FILE IMAGES of wildfires in Yakutia, which has a border with the Arctic Ocean and sits atop permafrost on a territory nearly five times the size of France. The summer of 2021 was Yakutia's driest in 150 years according to local officials and the region became a tinderbox that saw wildfires tear through more than 1.5 million hectares (3.7 million acres) of its swampy taiga forest. The UN has officially recognised the 38 degrees Celsius measured in Siberia last year as a new record high for the Arctic, sounding "alarm bells" over climate change. FILE IMAGES of wildfires in Russia's Yakutia region in 2021