As north cleans up after floods, southern Europe battles wildfires

Wildfires burned across southern European regions on Monday fuelled by strong winds and hot weather. Whereas nothern countries cleaned up after a weekend of flooding and torrential rain.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitosakis said during past 24 hours, the firefighters had battled around 50 fires. He also termed it likely that meteorologists would warn about a further heatwave

"I want to emphasize that August remains a difficult month," he said. "That is why it is important for all of us, all state services, to be on absolute alert until the firefighting period is formally over."

Fire officials said that negligence on farms and construction site was the cause of several fire incidents. Many of these fires were in the Pelopinnesian region. No casulaties were reported.

Conditions in southern Europe were in sharp contrast to the torrential rainstorms that lashed northern countries from Austria to Britain following the catastrophic flooding in Germany and neighbouring countries last week.

On the Italian island of Sardinia, firefighting planes from France and Greece reinforced local aircraft battling blazes across the island where more than 4,000 hectares of forest were burnt and more than 350 people evacuated.

In Sicily, fires broke out near the western town of Erice.

In Spain, the northeastern region of Catalonia saw more than 1,500 hectares destroyed near Santa Coloma de Queralt, forcing dozens to be evacuated, although the blazes were 90% stabilized on Monday, firefighters and authorities said.

(With inputs from agencies)