Russia accuses local officials over fatal floods

KRYMSK, Russia (Reuters) - The Russian government blamed local officials in the inundated south on Monday over the deaths of scores of people trapped by the weekend floods, as President Vladimir Putin tried to deflect popular anger at perceived failures of leadership.

Moscow's emergencies minister condemned "mistakes" by the authorities on the ground after at least 171 people were killed in the Black Sea region of the Kuban. Putin himself was shown on television sternly demanding his subordinates to report back to him by the end of the week on how the relief effort was going.

Two months into his third term, Putin will recall the start of his first 12 years ago when he was accused of reacting slowly to national disasters. He is also mindful of discontent with the authorities' competence and appears anxious to divert any blame.

In the town of Krymsk, between regional capital Krasnodar and Russia's main trading port at Novorossiisk, angry people who complained of being let down by their leaders were salvaging what they could from shattered homes. Two days after Putin flew in to view the damage and to grill local officials on their actions, postal workers went from house to house in Krymsk making $300 cash payments and promising further compensation.

On Monday, Putin told ministers at the Kremlin: "We must help these families, help all the people who are in very difficult circumstances and have lost almost all their belongings ... Report back to me on how things are going by the end of the week."

In Krymsk, relatives lined up to identify bodies stored in a refrigerated truck behind a local hospital. Clean-up crews were destroying rotting carcasses of livestock drowned in the flood.

Emergencies Minister Vladimir Puchkov signalled that the blame would be directed at regional leaders - rather than national figures - by saying they had been slow to warn people when torrential rain started falling late on Friday. Many drowned in their homes, trapped by rising water as they slept.

"Mistakes were allowed by local leaders and various services," Puchkov said in televised comments. "Not all the population was warned in time."

Krymsk residents also said a wall of water that swept through the mountain town was so high that the gates of a nearby reservoir must have been opened - a version denied by officials.

"Nothing is left. We are like tramps," said Ovsen Torosyan, 30, as he scoured the wreckage of his home. "I bought all the furniture and electrical goods on credit and still have to finish paying for them but they have all gone."

SCREAMING FOR HELP

"We were barely able to get out of our house and started screaming down the street for help. But we weren't able to save our things. We saw the water carry away the roof of our house," said one woman wearing a dirty pink shirt standing outside of the muddied ruins of her home.

In nearby municipal buildings, survivors who had lost their belongings picked through heaps of clothing - donations from nearby cities. Outside, dozens of white tents were set up in a large camp for flood victims who had lost their homes.

Putin, a former KGB spy, now 59, has increasingly struggled to project his customary image of mastery since the outbreak of protests against his rule in December.

In his 12 years in power, as president and prime minister, Russia has been plagued by natural and man-made disasters that have laid bare a longstanding shortfall in investment and management of Russia's transport and other infrastructure.

After the deaths of the crew of the crippled submarine Kursk in 2000, Putin conceded that continuing a summer holiday during that crisis had damaged the public's opinion of his leadership.

GRAIN HARVEST

Analysts and trade sources said they did not expect any impact on Russia's grain and oilseed harvest, although damage to the roads and railways could delay new grain deliveries to port.

The floods followed more than a month of heavy rainfall in the prosperous southern "breadbasket" region of Krasnodar, where agriculture and tourism thrive.

Officials, who raised the death toll to 171 late on Sunday, were expecting more rains elsewhere in Krasnodar region on Monday, although it was sunny and hot in Krymsk.

Torrential rain, equivalent to a third of the annual average rainfall in some places, temporarily paralysed transport and briefly halted exports from the nearby docks at Novorossiisk on the Black Sea, Russia's biggest commercial port.

The port was returning to normal operations, and the railway was operating normally again for passengers, but a railway spokesman said some freight traffic had been halted because of flood damage.

There was no report of damage around Sochi, the beach resort and its mountain hinterland in Krasnodar region which will host the Winter Olympics in 19 months time. Sochi is 250 km (160 miles) from Krymsk. ($1 = 32.8387 Russian roubles)

(Writing by Timothy Heritage,; Editing by Alastair Macdonald)