Forest fires kill 18 in Russia heatwave
MOSCOW — Eighteen people died in forest fires in Russia's worst heatwave in decades, officials said Friday, as Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited one of the worst hit areas to reassure…
MOSCOW — Eighteen people died in forest fires in Russia's worst heatwave in decades, officials said Friday, as Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited one of the worst hit areas to reassure local residents.Angry residents of a village in the central Nizhny Novgorod region where all 341 houses burnt down confronted Putin as he visited the area, many wiping tears from their eyes, television reports showed."We aren't asking for anything out of this world. We are just asking for a guarantee that we will be able to live here by winter," a woman resident said in footage shown on state Channel One television."By winter, all the houses will be standing. I promise you that your village will be restored," said Putin, adding that the standard compensation of 50,000 rubles (1,652 dollars) per household for loss of possessions would be increased to 200,000 rubles (6,614 dollars) per resident.He then lent forward and embraced the woman.Putin flew into the village of Verkhnyaya Vereya on Friday morning after more than 500 residents were left homeless by a fire. In characteristic strongman mode, he was shown facing residents, his sleeves rolled up and meeting with Emergency Minister Sergei Shoigu, where he ordered officials "not to get tied up in red tape."Television reports showed a central street with all the houses razed to brick foundations and evacuated residents sheltering in a children's summer camp."I was at home, I couldn't breathe, the houses were burning, and I couldn't see anything," Valentina Britova, an elderly woman in a headscarf, told the Rossiya television channel.Another resident, Yelena Vitushkina, recalled the evacuation: "The bus drove through the fire on both sides, it was blazing like in the cinema."President Dmitry Medvedev told the government to take urgent measures to organise the fire-fighting and to make funds available to rebuild the destroyed houses.The president also ordered the defence ministry to help put out the forest fires, his spokeswoman said."The president has ordered the defence min
last modification 2010-07-30 14:30:02
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