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According to Didier Reynders, Foreign Affairs has no news of 6 Belgians following the fires ravaging Greece.
The fires that ravaged Monday around Athens killed at least 74 people, said fire spokesman Stavroula Maliri on Tuesday, raising a previous record of 60 deaths. This badessment is not final, a hundred firefighters continuing the search for possible victims in the seaside area of the east coast of Attica, drowned in the flames Monday night, she said.
Business Belgian foreigners remained Tuesday without news of a Belgian tourist belonging to a group of 31 vacationers. Moreover, among the Belgian residents in Greece, the Foreign Affairs were still without news Tuesday of five people belonging to two families on the spot. Attempts to contact continued.
Following the violent fires around Athens, Greece, the Belgian Foreign Minister communicated via Twitter that 6 of our compatriots had still not given any news.
TUI lost track of two holidaymakers …
The tour operator TUI also communicated. Many Belgian holidaymakers are in the vicinity of the fire zones. " In the vicinity of the Greek capital of Athens, which is beset by two big forest fires, 32 tourists of tour operator TUI Belgium were staying at the Ramada Attika hotel. between them were evacuated from the area by boat to the port of Piraeus.The representative of TUI on the spot immediately took care of them and offered them to stay in another hotel.Two travelers joined this same hotel of their own As for the other 2 holidaymakers, we are closely monitoring the situation in collaboration with the Belgian and local authorities. "
"Our teams are currently badisting travelers and are doing their utmost to meet their needs, and we are also looking at what they can do for the rest of their stay. TUI is doing the necessary to bring them back to Belgium today. "
"In the other resorts around Athens, there is no problem at present, and the holidays are normally held there for the people there and for those who have to leave soon."
"Since the beginning of the fires, TUI has been constantly monitoring the situation with its teams present on the spot, with TUI group's international teams, hoteliers, local authorities and the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
26 people found dead in the courtyard of a villa
The toll of violent fires suddenly rose Tuesday to 50 dead after the discovery of the bodies of 26 people in the courtyard of a villa in Mati, in the is Attica.
According to a provisional badessment, at least 172 other people were injured, 11 of them seriously. Enlaced and charred, according to an AFP photographer on site, the 26 victims discovered Tuesday morning seem to have failed to reach the nearby sea to shelter.
The fire calmed down in this area, AFP told AFP, but a front was still growing in Kineta, some 50 km west of the capital.
Around the capital, most of the victims were trapped in the vicinity of Mati, a seaside resort about 40 km east of Athens, whose houses are often surrounded by tall pines. They died "at home or in their cars," said Greek government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos.
At least four people were also found dead at sea where they tried to find refuge when the flames drove residents panicked on the beaches.
Interior Minister Panos Skourletis told public TV ERT that the authorities "are still looking for more missing people". "Hell of Dante", headlined on Tuesday the newspaper Ta Nea (centrist opposition), "Attica in ashes", summed up the left-liberal daily Ethnos.
Suspicious activity
Nine coastal patrol boats, two military vessels and dozens of private boats badisted by army helicopters were mobilized all night to evacuate to the port of Rafina, close to Mati, the residents and tourists fleeing the flames on the beaches and at sea.
The first survivors were transferred to hotels and military camps, while many worried relatives flocked to Rafina.
Greece activated the European Civil Protection Mechanism to get help from its partners. In addition to Spain and Cyprus, Israel has offered reinforcements, according to Skourletis.
The spokesman also mentioned that there had been "15 simultaneous fire starts on three different fronts in Attica", which led Greece to request drones in the United States "to observe and detect any Suspicious activity".
In view of the situation, the presidency of the Republic canceled the annual reception scheduled for Tuesday to commemorate the restoration of democracy in Greece in July 1974.
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, for his part returned hastily a trip to Bosnia to follow the operations. According to him, "more than 600 firefighters" were on all three fronts of the fires, fanned by winds blowing up to more than 100 km / h.
The fires took place as a heatwave hit the country, with temperatures climbing to 40 degrees Celsius. According to the weather services, the conditions must remain difficult Tuesday, although the temperatures in Attica are forecast down, with showers.
Northern Europe suffocates
Forest fires and maquis are recurrent in Greece in the summer. The last most devastating fires killed in 2007 in the Peloponnese and on the island of Evia 77 people, ravaging 250,000 hectares of forests, maquis and crops.
Northern Europe, from Oslo to Riga, has also been crushed for several weeks by the heat and drought that engulfs forests and peat bogs, burning pastures, emptying groundwater and even lowering the level of lakes.
Sweden, which has the hottest July for at least two and a half centuries, has had to call on European solidarity to fight fire.
No less than 25,000 hectares have already gone up in smoke or continue to burn, twice the size of the city of Paris.
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