Malta

Smoke from the forest fires burning in Greece has spread across most of the Eastern Mediterranean, with the National Observatory of Athens' Meteo meteorological service reporting that the Thrace blazes in particular are releasing enormous volumes of microparticles that have now made their way to Malta and southern Italy.

It is widely expected that Greek debt will finally return to investment grade for the first time since 2010. Some minor credit rating agencies have already gone ahead with the upgrade, though none of the "big four" - DBRS, Fitch, Moody's and Standard & Poor's - have done so yet.

In the first seven months of this year, record levels of illegal crossings at EU borders were reported, DPA reported, citing the Union's border agency - Frontex.

Following an initiative launched by Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, the presidents of the member-states of the Arraiolos Group - Greece, Italy, Croatia, Malta, Portugal, and Slovenia - issued a joint appeal on Thursday, urging urgent action to address the dangers posed by the climate crisis in the Mediterranean.

Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou has expressed her gratitude by sending letters to the leaders of all the countries that provided assistance in combating the recent wildfires, according to an announcement Wednesday.

Turkey has become the latest country to offer firefighting aircraft to Greece to assist in the battle against wildfires across the country.

The neighboring country will provide two amphibious firefighting aircraft and a firefighting helicopter.

Wildfires are burning large tracts of forest and farmland in Attica and neighboring regions for the third day in a row, while another two major blazes, on the island of Rhodes and near the southern town of Sparta, flared up Wednesday.

Despite the expected arrival of firefighters from the EU and Israel on Thursday, authorities are not optimistic that the blazes will be contained soon.

Averof Neophytou, a former presidential candidate in Cyprus, told the Electricity Market Association general assembly on Thursday that the energy sector needs significant investments and, therefore, long-term planning and the formulation of a national energy policy.

The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) is about to set up an information center in Cyprus, called the EIT Community RIS Hub and is already in search of a national secretary to lead and coordinate it.

The announcement was made on Wednesday at an info day event in Cyprus, co-organized by the EIT and the Research and Innovation Foundation (RIF).

Carbon dioxide emissions from energy use in the European Union fell by 2.8 percent last year, thanks to reduced use of natural gas following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Eurostat has reported. 

The European Union's statistical agency said in a report that CO2 emissions from the 27 EU nations was almost 2.4 billion tonnes last year.