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President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered the defence ministry to do all it can to help put out the forest fires raging across Russia’s central region, his spokeswoman said on Friday.
“The president has ordered the ministry of defence to activate all necessary forces and capacities to help extinguish the fires,” said spokeswoman Natalya Timakova, quoted by Russian news agencies.
The move came as the death toll from forest fires that are sweeping across Russia amid a record heatwave grew to 18.