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Greece: Wildfires rampaged holiday towns near Athens last week.
The death toll rose to 88 by Saturday (June 28), while thousands of tourists and residents had to escape through choking smoke or along walls of flame.
Many evacuation routes were blocked as the fire spread quickly by gale-strong wind.
More than 600 firefighters and 250 fire engines were deployed to the sites of the two largest fires, in and around Rafina and Kineta, near the capital.
Meanwhile, heat waves continue to imperil Japan, claiming 86 lives since May and sending twenty thousand people to hospitals for heat-related reasons in the previous week.
The temperature rose to a record 41.1 Celsius (106 Fahrenheit) in Kumagaya, a city northwest of Tokyo, on Monday (July 23), setting a new record since August 2013 when the western prefecture of Kochi recorded a temperature of f 41C.
For more we go to HuffPost UK:
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Syria: Four suicide bombers attacked a vegetable market in Sweida, a Syrian provincial capital of Sweida, on Wednesday morning (July 25).
The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks.
At the same time, Islamic State militants raided towns and villages across the province, killing civilians and clashing with local militias.
More than 200 people had been killed in the suicide attacks and clashes, and 180 people were wounded, according to a local health official.
Earlier on, Israel launched a joint operation with US and its European allies to evacuate around 400 Syrian rescue workers near its border with Syria last Sunday (July 22).
However, the Syrian state TV al-Ikhbariya called the evacuation a “scandal,” as the Syrian government regard the rescue workers, called White Helmets, as “terrorists,” who support insurgent groups.
For more we go to BBC News:
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Laos: A billion-dollar hydro-electric power dam collapsed in southern Laos on Monday (July 23).
The $1.02 billion Xe-Pian Xe-Namnoy dam, part of a joint venture led by two South Korean companies with Thai and Lao partners, has been under construction since 2013 and is scheduled to go into operation next year.
The burst of the dam banks sent five billion cubic meters of water into the Attapeu province, flooding at least seven villages and washing away hundreds of homes and displacing some 6,600 people.
At least 27 people were dead and many more are still missing, and as many as 25,000 more people are being evacuated from the northern border province of Stung Treng, as the flood spreads.
Rescue and relief efforts have been difficult due to the remote nature of the disaster area and many are still stranded.
SK Engineering & Construction, the South Korean company which built the dam, is investigating whether the dam’s structural failure or heavy rain was responsible for the collapse.
For more we go to the New York Times:
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Image (Fire & Water) Courtesy of Romolo Tavani / Shutterstock.com
