AMENDOA, Portugal: Planes and helicopters joined more than a thousand firefighters in central Portugal Sunday to battle huge wildfires in a mountainous region where over 100 people died in huge blazes in 2017.
By 12:30 pm (1130 GMT), one of the biggest mobilisations ever seen in the area -- including 1,300 firefighters and 400 vehicles -- had been deployed to fight the blazes in the heavily forested Castelo Branco region, 200 kilometres (120 miles) north of Lisbon, the rescue services said.
Around 20 people were injured in the blaze, including eight firefighters and 12 civilians, according to interior ministry figures.
One badly burned civilian was evacuated by helicopter to Lisbon.
The biggest effort -- 800 firefighters, 245 vehicles and 13 planes and helicopters -- battled to douse flames in the municipality of Vila de Rei, which had spread nearly 25 kilometres.
"Only the fire at Vila de Rei remains active," Interior Minister Eduardo Cabrita told a news conference.
Authorities were looking into whether the fires may have been started deliberately, Cabrita said.
"The cause of the fires is being investigated... there's something strange. How is it that five such large fires broke out in areas that are so close to each other?" he asked.
The commander of the Civil Protection for the region, Luis Belo Costa, said that "given the difficult terrain, we have not succeeded in getting the fire in Vila de Rei under control, but have only contained about 60 percent of it, despite a lull in the wind."
The army said it was dispatching 20 soldiers and machinery to open routes "to facilitate access" for the firefighters.
In a message, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa expressed his "solidarity with the hundreds fighting the scourge of the fires".
Two other forest fires reported on Saturday have since been brought under control.
While a number of small villages were evacuated as a precaution overnight, no additional measures were planned on Sunday.
But that could change "if the situation deteriorates," Belo Costa said.
Five regions of central and southern Portugal were on maximum fire alert Sunday because of the dry weather and winds.
However, temperatures are currently below the threshold of 41 degrees Celsius (105 Fahrenheit) at which a red alert is triggered.
The fires, fanned by strong winds, had broken out on Saturday afternoon in the more inaccessible areas in the Castelo Branco region.
The centre of Portugal is hilly and covered in dense forest and is regularly ravaged by fires, including the deadliest in the country's history where 114 people died in two separate blazes in June and October 2017.
Portugal is still traumatised by those deaths, with authorities taking extra precautions.
Much of the population in the area is elderly, as young people move to the cities.
The forests are largely eucalyptus, a highly flammable wood used in the paper industry.
Despite the combustion risks, the trees are planted because they are fast-growing and represent an important source of income for locals.
With fields and pastures abandoned, the forests are poorly maintained, with the dense undergrowth facilitating the spread of the fires.
According to the EU's European Forest Fire Information System, more than 250,000 hectares of land were destroyed by fire across Europe between January and April this year, more than the 181,000 hectares recorded for the entire fire season in 2018.
1,300 firefighters battle Portugal wildfires
1,300 firefighters battle Portugal wildfires
- Around 20 people were injured in the blaze, including 8 firefighters and 12 civilians
- Authorities were looking into whether the fires may have been started deliberately
US alarmed by signs of ‘imminent military offensive’ in Darfur
WASHINGTON: The US has warned of a looming rebel military offensive on the Sudanese city of El-Fasher. This humanitarian hub appears to be at the center of a newly opening front in the country’s civil war.
After a year of fighting between the armed forces of Gen. Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and the paramilitaries of the Rapid Support Forces, under Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, millions have been displaced in the northeastern African country.
Until recently, El-Fasher — the last Darfur state capital not under RSF control — had been relatively unaffected by the fighting, hosting a large number of refugees.
But since mid-April, bombardments and clashes have been reported in the city and surrounding villages. The US “calls on all armed forces in Sudan to immediately cease attacks in El-Fasher,” the State Department said.
“We are alarmed by indications of an imminent offensive by the Rapid Support Forces and its affiliated militias,” it said, adding that “an offensive against El-Fasher city would subject civilians to extreme danger.”
After several days of “arbitrary shelling and airstrikes” in the city and its outskirts, a pro-democracy lawyers’ committee reported last week that at least 25 civilians had been killed.
Clashes in the eastern and northern parts of the city have already resulted in 36,000 displaced people, according to the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
As the war enters its second year, the UN and US have warned the breakdown of the fragile peace in El-Fasher would be catastrophic.
The city functions as the main humanitarian hub in the vast western region of Darfur, home to around a quarter of Sudan’s 48 million people and the site of harrowing violence during this and previous conflicts.
