A new outbreak of fox rabies at the Russian-Mongolian border Dear Editor, Lake Baikal and its neighboring territories are an intermediate zone for the "steppe" and "arctic-like" rabies virus lineages in Russia. After the elimination of dog-mediated rabies during the early 1980s, this area remained rabies-free for over 25-30 years. A sudden reappearance of rabies occurred in this zone in the Republic of Buryatia in 2011-2012. A marginal part of the Mongolian steppe penetrates the Siberian taiga forests in this area, and human and animal rabies have been repeatedly recorded in the Republic of Buryatia from the end of the nineteenth century till 1981. Among the various animals of this region, rabies was documented mainly in dogs, farm animals, and occasionally in wolves, but never in foxes (Botvinkin et al., 2008).The surveillance of animal rabies was performed by the regional veterinary service using data from the local veterinary laboratory. The first case of recurrence of rabies in the Republic of Buryatia was documented at the end of February in 2011 (Zakamensk district, N50°25′27′′ E104°8′44′′) and the last case in 2011 was confirmed in a dog in the middle of April. No other suspected cases were reported until the beginning of 2012. However, in February 2012 rabies re-emerged in the same area. The disease was diagnosed predominantly in wild canines (61%) while some cases were also diagnosed in cattle. All these cases were registered in the narrow valley of the Dzhida River in the forest mountain region.The rabies cases of 2011 were documented in two distinct locations about 30 km apart. The following year, several new cases were recorded around the previous locations with the most distant point being 80 km to the west from the place of the first cases. The Republic of Buryatia has a common border with Mongolia where rabies is known to occur in wild as well as domestic animals (Blancou, 2008;Boldbaator et al., 2010), and all cases recorded in the Republic of Buryatia during 2011-2012 occurred within 30-40 km from the Mongolian border. The nearest areas in the Asian part of Russia (Krasnoyarsk region and Republic of Tyva) that are affected by fox rabies are located more than 500 km to the north-west and are separated from the Republic of Buryatia by high mountain ridges and cannot be a source of infection for the Republic of Buryatia area.