Officials from Alberta Emergency Management Agency and Alberta Wildfire will provide an update on Monday regarding the Alberta wildfire situation.
As of Monday morning, Alberta Wildfire had 95 wildfires burning across the province, 23 of which were listed as out of control.
Officials continue to thank Albertans for being safe and requested people continue to take all measures to avoid human-caused fires, including abiding by the fire ban in effect, so that firefighters can continue to focus on the fires already burning.
“Given the conditions, it is imperative that everyone continue to respect the fire ban and off-highway vehicle restriction that is in place,” Josee St-Onge, a spokesperson for Alberta Wildfires, said.
St-Onge said there were over 1,500 Albertans working on wildfires, a number that includes firefighters, Alberta Wildfire staff and others.
She said 284 firefighters from outside the province are also now helping and another 250 firefighters from Washington, Colorado, Oregon, Montana, South Dakota and Idaho have arrived in Alberta and will be deployed.
Firefighters have been successful creating fire guards around the perimeter of fires, and they have been holding, St-Onge said. She added that crews will continue to be challenged, though, as temperatures and winds pick up.
Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, noted that the humanitarian operating environment in Ukraine remains complex and dangerous. Nonetheless, he said, thanks to the courage of humanitarian workers, particularly and mostly local workers, the UN and its partners continue to deliver life-saving assistance to front line areas and wherever they are needed across the country.
Mr. Griffiths also emphasized that food exported under the Black Sea initiative – and food and fertilizer exports from the Russian Federation – continue to make a crucial contribution to global food security. Over the past month, he said, we have unfortunately seen a significant reduction in volumes of exports moving out of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, due to challenging dynamics within the Joint Coordination Centre and a related slowdown in operations.
Mr. Griffiths noted that in recent weeks, we have engaged in intensive discussions with the parties on the Black Sea Initiative, to secure agreement on its extension and the improvements needed for it to operate effectively and predictably, and that we will continue over the coming days. In parallel, he said that Rebeca Grynspan and her team have continued to deliver a wide range of support with concrete results under the Memorandum of Understanding on the facilitation of export of Russian food and fertilizer. He stressed that the continuation of the Black Sea initiative is critical, as is the recommitment by the parties to its smooth and efficient operation, and we call on all parties to meet their responsibilities in this regard. The world is watching, he said.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has received reports of deadly attacks across the country over the weekend. In addition to civilian casualties, there was damage to schools, hospitals and other critical facilities on both sides of the front line in eastern and southern Ukraine.
In the city of Mykolaiv, an attack on Saturday damaged a bakery contracted by the World Food Programme (WFP) to supply bread to communities there and in the neighbouring city of Kherson. The vehicles used to store and transport bread were also damaged. Thankfully, the staff were safe and able to return to work.
The Humanitarian Coordinator in Ukraine, Denise Brown, said that the humanitarian community will continue to support their courageous work being done by the staff working in that bakery in efforts to bring bread to front-line communities.
Once again, the UN calls on all parties to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, in accordance with international humanitarian law.
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