The State Department said it had seen “credible reports” that the RSF and affiliated militias had razed multiple villages west of the city, while it condemned “reported indiscriminate aerial bombardments” in the region by Sudan’s armed forces.
Death toll in migrant boat capsize off Djibouti rises to 24: UN agency
- 20 remain missing after the boat carrying at least 77 migrants, including children, capsized near the town of Obock
NAIROBI: The death toll from a migrant boat disaster off Djibouti this week has risen to 24, the UN’s migration agency said, highlighting a sharp increase in the number of people returning from Yemen to the Horn of Africa nation this year.
The capsize on Monday was the second fatal maritime accident in two weeks off Djibouti, which lies on the perilous so-called Eastern Migration Route from Africa to the Arabian Peninsula.
At least 24 people died, and 20 remain missing after the boat carrying at least 77 migrants, including children, capsized near the town of Obock, the International Organization for Migration said.
It said 33 survivors were being cared for at an IOM center in Obock and that local authorities are conducting search and rescue operations in the hope of finding more people alive.
Addis Ababa’s ambassador to Djibouti had said those on the boat were Ethiopian migrants.
Another vessel also carrying mainly Ethiopian migrants sank in the same area on April 8, with a death toll of at least 38.
“The occurrence of two such tragedies within two weeks highlights the dangers faced by children, women, and men migrating through irregular routes, underscoring the importance of establishing safe and legal pathways for migration,” IOM chief of mission in Djibouti, Tanja Pacifico, said.
The IOM said it had recorded a total of 1,350 deaths on the Eastern Route since 2014, not including this year.
In 2023 alone, it said it documented at least 698 deaths along the route, including 105 lost at sea.
The agency believed the people on both ill-fated vessels were attempting to return from Yemen to Djibouti.
Each year, tens of thousands of African migrants brave the Eastern Route across the Red Sea to reach Gulf nations, escape conflict or natural disaster, or seek better economic opportunities.
However, many are unsuccessful and “thousands are stranded in Yemen where they experience extremely harsh conditions,” the IOM said.
Since the start of 2024, the agency said 3,682 migrants have left Yemen for Djibouti, more than double the figure for the same period last year.
155 killed in Tanzania as heavy rains lash East Africa
- Kenyan president convenes emergency multi-agency meeting to respond to crisis after floods cause chaos
DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania: At least 155 people have died in Tanzania as torrential rains linked to El Nino triggered flooding and landslides, Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa said on Thursday.
Tanzania and other countries in East Africa — a region highly vulnerable to climate change — have been pounded by heavier than usual rainfall during the current rainy season, with dozens of deaths also reported in Kenya.
Majaliwa said the rains have affected more than 51,000 households and 200,000 people, with 155 fatalities and 236 injuries.
“The heavy El Nino rains, accompanied by strong winds, floods, and landslides in various parts of the country, have caused significant damage,” Majaliwa told parliament in Tanzania’s capital, Dodoma.
He added: “These include loss of life, destruction of crops, homes, citizens’ property, and infrastructure such as roads, bridges, and railways.”
El Nino is a naturally occurring climate pattern typically associated with increased heat worldwide, drought in some parts of the world, and heavy rains elsewhere.
It can have a devastating impact on East Africa.
In Burundi, around 96,000 people have been displaced by months of relentless rains.
In addition, about 45 people have been killed in Kenya since the start of the rainy season in March, including 13 who lost their lives in flash floods in the capital, Nairobi, this week.
Kenyan President William Ruto convened an emergency multi-agency meeting on Thursday to respond to the crisis after torrential rains triggered floods that caused chaos across the city, blocking roads and bridges and engulfing homes in slum districts.
Kenyans have been warned to stay on alert, with more heavy rains forecast across the country. Officials said people living in the most vulnerable areas would be relocated.
“The government ... will do whatever it takes, apply all the required resources in terms of money and personnel to make sure that lives are not lost and the people of Kenya are protected from this disaster,” Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua told a press briefing.
Meanwhile, the UN humanitarian response agency OCHA said in an update this week that in Somalia, the Gu (April to June) rains are intensifying, with flash floods reported since April 19.
It said four people had been reportedly killed, and at least 134 families or more than 800 people were affected or displaced across the country.
Late last year, more than 300 people died in torrential rains and floods in Kenya, Somalia, and Ethiopia just as the region was trying to recover from its worst drought in four decades that left millions of people hungry.
From October 1997 to January 1998, massive floods caused more than 6,000 deaths in five countries in the region.
