
On Monday, Sweden activated the EU Civil Protection Mechanism and requested the assistance of EU member-states to fight the fires.
