The journey leads through dense smoke, on the road you can see the remains of burning houses: Such pictures came from the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk at the weekend.

Fires destroyed several settlements there over the weekend.

According to the Russian civil protection service, strong winds meant that the fires could spread quickly.

Residential houses, kindergartens, sawmills and medical care centers were destroyed in several parts of the region.

Frederick Smith

Political correspondent for Russia and the CIS in Moscow.

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Authorities said 518 homes were damaged, 309 other structures and 61 vehicles.

Most residents would be placed with relatives.

According to official information, seven people were killed in the Krasnoyarsk region alone by Sunday, and 17 others were injured.

A sandstorm also hit the region.

The stormy weather is also associated with the fact that the fires started at all: the wind uprooted trees, the power grid was partially out of order, there were short circuits and fires broke out in several places at the same time, official sources said.

Residents of the region reported breathing problems.

Krasnoyarsk Mayor Sergei Yeremin urged residents of the regional capital to stay at home.

Krasnoyarsk is one of the most polluted cities in Russia due to its metalworking industry.

The “Clean Sky” initiative has now reported particularly severe air pollution.

President Vladimir Putin ordered compensation for the victims and survivors of the fires.

The authorities then promised to quickly restore the living space and to use houses of standard construction - so that it goes quickly.

The question of the causes remains in the background

There were also reports of fires in the neighboring Irkutsk region over the weekend.

And a meteorologist warned that there was an extraordinarily high risk of fire in other Siberian regions in the coming days.

The state news agency Tass reported that this was due to the wind and the dry weather - just as the question of the causes behind the number-heavy reports of helpers deployed, the authorities' willingness to help and destroyed houses was lagging behind.

The environmental protection organization Greenpeace expressed itself in more detail.

Its Russian section counted a total of around 800 burned buildings in the Krasnoyarsk region, in the Omsk and Irkutsk regions and in other parts of Siberia.

Strong winds are expected to continue across much of Siberia through next Wednesday, Greenpeace warned, separating the fires from the wildfires that ravage Siberia every year and are raging ever more violently due to climate change.

Most of the fires broke out in open areas: in steppes and in agricultural areas.

Persistent peat fires could develop

Greenpeace also saw the strong wind as the cause of the fires;

its speed was in some places 25 meters per second and according to some reports even up to 40 meters, hurricane speed.

However, the environmentalists also saw the coal heating that was common in the villages as a fire-promoting factor.

However, Greenpeace particularly questioned the short-circuit thesis as the cause of the fires, emphasizing that most fires were caused by the traditional fires used to clean the soil of dry grass after winter and by burning household waste.

Fire is also used in forestry.

Greenpeace complained that the state was using a punitive practice to get citizens to burn grass.

Because owners would have to pay high fines if dry grass lies around on their agricultural land, forest grows back there or weeds proliferate.

This forces the owners to clean the premises "in the simplest and cheapest way - with fire".

Greenpeace warned that this practice could also start new, persistent peat fires.

In the Sverdlovsk region in the Urals, authorities are currently trying to put out such fires.

Due to climate change, strong hurricanes as well as drought and heat waves increased, Greenpeace wrote on Sunday.

The organization called for a total ban on the use of fire in Russia's agriculture and forestry.