Summary
That’s all for today, thanks for following along. Here’s a summary of the day as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe, and efforts to contain wildfires across Greece continued for a seventh straight day.
Firefighters in Greece were struggling to contain 82 wildfires across the country, 64 of which started on Sunday, the hottest day of the summer so far. As well as huge blazes on the island of Rhodes, which forced 19,000 people to flee, wildfires also broke out on the island of Corfu and in the northern Peloponnese region, triggering further evacuations.
Greece’s prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, told parliament: “For the next few weeks we must be on constant alert. We are at war, we will rebuild what we lost, we will compensate those who were hurt.”
“The climate crisis is already here, it will manifest itself everywhere in the Mediterranean with greater disasters,” he said.
Wildfires killed 25 people in the mountainous Béjaïa and Bouïra regions of Algeria on Monday, the interior ministry said, as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe.
Authorities evacuated nearly 2,500 people from the Greek island of Corfu on Monday as the prime minister warned the heat-hit country was “at war” with several wildfires.
While wildfires raged on the Greek islands Rhodes and Corfu, with thousands of British tourists thought to be there, the UK government continued to refuse to advise against travel to the country.
Ireland’s deputy prime minister has said that a refund would be the “proper approach” for those who want to cancel their holidays in Greek regions affected by wildfires.
The Liberal Democrats are calling on the Foreign Office to add Rhodes to to its “red list” – and advise British nationals against all but essential travel.
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has contacted the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, to offer additional assistance.
The Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the situation on Rhodes was “undoubtedly a wakeup call” on the climate crisis. “Climate change is real. It is now. And it is essential that the world combats it, and Britain is playing a leading role in doing that,” he said.
Rishi Sunak has signalled the UK government could delay or even abandon green policies that impose a direct cost on consumers, as he comes under pressure from the Conservative right to create a dividing line with Labour at the next election.
Tourists planning trips to the Mediterranean should see the Greek wildfires as a “big, big warning”, with the climate crisis highly likely to fuel more severe blazes in future, one of the UK’s leading climate scientists said.
Up to 10,000 Britons are estimated to be on fire-ravaged Rhodes, with repatriation flights to rescue holidaymakers landing back in the UK. Three repatriation flights to return hundreds of holidaymakers from Rhodes are planned on Monday evening, Jet2 said.
An easyJet spokesperson said the airline was doing all it could to help customers in Rhodes and invited those due to travel to or from the island until Saturday to change the date for free.
Jet2, which has cancelled all flights and holidays due to depart to Rhodes up to and including Sunday, has “significantly increased” the number of its staff on the island.
A Tui spokesperson said all outbound flights to Rhodes up to and including Tuesday had been cancelled and passengers due to travel on these flights would receive full refunds.
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Emergency teams in Canada are still searching for four people who went missing in flooding after more than 200mm (7.87in) of rain fell in some parts of Nova Scotia at the weekend.
Two children, a young person and a man were inside two vehicles when the road they were travelling on suddenly became submerged, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Nova Scotia.
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