The blazes in Europe have brought scenes of unity: communities in France welcoming evacuees, neighbors in Spain helping one another extinguish house fires, farmers skirting restrictions to lend firefighters a hand.
But the disaster has also reignited political spats over climate and disaster response policies.
In Spain, tensions have arisen over the decision to nationalize the response to wildfires in the Madrid region. The region’s conservative leader, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, requested a national emergency declaration that allowed the intervention of the nation’s ministry of the interior, under Spain’s progressive prime minister, Pedro Sánchez.
Center-left politicians framed the move as a sign of failed leadership by the conservative People’s Party. Óscar Puente, Spain’s transportation minister, said in a social media post that Madrid had come to rely on a special disaster response unit of the nation’s armed forces to combat fires because of labor disputes and regional budget cuts to emergency services.
“They cut taxes for the rich, slash public services, and then ask the government to resolve their mess,” he wrote.
Ms. Ayuso said she would prioritize the disaster response over political rancor. “The first fool who gets in the way to heat things up, that’s on their conscience,” she said to the Spanish media on Friday.
In France, President Emmanuel Macron has drawn criticism from the left and right over his government’s response to the crisis.
Jordan Bardella, the leader of France’s far-right National Rally party, said officials had taken too long to deploy a military plane adapted to release flame retardant.
“The government will not be able to avoid answering the French people about the delay in the use of the Airbus A400M and the lack of resources allocated to civil security,” Bardella wrote on social media on Friday.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of France’s left-wing France Unbowed party, said he was “furious” about the perceived delay.
Maud Bregeon, a spokeswoman for the French government, said the nation’s air force and disaster response forces had worked quickly with Airbus to test the plane and put it to use.
“Adapting the A400M is a bit longer and more complex than a children’s Lego set (or your comments on X),” she said in response to Mr. Mélenchon.
Visiting Bordeaux on Monday, Mr. Macron said he understood people’s anger over the fire response, but he sought to temper expectations. “The situation we’re facing today is the hardest we’ve ever recorded, the hardest since World War II,” he said.
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