Fire-ravaged town starts rebuilding

Three hundred of the houses that were ravaged in last summer's disastrous wildfires in Mati, eastern Attica, have received permits to rebuild and are slated to receive state funding for the purpose, Infrastructure Ministry General Secretary Maria Kleanthi told a meeting of local authority officials and residents on Wednesday.
As for the houses that are beyond repair, 120 are slated for demolition and another 120 are to be razed in the coming weeks, Kleanthi said.

Immediately after the July 23 blaze, which killed 103 people, authorities demolished 60 buildings deemed to be dangerously unstable.
Officials stressed that the remaining unstable buildings must be stripped of toxic asbestos before being razed.