G7 Ready To Help Amazonian Countries Affected By Forest Fires - French President

PARIS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 25th August, 2019) Leaders of G7 countries agree to help the countries of the Amazon basin to deal with forest fires, French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters on Sunday.

Prior to the beginning of the G7 summit in the French resort town of Biarritz on Saturday, Macron called fires in South America a serious international crisis and criticized his Brazilian counterpart, Jair Bolsonaro, for not following his obligations to combat climate change.

"There is a genuine agreement to announce that we all agree that we should help the countries affected by fires as soon as possible ... Currently, out teams are making contacts with the countries of the Amazon basin so we could finalize particular obligations regarding technical and financial resources," Macron said.

He noted that France was technically one of those countries, with its oversee department of French Guiana, and announced that G7 countries were working on an international mechanism to help the affected nations in the most effective manner.

The fires in Amazonia have been going on for weeks. Their current area has already surpassed the territory affected by all fires in the region in 2018 by 82 percent. According to the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research, there have been 1663 new fires registered in the country this Thursday and Friday alone, half of them in the Amazon basin.