We “remain below the average of the last 15 years. But I’m accused of being a Nero, who sets fires everywhere.”

Yet fires are at a seven-year high, according to INPE data, and despite a slight drop at the start of the month, the number of active fires recorded in Brazil from the start of the year to September 19 was up 56 per cent over the same period in 2018. Nearly half of the blazes are in the Amazon.

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Bolsonaro is a climate change sceptic, but last month he sent soldiers to help put out fires in the Amazon region after Brazil came under criticism at the G7 summit, with the host French President Emmanuel Macron among the most outspoken detractors.

Under that deployment, which was renewed Friday for another month, nearly 7,000 soldiers and 16 aircraft are fighting both the flames and “deforestation and illegal mining,” Brazil’s defence ministry said.

Marcio Astrini, a Greenpeace official in Brazil, said the deployment is making little difference.

“We did a lot of flyovers. We did not see anything happening on the ground, apart from the deforestation that is progressing. It’s tragic,” he said.

Experts sent by the United States, logistical equipment from Japan, and four aircraft from Chile are all fighting the blazes, while firefighters sent from Israel have departed, the defence ministry said.

Bolsonaro however has blanched at other international offers to help put out the fires, rejecting US$20 million from the G7 and accusing members France and Germany of “buying” Brazil’s sovereignty.

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On Monday, Macron will launch a “call for mobilisation” on the Amazon together with his counterparts Sebastian Pinera of Chile and Ivan Duque of Colombia during a meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Brazil won’t attend the meeting, but Environment Minister Ricardo Salles, also a climate change sceptic, will appear at the UN’s climate summit on Monday, before travelling to Europe.

On Tuesday, Bolsonaro will make the opening speech at the UN General Assembly, in which he is expected to focus on the Amazon.

“I am preparing a rather objective speech, unlike my predecessor,” he wrote on Facebook, adding, “I’m going to get hit, you can be sure. The media always finds something to complain about.”

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Environmental groups have little faith that Bolsonaro will change tack.

The government “wants to show that it is doing the best for the forest. In fact, it is doing its utmost for deforestation,” said Greenpeace’s Astrini.

“Brazil is running a campaign to show that it is taking care of the Amazon. It’s a lie,” he said.

And there’s little to suggest that the fires are abating.

Between September 18 and 19, the number of forest fires in Rondonia state jumped to 242 from 12 just the day before, an increase of 1,915 per cent, according to the INPE.

Fears are also rising over the number of blazes in the Cerrado savannah, which account for a third of all the fires in Brazil.

And on Friday the World Wide Fund for Nature warned of an “emergency situation in the biome” of the Pantanal wetland.

Fires have risen 351 per cent since January in the Pantanal region, some 90 per cent of which were set illegally.