Amazon in ashes FRIDAY YESTERDAY

G7 leaders urge Brazil president to t ackle blazing rainforest

ARMED troops were deployed to help douse the huge fires engulfing the Amazon rainforest yesterday as Brazil’s head of state was urged to act by international leaders.

Amid a storm of protest, President Jair Bolsonaro was seen joking around and taking selfies at a military ceremony before sending soldiers to assist in putting out blazes that have raged for three weeks.

‘The protection of the forest is our duty,’ he said, as thousands of people took to the streets of Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and the capital Brasilia to protest.

The environmental crisis was discussed by international leaders at the G7 meeting in Biarritz. Meanwhile, there were further protests outside Brazilian embassies in London and Paris and Bogota, Colombia. On Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron and Ireland’s Prime Minister Leo Varadkar threatened to block a free- trade agreement between the EU and South American nations if Mr Bolsonaro did not act to stop the deforestation of the Amazon, which experts say has fuelled the fires.

In response, Mr Bolsonaro vowed he ‘ will act to combat def o r e s t a t i o n a nd c r i minal activities that put people at risk in the Amazon’.

He said that Brazilian forces will deploy to border areas, indigenous territories and other affected regions to assist in putting out fires for a month, according t o a presidential decree.

Leading politicians, celebrities, environmentalists and the Prime Minister’s girlfriend Carrie Symonds have warned of the devastating impact of the fires ravaging the rainforest, which produces a fifth of the world’s oxygen.

The wildfire is believed to be the most intense blaze to grip the jungle in nearly a decade, with s ci entists warning t hat t he rainforest is drier and more flammable than normal due to global warming.

Yesterday’s protests came as it emerged there have been a record 72,843 fires in the jungle this year, up 83 per cent on 2018.

The Amazon, often referred to as the ‘lungs of the world’, is home to around three million species of plants and animals, and one million indigenous people. Environmental groups blame the wildfires on the Brazilian government’s relaxed policies allowing swathes of the rainforest to be cleared for farming and mining.

Oliver Salge, from Greenpeace, said: ‘If you burn the forest, you are backed up by a president.’

ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS: Huge swathes of the jungle, above, are still ablaze and others, right, a smoking wasteland as a record number of fires rage out of control in the ‘lungs of the world’