AP Features, July 24th, 2007
One man died and 20 people were rescued from burning homes as a fire raged on the outskirts of Macedonia's second largest city Tuesday, destroying several dozen homes and setting off unexploded shells from World War I.
Authorities said about 20 large fires, razing pine and oak forests, were reported across the country as temperatures reached 42 degrees Celsius (107 Fahrenheit) in a heat wave across the Balkans.
The sweltering heat has been blamed for 18 deaths in Romania in the last week. A firefighting plane crashed in Greece Monday and another went down in Italy, killing three people.
In Macedonia, medical authorities confirmed that a man had died of smoke inhalation in his summer house near Bitola, in southern Macedonia.
Authorities warned that unexploded bombs in the area from World War I posed an additional threat.
"A lot of this ordnance could be set off by the high temperatures and there is a risk for large explosions," Kostadin Popovski, head of an army mine division said. "We have already had several explosions."
Southern Macedonia was the scene of heavy fighting in World War I, during a drive by Allied forces in 1916 to support Serbia and stop the advance of opposing troops.
Macedonia last week declared a state of emergency, cutting the eight-hour working day to six hours, and granting pregnant women paid leave.
Late Monday, Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski said he had requested help from Greece and other countries in the region to help deal with the fires, citing insufficient resources to deal with the crisis.
Gruevski left a parliament session in the capital Skopje to travel to Bitola and coordinate firefighting efforts.
"We have asked Greece and other neighboring countries for assistance. We also expect Turkey and Austria to send aircraft," Gruevski said.
President Branko Crvenkovski ordered army units to assist firefighters in Bitola, while the city's mayor Vladimir Talevski also urged residents to assist in the effort.
Despite the heat and strong winds, Pande Lazarevski, head of the national center for crisis management, also said there was evidence of arson.
"We have bolstered police patrols in several areas," he said.
