Syria fights fires for fourth day as Jordan sends help
DAMASCUS: Syrian authorities said some 100 square kilometers (40 square miles) of forest had 'turned to ash' in wildfires as firefighters from neighboring Jordan arrived Sunday to battle a fourth day of blazes in the province of Latakia.
Syrian emergency workers have faced tough conditions including high temperatures, strong winds, rugged mountainous terrain in the coastal province and the danger of explosive war remnants, in a country scarred by years of conflict. Jordanian civil defense teams crossed into Syria on Sunday morning, the Syrian ministry for emergency and disaster management said, as state media published footage of the convoy.
Minister Raed Al-Saleh said on X that 'hundreds of thousands of forest trees over an estimated area of around 10,000 hectares (25,000 acres) in 28 locations have turned to ash'.
He said some 80 teams including civil defense personnel had been battling the blaze, noting local organizations and residents were also providing assistance, along with teams and firefighting aircraft from neighboring Jordan and Turkey. Turkey, a key backer of Syria's new authorities, sent assistance including aircraft and fire engines on Saturday.
Jordan's public security directorate said in a statement that the 'specialized firefighting teams from the civil defense... have been provided with all the modern equipment and machinery necessary to carry out their duties to the fullest extent'. Swathes of forested area and farmland have burned and some villages evacuated as the fires raged including near the Turkish border.
The United Nations deputy envoy to Syria Najat Rochdi said in a statement Sunday on X that Damascus 'needs more international assistance' to face the fires. A statement from the UN resident and humanitarian coordinator for Syria Adam Abdelmoula said that 'UN teams are on the ground conducting urgent assessments to determine the scale of the disaster and to identify the most immediate humanitarian needs'.
Nearly seven months after the ousting of longtime ruler Bashar Al-Assad, Syria is still reeling from more than a decade of civil war that ravaged the country's economy, infrastructure and public services.
With man-made climate change increasing the likelihood and intensity of droughts and wildfires worldwide, Syria has also been battered by heatwaves and low rainfall. In June, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization told AFP that Syria had 'not seen such bad climate conditions in 60 years'. — AFP
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Kuwait Times
3 hours ago
- Kuwait Times
Erdogan, pro-Kurdish MPs meet in ‘new phase' of reconciliation
ANKARA: Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (center), MPs of Turkey's pro-Kurdish Equality and Democracy (DEM) party Pervin Buldan (second left) and Mithat Sancar (left), head of Turkish Intelligence Ibrahim Kalin (right) and Justice and Development (AK) Party Deputy Chairman Efkan Ala (second right) posing during their meeting at the Presidential Complex in Ankara. -- AFP ISTANBUL: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met lawmakers from the pro-Kurdish DEM party Monday to discuss the next steps after PKK militants agreed to end their decades-long insurgency. DEM, Turkey's third-biggest party, has played a key role in facilitating an emerging peace deal between the government and jailed PKK founder Abdullah Ocalan, whose Kurdish militant group is expected to begin laying down its weapons later this week. The meeting, which lasted just over an hour, brought together Erdogan, Efkan Ala, a senior figure in his ruling AKP, and spy chief Ibrahim Kalin with DEM lawmakers Pervin Buldan and Mithat Sancar. 'Our delegation conveyed their views and suggestions on the new stage the process has reached and what to do next,' the DEM lawmakers said in a brief statement after the talks. DEM lawmaker Buldan called the meeting 'historic'. 'The process is now entering a new phase in which consultations are needed,' she told reporters before the meeting. 'It is important to consult to take the necessary steps,' she added, saying the sides would 'exchange views'. Fellow DEM lawmaker Mithat Sancar said the new phase was 'very important' and that they would use the meeting to 'share our views' and to 'listen to them'. 'We will consult with the president and his delegation about the characteristics of this new phase and the upcoming requirements.' On Sunday, the pair held a 'very productive' meeting with Ocalan on Imrali prison island. The jailed 76-year-old PKK founder also characterized the upcoming talks with Erdogan as 'historic'. He told them a parliamentary commission being set up would 'play a major role' in directing the peace process. The meeting came as the PKK was to hold a ceremony in Iraqi Kurdistan to start destroying a first tranche of weapons — which will likely take place on or around July 10-12. Erdogan said the move would give momentum to peace efforts with the Kurds. The disarmament process is expected to unfold over the coming months. — AFP
Kuwait Times
3 hours ago
- Kuwait Times
US envoy says satisfied with Lebanese response on disarming of Hezbollah
