Firefighters sought on Monday to take advantage of more favourable weather to subdue massive wildfires threatening the French city and tourist region of Bordeaux and a number of sites in neighbouring Spain. They were racing against the clock as another heatwave is expected to hit both countries later this week in what has been a blisteringly hot and dry summer across western Europe. Authorities have evacuated about 220,000 people, including holidaymakers and local residents, in France, while...
Blazes are about 15km from Bordeaux, but the city's mayor says there are no plans to evacuate.
Extreme heat is fuelling wildfires across North Africa, with major fires burning in Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco.
French and Spanish authorities are struggling to contain the blazes, which are partly caused by successive heatwaves.
Wildfires raged on Wednesday in Sicily, southwestern France and central Spain, having claimed the lives of three firefighters and sparked thousands of evacuations. Temperatures topped 40 degrees Celsius and gusts of hot wind fanned the flames in the southern Italian island, where wildfires have been raging for several days. Around 6,000 firefighters, forest guards and civil protection officials were deployed to battle the flames with the help of water-bombing aircraft, the head of the region,...