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Brazil Fires Drive Acceleration in Amazon Deforestation

Illegal burning of the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, in the northern Brazilian state of Amazonas, in September 2024. MICHAEL DANTAS / AFP/File
Illegal burning of the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, in the northern Brazilian state of Amazonas, in September 2024. MICHAEL DANTAS / AFP/File
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Brazil Fires Drive Acceleration in Amazon Deforestation

Illegal burning of the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, in the northern Brazilian state of Amazonas, in September 2024. MICHAEL DANTAS / AFP/File
Illegal burning of the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, in the northern Brazilian state of Amazonas, in September 2024. MICHAEL DANTAS / AFP/File

A record fire season in Brazil last year caused the rate of deforestation to accelerate, in a blow to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's pledge to protect the Amazon rainforest, official figures showed Friday.

The figures released by the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), which tracks forest cover by satellite, indicated that deforestation rate between August 2024 and May 2025 rose by 9.1 percent compared to the same period in 2023-2024, said AFP.

And they showed a staggering 92-percent increase in Amazon deforestation in May, compared to the year-ago period.

That development risks erasing the gains made by Brazil in 2024, when deforestation slowed in all of its ecological biomes for the first time in six years.

The report showed that beyond the Amazon, the picture was less alarming in other biomes across Brazil, host of this year's UN climate change conference.

In the Pantanal wetlands, for instance, deforestation between August 2024 and May 2025 fell by 77 percent compared to the same period in 2023-2024.

Presenting the findings, the environment ministry's executive secretary Joao Paulo Capobianco chiefly blamed the record number of fires that swept Brazil and other South American countries last year, whipped up by a severe drought.

Many of the fires were started to clear land for crops or cattle and then raged out of control.

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Firefighters Battle a Wildfire Burning Out of Control on the Greek Island of Chios

A firefighting helicopter during firefighting operations on Chios Island, Greece, 24 June 2025. EPA/KOSTAS KOURGIAS
A firefighting helicopter during firefighting operations on Chios Island, Greece, 24 June 2025. EPA/KOSTAS KOURGIAS
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Firefighters Battle a Wildfire Burning Out of Control on the Greek Island of Chios

A firefighting helicopter during firefighting operations on Chios Island, Greece, 24 June 2025. EPA/KOSTAS KOURGIAS
A firefighting helicopter during firefighting operations on Chios Island, Greece, 24 June 2025. EPA/KOSTAS KOURGIAS

Hundreds of firefighters backed up by aircraft were battling a wildfire burning out of control for the third day on the eastern Aegean island of Chios Tuesday, with authorities issuing multiple evacuation orders.

Towering walls of flames tore through forest and agricultural land on the island, where authorities have declared a state of emergency and have sent firefighting reinforcements from Athens, the northern city of Thessaloniki and the nearby island of Lesbos, said the Associated Press.

By Tuesday morning, the fire department said 444 firefighters with 85 vehicles were tackling the blaze on scattered fronts. Eleven helicopters and two water-dropping planes were providing air support.

Emergency services have issued evacuation orders for villages and settlements in the area since Sunday, when fires broke out near the island’s main town. The fire department has sent an arson investigation team to Chios to examine the cause of the blaze.

“We are faced with simultaneous fires in multiple, geographically unconnected parts of the island — a pattern that cannot be considered coincidental,” Climate Crisis and Civil Protection Minister Giannis Kefalogiannis said Monday from Chios. Authorities, he said, were “very seriously examining the possibility of an organized criminal act, in other words arson.”

The minister said police forces on the island had been reinforced, while military patrols had been doubled.

“Whoever thinks that they can play with the lives of citizens and cause chaos with premeditated actions will be led to court,” Kefalogiannis said. “Arson is a serious crime and will be dealt with as such.”

Wildfires are frequent in Greece during its hot, dry summers. In 2018, a massive fire swept through the seaside town of Mati, east of Athens, trapping people in their homes and on roads as they tried to flee. More than 100 died, including some who drowned trying to swim away from the flames.