In the headlines: in the Balkans, fires cause deaths, displaced people and immense damage
A firefighter in the blaze in Varympompi, in the northern suburbs of Athens, August 3, 2021. REUTERS - GIORGOS MOUTAFIS
Text by: Courrier des Balkans Follow |
Florentin Cassonnet
6 mins
Publicity
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Turkey, Greece, Albania, Bulgaria and North Macedonia: all the countries in the southern Balkans have been engulfed in flames for several days.
Historically, the heat wave has encouraged the outbreaks of fires, but the disaster - which has already caused several deaths, hundreds of injured and thousands of victims - is amplified by the unpreparedness and negligence of the authorities.
State of play.
Storms, torrential rains, heat waves, prolonged droughts.
In the Balkans, the effects of climate change are being felt strongly.
Case.
In Serbia, the inhabitants of Beočin are finding it more and more difficult to breathe because of the toxic fumes released for years by the huge local cement factory, owned by the Franco-Swiss group LafargeHolcim.
However, they prefer to keep silent for fear that the factory will close.
A resistance tries to organize itself, in anonymity.
Investigation.
In Moldova, two women in power and the promise of a
"new start"
Albania, North Macedonia and Serbia have announced the opening of their borders for January 1, 2023. This
area of free movement called the Open Balkans
could also include Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro, but these three countries denounce a
"dangerous"
initiative
, which would only be a substitute for European integration.
This is
a first in all of Eastern Europe
: two women will lead Moldova together.
After the triumph of her Action and Solidarity Party in the legislative elections of July 11, President Maia Sandu appointed Natalia Gavrilița, her closest collaborator, to head the government.
But their liberal and pro-Western anchoring risks further accentuating the cutting of the country in two.
Triumphantly elected mayor of Zagreb last May, environmentalist Tomislav Tomašević immediately attacked the mafia system of his controversial predecessor.
Objective: more transparency and less corruption.
The task promises to be complex.
Reportage.
The Croatian Mate Rimac offers himself Bugatti!
It is the
media coup of the summer
in the world of the automotive industry: Mate Rimac, 33, has just bought the French luxury manufacturer Bugatti.
A specialist in electric hypercars, the young Croatian with his all-consuming ambition hopes to compete with Elon Musk and his Tesla.
Truly ?
Since the apparition of the Virgin to six young people in 1981, Međugorje has been one of the main centers of Marian pilgrimage in Europe and a particularly lucrative business, which is said to have brought in several billion euros to its inhabitants.
But the pandemic has put a stop to the frequentation of the site and the traders are grimly.
Reportage.
At the beginning of 1981, the state label Jugoton released
Paket Aranžman
, an improbable split album bringing together three
budding
bands from Belgrade.
A record considered to be the birth certificate of novi val, the Yugoslav new wave, the most important movement in the history of socialist rock.
Forty years later,
r
ack on this monument
which has lost none of its splendor.
A large number of inhabitants of the Greek island of Lesvos are descendants of refugees expelled from Asia Minor in the 1920s. A century later, they rub shoulders with exiles who hope to reach Western Europe.
Just published,
Les Chants de l'Asphodèle
is a work that combines photographs and poetic texts to better probe the intimacy of the island.
Maintenance.
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