Russian wildfires destroy swathes of land

The fires - three times more extensive than during the same period last year - have destroyed some 618,000 hectares so far, an area much greater than the 215,000 hectares destroyed last year.

Siberia has been particularly badly affected, the emergency ministry said. On Tuesday fires ravaged the Krasnoyarsk region, leaving about 20,000 people without electricity in the town Kodinsk and the surrounding areas, which include the construction site of the Boguchany dam, one of the country's largest infrastructure projects.



The district has declared a state of emergency, the regional emergency ministry department said.

Russia endured the worst heatwave in its recorded history last year.

 A record drought wiped out the harvest and wildfires spread out of control, killing dozens, burning down thousands of houses and threatening military and nuclear installations.



The 2010 fires left Moscow shrouded in smoke for several weeks, forcing people to leave the capital in droves and causing mortality rates in the city to double.



In April, President Dmitry Medvedev warned Russian officials they would be sent to personally douse the blazes if they failed to prevent fires this year.