IBS

AP

AS RECENTLY as two years ago, a forest fire came close to burning down the home of Costas Karamanlis. The Greek prime minister’s seaside villa outside Athens escaped the conflagration. But the event prompted Mr Karamanlis to promise strict measures to dissuade developers from building on land cleared by the blaze; satellite photos, for example, would be taken at regular intervals to help enforce Greece’s law banning construction in forest areas.

Mr Karamanlis and his conservative government have failed to deliver. This week the emergency services struggled to contain the worst forest fires to strike Greece in more than a century. The latest blazes sweeping the countryside have left more than 60 people dead. The problems of tackling the fire were compounded by the forestry department’s lack of access to satellite pictures that could have enabled fire-fighters to find and douse blazes before they caused serious damage.

Many perished trying to escape from Zacharo, a village in the Elis district in south-west Greece, as it was engulfed by flames. Other villages in the Peloponnese region were still being evacuated on Wednesday Aug 29th, six days after the fires started. Homes in more than 100 villages were gutted, livestock died and the olive crop was destroyed. So far the fires are reckoned to have caused €5 billion-worth of damage by some estimates.

The government, preparing for a snap election on September 16th, was quick to come up with some financial assistance for the stricken: €13,000 in cash, equivalent to more than a year’s income for most villagers from Elis, was handed out to anyone affected by the fires. Few were grateful; many who escaped from burning villages said they felt the emergency services had let them down.

Greek forestry officials blame arsonists for more than half of the fires. The remainder, they claim, were caused by flying sparks from electricity pylons or human carelessness. Seven people were arrested in the aftermath of the fires that struck Elis and Evia, an island in the Agean Sea near Athens; both the anti-terrorist squad and the intelligence service joined the hunt for fire-raisers.

Conspiracy theories are rife. Hardline members of Mr Karamanlis’s New Democracy party claim that the left had organised a fire-raising campaign to discredit the party and damage its chances of being re-elected. But there is probably no single culprit. An exceptionally hot summer following on the heels of a winter drought has made Greece’s resinous pine forests even more flammable than usual. Strong winds helped a spark from a chainsaw start one big fire.

Eye witnesses claim that several fires in the Peloponnese were started deliberately. Arsonists certainly have strong motives for starting blazes. Rising incomes have fuelled a construction boom. Demand is high for land near the sea to build second homes. Although Greek law states that builders cannot put up homes on forest land, developers are practised at getting around the rules.

Because Greece still lacks a land registry covering the whole country—a programme to put this right paid for by the European Union is moving at snail’s pace—it is easy to have burned land reclassified as farmland, which can then be sold for development. And in many places local officials are open to bribery to ease the issuing of planning permits without asking too many questions. Politicians often declare an amnesty for illegal buildings ahead of an election.

Will things be different next summer? Better fire-fighting is a priority. Greece has almost 40 water-bombing aircraft, more than any other southern European country. But its forestry service and fire-brigade are under-staffed, ill-equipped and poorly trained.

The civil-defence department lacks a fire-prevention strategy, which could lessen the impact of future fires. In other places prone to burning people clear undergrowth from their local forests during the winter and bulldoze fire-breaks around villages. In summer round-the-clock fire-watches are maintained. The next government, whether led by Mr Karamanlis or George Papandreou, leader of the main opposition Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement, will have to take fire prevention seriously.