Greece turned up the pressure on Bulgaria yesterday to help avoid further damage in the northeast of the country as authorities in the Evros prefecture remained on alert for more flooding.

The Evros River, known as Maritsa in Bulgaria, flows from Greece’s neighbor and Athens has repeatedly complained about Sofia’s lack of action to limit the amount of water being channeled into the country from its dams.

“Bulgaria is now a member of the European Union and must fulfill certain obligations related to this matter,” said Interior Minister Prokopis Pavlopoulos in Thessaloniki.

“The issue with floods in Evros must come to an end.”

The Evros is above the emergency level and a levy in the area of Mandra broke yesterday, leading to 300 hectares of farmland being flooded.

Some 14,000 hectares of land have been flooded in Evros this week. The flooding has yet to reach the levels of last year – the worst in more than four decades – when some 30,000 hectares were covered by water.