In Greece, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said firefighters had battled around 50 fires during the past 24 hours and it was likely there would be more with meteorologists warning that a further heat wave was in prospect.

Fire service officials said negligence on farms and construction sites had been behind several incidents, many of which were in the southern Peloponnese region.

 No casualties were reported. Conditions in southern Europe were in sharp contrast to the torrential rainstorms that lashed northern countries from Austria to Britain following the catastrophic flooding in Germany and neighboring countries last week.