As fires devour Amazon rainforest, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro blames NGOs for blazes
- Nearly 73,000 forest fires were recorded in Brazil in first eight months of the year – the highest number since 2013
- Activist have criticised president’s anti-environment rhetoric, while Bolsonaro accused green groups of starting blazes for publicity
Wildfires in the Amazon rainforest in northern Brazil have ignited a firestorm on social media, with President Jair Bolsonaro on Wednesday suggesting green groups had started the blazes.
Images of fires purportedly devouring sections of the world’s largest rainforest have gone viral on Twitter. #PrayforAmazonas is the top trending hashtag in the world on Wednesday, with 249,000 tweets.
“No matter how successful we are, if our Earth dies, we all die,” posted one Twitter user.
The virtual anguish over the destruction comes as official figures show nearly 73,000 forest fires were recorded in Brazil in the first eight months of the year – the highest number for any year since 2013. Most of them were in the Amazon.
That compares with 39,759 in all of 2018, according to the embattled National Institute for Space Research (INPE), which has been in Bolsonaro’s crosshairs since it released data showing a surge in deforestation in recent months.