MOSCOW, Aug 8, (Agencies): Moscow doctors said they were wary of diagnosing patients with heat and smoke-related illnesses out of fear they will lose their jobs, hinting at Russia’s long record of covering up the impact of disasters. Many Russians have criticised the government’s slow response to the peat and forest fires that have engulfed swathes of Russia and left a harmful smoke cloud that has choked the capital for several days.

Denial
The opposition accused authorities of being in denial. Powerful Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov, notably silent during the crisis since he left for holiday on Aug 2, was returning on Sunday because of “the developing situation in the city due to fires”, news agencies quoted his spokesman as saying.
Fires caused by the hottest weather since records began 130 years ago have left thousands homeless and prompted officials to warn against venturing outdoors in Moscow, where flights were diverted and residents wore surgical masks.
The Emergencies Ministry said on Sunday the area forest and peat fires in the Moscow region had tripled since Friday; currently at 210 hectares (519 acres), up from 65.7.
France, responding to Moscow’s plea for aid, offered 120 men, 37 vehicles, 15 motorpumps and a bombardier DASH water plane, the French presidency said in a statement on Sunday.

An unnamed doctor at a Moscow clinic wrote on his site that the bodies of those who had died from heatstroke and smoke ailments over the last few days were piling up in the basement, as the “fridges are full”, leaving a “rotting stench”. He added the situation was similar at hospitals across Moscow.
“(But) we can’t give that diagnosis — we don’t want to be sacked. We have families to feed,” he said on his site http://mamako.livejournal.com/704159.html; comments that were were carried by several Russian media outlets on Sunday.
He added that if a state of emergency were declared in Moscow as in other regions, doctors have to be paid double.
Another doctor at a major hospital, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that staff had been instructed by senior management to not link patients’ illnesses with the heatwave.
A spokeswoman for the Moscow city government declined to comment on the doctors’ claims.

Accused
Pro-Western opposition party Yabloko on Sunday accused the governor of the Nizhny Novgorod region, some 350 kms (220 miles) east of Moscow, of deliberately denying residents access to information on the fires raging in his region by not reinstating site wyksa.ru, which was shut on Aug 5 in a cyber attack.
The site had served as a lifeline for residents by giving detailed information on how to get help, Yabloko said in a statement, adding that its closure “killed people”.
Last week the Ministry of Defence denied two military installations were damaged by fire, but the reports were later revealed to be true.
Critics say Moscow has a history cover ups when disaster strikes, from its delay in responding to the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster to the conflicting reports surrounding the 2000 sinking of the Kursk nuclear submarine.

Though the government maintains the official death toll from fires is 52, an “informed source” told Interfax news agency on Friday that the death rates in Moscow surged nearly 30 percent in July because of the heat and foul smoke cloud.
One of the world’s top grains producers, Russia has announced a temporary ban on exports after crops were ravaged by the dry weather. The news sent world wheat prices soaring.
Moscow temperatures hit 34.7 degrees Celsius (94.5 F) on Sunday, breaking a record for the sixth time in August. Trains and flights out are booked solid as residents flee and the United States and Italy have warned against travel to Russia.
Moscow went into a near shut-down on Sunday; streets and cafes emptied, schools and gyms cancelled their classes and state television Rossiya 24 said organised tours were scrapped.
It showed groups of Japanese tourists wandering near Red Square. Dozens of flights at Moscow’s busy airports were delayed on Sunday morning due to low visibility, it said.
Fires near the Sarov nuclear arms facility where troops dug a 8-km (5-mile) long canal were finally put out, agencies said.

Stranded
Thousands of air travellers were stranded and concerns grew over public health Sunday as Moscow choked in the worst smog in living memory, blown over the Russian capital from spreading wildfires.
Iconic buildings like the Kremlin towers and the city’s wedding-cake Stalin-era skyscrapers were completely obscured from a distance by the acrid smoke, while neighbouring Finland said it was starting to feel the effects.
The wildfires have sparked a major crisis in central Russia, killing 52 people and sending authorities scrambling to protect strategic sites, including the country’s main nuclear research facility.
Moscow’s high-profile mayor Yuri Luzhkov, widely ridiculed in the press for refusing to return to the city from a summer break and handle the crisis, decided Sunday to come back after all, aides said.
They said he was interrupting treatment for a “sports injury”.

Some 2,000 people were stranded at Moscow’s Domodedovo international airport when major delays hit their flights after they had crossed passport control to the departures area with food running short, state television said.
Domodedovo, in the south of Moscow, was the airport worst hit with dozens of flights delayed Sunday. “Passengers need to be warned that delays are unavoidable,” said Sergei Izvolsky of aviation committee Rosaviatsia.
The airport sent out requests to aviation companies to staff flight crews with pilots capable of flying in zero visibility conditions.
“We are located at the very epicentre of wildfires,” Domodedovo spokeswoman Elena Galanova told AFP. “We’re asking them to take complicated meteorological conditions into account.”
Residents of Moscow have rushed to escape the smog-bound capital, with travel agents reporting package tours to destinations popular with Russians like Egypt, Montenegro and Turkey completely sold out.

“In the last week the demand for tickets from Moscow sold online has gone up by 20 percent,” Irina Tyurina, spokeswoman of the Russian Union of Tour Operators, told the Echo of Moscow radio.
“For this weekend there are no places on aircraft to resort destinations and next weekend very few. The smoke has prompted this desire of Muscovites to leave the city,” she said.
State air pollution monitoring service Mosekomonitoring said that carbon monoxide levels in the Moscow air were 3.1 times higher than acceptable levels as of Sunday afternoon. The day earlier they had been 6.6 times worse.
Moscow residents and tourists tried to protect themselves from the smog by donning medical masks or even just clutching wet rags to their faces. The Russian pharmacists association said there was no shortage of masks but new stocks were being brought in.
The wildfires were still blazing in central Russia, the emergencies ministry said, as weather forecasters said Russia’s worst heatwave in decades would continue with temperatures of 39 degrees Celsius.
Some 554 fires were still covering 190,400 hectares of land in Russia, the emergencies ministry said, down just 3,000 hectares from the figure the day earlier.

“The situation with the wildfires in Russia remains difficult but a trend of improvement is being recorded,” the emergencies ministry said on its website.
There were worries the flames could hit Russia’s main nuclear research site in Sarov, a city closed to foreigners, but officials said the situation was under control and soldiers deployed there would be sent elsewhere.
Meteorologists in neighbouring Finland said air quality there had declined significantly in recent days thanks to the plumes of smoke from Russia.
“There has been an increase in dangerous particles (in the air), and there will likely be an increase in the health effects as well,” Jaako Kukkonen, the head of the Finnish Meteorological Institute’s air quality division, told AFP.
France on Sunday offered to send 120 firefighting personnel and a water bomber to Russisa to help.

Also:
LISBON: About a dozen people were evacuated from their homes in central and northern Portugal and one person was injured Saturday after 20 serious wildfires broke out, rescue services said.
Nearly 1,000 firefighters were mobilised to fight the blazes, with the worst reported from near the town of Sao Pedro do Sul, in the Viseu area, where 220 firemen were involved.
Twelve people were evacuated from two hamlets in the afternoon as a precaution.
One resident was hurt trying to fight the flames and was rushed to a hospital with second-degree burns.
Two Spanish water-dropping planes were helping to put out the flames.
Temperatures soared to nearly 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) in parts of Portugal Saturday, triggering a “maximum fire alert” for 100 municipalities in 14 regions.
Forest fires that raged in Portugal in late July burned out after a few days as temperatures cooled.
None of the fires — which were also mostly in northern and central parts of the country— had affected populated areas.