Brazil Rejects International Aid To Help Fight Amazon Wildfires
Aug 27, 2019, 7:07 AM | Updated: Jun 8, 2022, 5:03 pm
In this aerial image, A fire burns in a section of the Amazon rain forest on August 25, 2019 in the Candeias do Jamari region near Porto Velho, Brazil. According to INPE, Brazil's National Institute of Space Research, the number of fires detected by satellite in the Amazon region this month is the highest since 2010. (Photo by Victor Moriyama/Getty Images)
(Photo by Victor Moriyama/Getty Images)
JACUNDA NATIONAL FOREST, Brazil (AP) – Brazil has rejected a Group of Seven offer of international aid to fight Amazon wildfires, and French President Emmanuel Macron is shrugging off the snub.
Macron put the Amazon fires high on the agenda of the G-7 summit in France, where world powers pledged this week some $40 million to fight the fires and plant new trees because of the Amazon’s importance to the global climate.
Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro accused France and other rich countries of treating the region like a “colony.”
Macron said in a speech Tuesday that Bolsonaro’s interpretation is a “mistake.”
He said the money isn’t just aimed at Brazil but at nine countries in the Amazon region, including Colombia and Bolivia. France too considers itself an Amazon country via its overseas region of French Guiana.
Macron and Bolsonaro have been feuding over social media in recent days.
