The Greek coast guard has evacuated more than 2,000 people from Evia island, a popular vacation spot northeast of Athens, since the forest fire broke out on August 3.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said the forest fire that devastated Evia Island was part of a series of extreme weather caused by climate change caused by human behavior.
The Greek forest fires are a grim reality of climate change
Firefighters try to put out a fire on the island of Evia, Greece, on August 9.
Professor Petteria Taalas, secretary general of WMO, made the statement after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released a landmark report, warning that climate change is
`The grim reality of climate change is happening in real time right before our eyes,` Taalas said.
Temperatures have reached 45 degrees Celsius across Greece in the past few days.
Fires have also raged in neighboring Turkey over the past 10 days.
Taalas is certain that extreme weather events and fires in Europe and around the world are related.
`In recent days, we have witnessed many terrible fires in Türkiye and Greece amid an intense and prolonged heat wave in the Mediterranean. Siberia, an area long associated with permafrost, once again witnessed large forest fires following the unusual heat wave, fires and low ice levels in the Arctic sea in 2020.`
WMO, a United Nations agency headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, established the IPCC with the United Nations Environment Program in 1988.
For some in Evia, international support may now be meaningless.