# More than 160 people have been detained or questioned over deliberately starting fires in France since the sixth of this month. Some 220-thousand people have been evacuated in France and more than 100-thousand in Spain as firefighters battle to contain the wildfires amidst a heatwave. France’s Prime Minister, Sébastien Lecornu, says the fires mostly stem from carelessness: a cigarette butt, a barbecue, or work carried out without precautions. He says that deliberately starting a fire is a crime punishable by 15 years’ imprisonment. No one has been charged yet.
More than 100 detained or questioned in France over unprecedented fires