Fires have scorched forests contaminated with radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, a Russian forestry official said today, but it was unclear how dangerous the smoke might be.
Kremlin leaders are already grappling with Russia's deadliest wildfires since 1972 and a drought that has destroyed crops after what weather monitoring officials say was the country's hottest summer in a millennium.
Fears of stirring up nuclear pollution from the Chernobyl disaster could take the crisis to a new level, though officials said radiation levels were normal in Moscow and once scientist said the level of risk depended on exactly where the fires were.
"Yes, there have been fires," Vasily Tuzov, deputy director of Russia's forest protection agency, told Reuters by telephone when asked if there had been fires in forests polluted by the Chernobyl accident, the world's worst civil nuclear disaster. "Most of them have been extinguished now," Mr Tuzov said.
He refused to give more details about the fires, referring to a statement on the agency's website that said fires covering an area of 39 square kilometres had been registered in regions with forests polluted with radiation.
The regions affected included Bryansk province, which borders Ukraine southwest of Moscow and was polluted by radioactive dust that billowed across Ukraine, Russia, Belarus and Europe after a series of explosions at Chernobyl's reactor No. 4 on April 26th, 1986.
Russian Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu said on August 5th that in the event of a fire in forests in the Bryansk region, radioactive particles could be propelled into the air.
Radiation levels in the Moscow region were unchanged, however, and within normal limits today, said on Yelena Popova, the head of Moscow's radiation monitoring centre.
The wildfires have killed at least 54 people in Russia. Strong winds cleared the toxic smoke that has choked Moscow for three weeks on Wednesday, but weather forecasters warned it could return in 24 hours.
The heat and smoke in Moscow - which sent pollution levels to the highest levels in decades - almost doubled mortality rates in the capital and disrupted flights, consumer activity and even trading in Russian stocks and bonds.
The Emergencies Ministry said the area of burning forests in Russia had almost halved in the past 24 hours to 927 square km from 1,740 square km.
Reuters