The biggest fear for senior citizens taking refuge in Benavente, a town in a zone ravaged by vast wildfires in Spain, is that "everything they own could burn", its mayor Beatriz Asensio told AFP.

She was speaking as she visited a temporary shelter in her municipality, in Zamora province in the Castile and Leon region, hosting residents from surrounding areas who had been evacuated ahead of fast-moving fire fronts.

Many were elderly, reflecting the demographic decline in much of rural Spain.

Zamora has the greatest concentration of residents in Spain aged over 80, representing 12.3 percent of the province's population, according to official statistics.

Ourense, in the neighbouring region of Galicia -- also weathering wildfires -- was close behind, with 12.1 percent.

The fires burning i

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