In March, the UN’s World Meteorological Organization said that El Nino, which peaked in December, was one of the five strongest ever recorded.
Though the weather pattern is gradually weakening, its impact will continue over the coming months by fueling the heat trapped in the atmosphere by greenhouse gases, it said.
Therefore, the WMO said in a quarterly update that “above normal temperatures are predicted over almost all land areas between March and May.”
‘Uncommitted’ organizers will join campus protesters in Michigan over Gaza
- Student protests in the US over the war in Gaza have intensified and expanded over the past week
- Democrats have become increasingly uneasy over the US support for Israel as the death toll and destruction climb in Gaza
WASHINGTON: Organizers behind the “uncommitted” political movement against President Joe Biden’s staunch support for Israel’s war against Hamas will travel to the University of Michigan’s campus on Thursday to join students protesting the war.
Student protests in the US over the war in Gaza have intensified and expanded over the past week after police first arrested students at Columbia, with so-called Gaza solidarity encampments established at colleges, including Yale, and New York University. Police have been called in to several campuses to arrest hundreds of student demonstrators.
Uncommitted organizers will travel to the University of Michigan’s Ann Arbor campus, they told Reuters, bringing together a political movement that’s disrupted Biden events and amassed hundreds of thousands of votes in Democratic primaries and a student movement that’s drawn students and faculty of various backgrounds.
Biden won Michigan by less than a 3 percent margin in 2020.
Democrats have become increasingly uneasy over the US support for Israel as the death toll and destruction climb in Gaza. A growing revolt inside the Democratic base signifies the challenge Biden faces in bringing together the coalition he needs to defeat Republican frontrunner and former President Donald Trump.
“President Biden is choosing to put his hands over his ears and ignore the hundreds of thousands of people who have already come out against the war at the ballot box,” said Abbas Alawieh, a prominent “Uncommitted” organizer, who is going to Ann Arbor with Layla Elabed, another Michigan organizer.
“Signing into law more money for Israel is sending a clear message to uncommitted voters, young voters that he doesn’t care to engage seriously with our demands to end this war,” he said, referring to the $26 billion in new aid Biden recently approved.
Alawieh said the uncommitted movement has not been coordinating with student groups so far. “We have an electoral focus, but we certainly see the demands of student protesters, who are calling for peace,” he said.
On campuses where protests have broken out, students have issued calls for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, an end to US military assistance for Israel, university divestment from arms suppliers and other companies profiting from the war, and amnesty for students and faculty members who have been disciplined or fired for protesting.
Biden told reporters on Monday that he condemned both “antisemitic protests” and “those who don’t understand what’s going on with the Palestinians.” Biden campaign spokeswoman Lauren Hitt has said the president “shares the goal for an end to the violence and a just, lasting peace in the Middle East. He’s working tirelessly to that end.”
Trump called the campus protest situation “a mess” as he walked into his criminal trial in New York.
The uncommitted movement amassed sizable vote totals in Michigan, Minnesota and Hawaii primaries and had won 25 delegates as of the beginning of April. They are preparing to target the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August, where Biden is expected to be nominated.
Polls show Biden and Trump running neck-and-neck ahead of their Nov. 5 election rematch nationally. Biden’s 2020 victory was due to narrow wins in key swing states like Michigan.
US nudges Germany on long-range missiles for Ukraine
- Washington confirmed the day before that it had sent Ukraine a variant of the ATACMS missile with a range of 300 kilometers
- “In terms of Taurus... this is a decision for Germany,” a senior US defense official told journalists
WASHINGTON: The United States hopes decisions by it and allied countries to send long-range missiles to Ukraine may encourage similar action by Germany, which has so far refused to provide its Taurus missiles, a US official said Thursday.
Washington confirmed the day before that it had sent Ukraine a variant of the ATACMS missile with a range of 300 kilometers (190 miles), while France and Britain have respectively supplied SCALP and Storm Shadow missiles, both of which have a range of about 250 kilometers.
“In terms of Taurus... this is a decision for Germany,” a senior US defense official told journalists when asked if the provision of long-range ATACMS could clear the way for Taurus missiles to be sent to Kyiv.
“But certainly the US provision of ATACMS as well as prior decisions by the UK and France to provide long-range cruise missiles, we would certainly hope that this would be a factor,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Kyiv has long pushed for Germany to provide it with Taurus missiles — which can reach targets up to 500 kilometers away — to help its fight against invading Russian forces.
But Berlin has declined to send the missiles, fearing that it would lead to an escalation of the more-than-two-year-old conflict.
