WASHINGTON — US President Barack Obama told his counterpart Dmitry Medvedev that he was sending firefighting equipment and other aid to help Russia battle wildfires that have ravaged parts of the country, the White House said Friday.
"President Obama called President Medvedev yesterday to express his deepest condolences for the tragic losses that Russia has suffered in the recent wildfires," the White House said in a statement.
"USAID, the Department of Defense, the US Forest Service, and the state of California are mobilizing firefighting equipment and airlift to assist Russia in combating the wildfires."
The White House statement stressed that the United States was "responding to Russia's request for technical assistance in combating the fires.
"The American people stand with the people of Russia in this difficult time."
US personnel are not part of the aid.
"There are no firefighters included in the assistance and Russia did not request any," a senior US administration official said.
protective gear, water storage tanks and backpack water pumps.
State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said the United States on Friday began the deliveries of 2.5 million dollars worth of equipment -- including water tanks, pumps, hand tools, fire-protective clothing and medical kits.
The United States also contributed "50,000 dollars to support the operations of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies to provide relief items, including blankets, bedding, and food parcels," he said.
The state of California has contributed further supplies of fire-protective clothing, he said in a statement. "Total overall US support for this effort is estimated to be valued at 4.5 million dollars."
Ties between Washington and Moscow have improved substantially since Obama took office in early 2009, after open discord between the countries over the war in Georgia the previous summer.
In April the two presidents signed a new START treaty for the mutual reduction of strategic nuclear weapons.
Medvedev's June visit to the White House was seen as particularly cordial, although the arrest 10 days later of 10 Russian spies in the United States revived concerns over lingering elements of the two nations' Cold War rivalry.
The US Agency for International Development said on its website that last week USAID's Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance provided 50,000 dollars for immediate humanitarian assistance and deployed two disaster management specialists to help "determine the need for any further assistance to support fire management efforts."
Russian authorities say more than 50 people have died in the fires, in the midst of a heat wave described by experts as the worst in the thousand-year history of the country.
Nearly 50,000 people were battling the fires, which on Friday were raging dangerously close to Russia's main nuclear research center in Sarov. There have also been fears the fires could stir up particles on land in western Russia still contaminated by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
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