Sunday 24 / November / 2024
Muscat: His Majesty Sultan Haitham Bin Tarik sent a cable of condolences and sympathy to His Excellency Gabriel Boric, President of the Republic of Chile, over the victims of the forest fires that swept through central Chile.
In the cable, His Majesty expressed his sincere condolences and sincere sympathy to His Excellency, the families of the victims, and the friendly Chilean people, hoping for a speedy recovery for the injured.
Firefighters in central Chile on Sunday battled to quell fierce forest fires that have killed 112 people so far and razed entire neighborhoods, while President Gabriel Boric warned the country faces a "tragedy of very great magnitude".
Hundreds of people are still missing, authorities say, stoking fears the death toll will keep climbing as more bodies are found on hillsides and houses devastated by the wildfires.
The fires that gathered momentum on Friday now menaced the outer edges of Vina del Mar and Valparaiso, two coastal cities popular with tourists. The urban sprawl of those cities accounts for more than a million residents west of the capital Santiago.
Drone footage filmed by Reuters in Vina del Mar area showed whole neighborhoods scorched, with residents rummaging through husks of burnt-out houses where corrugated iron roofs have collapsed. On the streets, singed cars littered the roads.
