Raging wildfires have killed at least 74 people and injured scores more as flames swept through a small resort town near Athens.

Emergency crews found one group of 26 victims, including families with children clasped in a last embrace as they tried to flee the flames. They were huddled together in a field just 30 metres from the sea near Mati in the region of Rafina, eastern Greece.

Nikos Economopoulos, head of Greece's Red Cross, told Skai TV: "They had tried to find an escape route but unfortunately these people and their kids didn't make it in time. Instinctively, seeing the end nearing, they embraced."

Interior Minister Panos Skourletis described the wildfires as a "Biblical disaster", according to The Times, and said rescue workers were "still searching to see if there are more missing", while mayor of Rafina Evangelos Bournous told the channel: "The number of dead is rising."

Ferocious fires came all the way into the towns, meaning the only safe direction for people to flee was towards the sea where hundreds of people had to be rescued in local fishing boats.