Albania in flames as dozens more fires start

Source: Xinhua| 2017-08-22 00:30:58|Editor: Mu Xuequan
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TIRANA, Aug. 21 (Xinhua) -- Over 10 massive fires have broken out in Albania in the last 24 hours while hundreds of Armed Forces personnel, Albanian civil emergencies office said Monday in a statement.

A few days ago, the fire situation in Albania had been put under control thanks to rainfall and a drop in temperatures, but now, Albania is again threatened by fires which have been raging across the country for more than a month.

Sunday night, authorities in Tirana informed that fires were approaching houses in some villages and the operation to battle the flames continued all night.

"Fires have burnt considerable areas of pine forest in the vicinity of Voskopoja in Korca municipality (southeastern Albania), endangering the tourist village, while another fire broke out in a pine forest in Surrel village in Tirana municipality," the civil emergencies department informed.

The Albanian government has decided to allocate more funds to cope with this state of emergency.

A week ago, the government approved a budget revision and allocated one billion lek (8.9 million U.S. dollars) to cope with the fires.

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