Zionists continue to occupy Lebanon, strike positions despite ceasefire BEIRUT: US envoy Thomas Barrack said Monday he fwas satisfied by the Lebanese authorities' response to Washington's request to disarm Hezbollah, which was heavily weakened in a recent war with Zionist entity. Lebanese leaders who took office in the aftermath of the conflict have vowed a state monopoly on bearing arms, while demanding Zionist entity comply with a November ceasefire that sought to end more than a year of hostilities with the Iran-backed group. 'I'm unbelievably satisfied with the response,' Barrack, Washington's ambassador to Turkey and special envoy to Syria, told a press conference after meeting President Joseph Aoun. 'It's thoughtful, it's considered. We're creating a go-forward plan. To create that, we need dialogue. What the government gave us was something spectacular,' he said. 'Now what it takes is a... thrust to the details, which we're going to do. We're both committed to get to the details and get a resolution,' he said, adding: 'I'm very, very hopeful.' The presidency said on X that Aoun handed Barrack 'ideas for a comprehensive solution'. A Lebanese official told AFP that late last week, Beirut submitted an initial response to Washington, which then requested modifications. Lebanese officials then worked through the weekend to develop the final version, the source added, requesting anonymity as they were not authorized to brief the media. During a visit last month, Barrack asked Lebanese leaders to formally commit to fully disarming Hezbollah. Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said Sunday his group would not surrender or lay down its weapons in response to Zionist entity threats. Zionist entity's military has continued to occupy positions in Lebanon and to strike the country despite the ceasefire, saying it is targeting Hezbollah sites and operatives and accusing Beirut of not doing enough to disarm the group. Barrack said that Hezbollah 'needs to see that there's a future for them, that that road is not harnessed just solely against them, and that there's an intersection of peace and prosperity for them also.' He warned that 'the rest of the region is moving at Mach speed, and you will be left behind', noting that 'dialogue has started between Syria and Zionist entity, just as the dialogue needs to be reinvented by Lebanon.' Under the ceasefire, Hezbollah was to pull its fighters back north of the Litani river, some 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the Zionist entity frontier. Zionist entity was to withdraw its troops from Lebanon, but has kept them deployed in five areas that it deemed strategic. Lebanese authorities say they have been dismantling Hezbollah's military infrastructure in the south near the Zionist entity border. Hezbollah's Qassem said Zionist entity must abide by the ceasefire agreement, 'withdraw from the occupied territories, stop its aggression... release the prisoners' detained during last year's war, and that reconstruction in Lebanon must begin. Only then 'will we be ready for the second stage, which is to discuss the national security and defense strategy' which includes the issue of group's disarmament, he added. — AFP
Kuwait Times
4 hours ago
- Kuwait Times
Thousands retrace footsteps of Srebrenica genocide survivors
NEZUK, Bosnia and Herzegovina: Thousands of people embarked Tuesday on a days-long march through a dense Bosnian forest, retracing the harrowing path taken by survivors to mark three decades since the Srebrenica genocide that killed more than 8,000 men and boys. The annual march to Srebrenica covers a 100-kilometre (62-mile) route from the eastern Bosnian village of Nezuk, where the first survivors arrived after fleeing the unfolding massacre by Bosnian Serb forces. On July 11, 1995, General Ratko Mladic's forces stormed the Muslim enclave of more than 40,000 people in eastern Bosnia and executed over 8,000 men and boys before burying them in mass graves. At the time, Srebrenica was a 'UN protected zone' — an ultimately hollow phrase meant to shield the many displaced people who had fled the 1992-1995 war. On Tuesday, one 'survivor of the death march' told AFP he was retracing his steps, along with about 6,000 other marchers. 'For me, the march lasted seven days and eight nights,' 65-year-old Amir Kulaglic said. At the time, he was a member of the mostly Muslim Bosnian army. 'All of us who took part in this march had only one wish: to survive and to be reunited with members of our family,' Kulaglic said. Enduring repeated ambushes, bombing and chemical gas attacks from Bosnian Serb forces, he was among the first to reach Nezuk, leading a column that stretched nearly 11 kilometres when it set out. His father and several other relatives didn't survive the journey. The marchers will reach the Srebrenica Memorial Centre in Potocari, where most victims are buried, on Thursday and will attend a ceremony the following day. After decades of painstaking work, about 7,000 victims have been identified and properly buried, but about 1,000 remain missing. The remains of seven victims will be buried during the July 11 commemorations, including two 19-year-old men and a 67-year-old woman. Another marcher, 37-year-old Elvisa Masic, said she was taking part in the walk to understand what her father and other family relatives had 'suffered'. 'We found remains, a bone or two, of most of the family members, and they were buried, but we never found anything of my father,' she said. Bosnia's 1992-1995 war, between its Croat, Muslim and Serb communities, claimed approximately 100,000 lives. — AFP An international criminal court sentenced Mladic, now 83, and former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, now 80, to life jail terms for war crimes and genocide. Both are still incarcerated but a proper reckoning inside the splintered Bosnian states remains overdue. For Kulaglic, he hopes that soon a new generation of Serbs will properly recognize the crime and seek forgiveness. – AFP
