Italy arrests two Sicilian sheep farmers for lighting wildfires

Carabinieri military police are seen finding a petrol can in a car during a investigation that led to the arrest of two suspected arsonists in Buccheri, Italy August 14, 2021 in a video screengrab. Siracusa Carabinieri/Handout via REUTERS

ROME (Reuters) - Italian police arrested two farmers in Sicily on Saturday on suspicion of lighting recent wildfires to create grazing land for their sheep, and said the two had been planning another large and dangerous blaze.

Wildfires have torn through swathes of southern Italy this summer, helped by record high temperatures, ravaging woodland in Calabria and on the islands of Sicily and Sardinia.