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Mongolia prairie fire halted on China border

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-05-26 16:42

HOHHOT -- A total of 400 police officers halted a 10-kilometre wide fire from spreading in China Tuesday after it crossed the Mongolian border Monday.

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Mongolia has a tradition of burning grassland in May, which sometimes develops into massive fires, forest police said.

The fire entered the Arxan City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on the border at around 6 a.m. Monday and fanned by winds and hot weather was spreading at 2 km per hour, said the Hinggan League forest police squad.

The fire was still raging on the Mongolian side.

Grassland fires in Mongolia have threatened more than 100 kms of China's border areas since last Wednesday.

Chinese forest police officers and forest farm workers have put out a few small fires after they entered China, but the 10 km fire is the largest to come across the border so far this year.