By Kate Abnett

BRUSSELS (Reuters) -Wildfires have burned more than a million hectares of land in the European Union this year so far, the highest amount in any year since official records began in 2006, EU data showed.

A total of 1,028,000 hectares in the EU had been ravaged by blazes as of Tuesday – an area bigger than Cyprus, and higher than the total in any year on record, data by the EU’s European Forest Fire Information System, analysed by Reuters, showed.

The previous record was in 2017, when the area burned by wildfires was around 998,000 hectares.

Spain and Portugal have been worst hit and together accounted for around two-thirds of the EU’s burnt area. The EFFIS data showed a sharp increase in wildfires over 5-19 August – a period which overlapped with a 16-day heatwave in Ibe

See Full Page