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Canada wildfires spark 'ecoterrorist' conspiracy theory
So far in 2023, Canada has seen larger wildfires than any previous year, with over 7.4 million acres burned and tens of thousands of people evacuated
As Canada hurtles towards its worst wildfire season in history, a conspiracy theory took off online with a claim that environmentalists intentionally set some of the blazes.
So far in 2023, Canada has seen larger wildfires than any previous year, with over 7.4 million acres burned, leading to tens of thousands of people evacuated and large swathes of the eastern United States blanketed in smoke.
"I bet a good portion of the wildfires raging across the country were started by green terrorists who want to give their climate change campaign a little boost," Maxime Bernier, a former foreign minister-turned fringe party leader, tweeted earlier this week.
On TikTok, a video already viewed almost 20,000 times claimed the fires in Nova Scotia were set "on purpose to push a climate change agenda." One article speculated that since 90 percent of Alberta's fires could be "human-caused," there was a possibility that "ecoterrorists" may be behind them.
In Quebec, some questioned how all the wildfires could have started on the same day, as one Facebook video with more than one million views blamed "a terrorist attack.” But Karine Pelletier from Quebec's Forest Fire Protection Agency said the causes were still under investigation.
"There are a lot which are caused by humans, but these are almost always accidents," she said, noting that recent lightning strikes were to blame for many of Quebec’s blazes.
Alberta Wildfire told AFP that unless lightning is involved, a blaze is classified as human-caused. This does not exclusively mean arson. "It could be related to general causes, including agriculture, forest industry, power lines, or oil and gas industry, railroad or residential wildfires," said spokeswoman Melissa Story.
Nova Scotia officials have also said they were still investigating the origins of the province’s fires, which are presumed to be human-caused.
"Human-caused fires can be accidental, intentional, or undetermined," said Heather Fairbairn, a spokeswoman for the Office of the Fire Marshal of Nova Scotia, "certainly, we are seeing the impacts of climate change which can increase fire risks."