During the Late Precambrian-Palaeozoic the southern Siberian continent bordered on the Palaeopacific and Palaeoasian Ocean tectonic plates. Their interactions led to the formation of the complex Central Asian folded (orogenic) belt containing the Silurian Tuvaella and Retziella brachiopod fauna. The subduction of the Palaeopacific plate under the Siberian continent led to the formation of the Late Precambrian-Palaeozoic accretionary orogen. The subduction of the Palaeoasian Ocean plate, including Gondwana-derived continental blocks, under the Siberian continent, created in the Late Precambrian-Ordovician a composite Kazakhstan-Baikal continent (collisional orogen). The Late Precambrian-Early Palaeozoic Ob-Zaisan ocean basin was located between the Kazakhstan-Baikal and the Siberian continents. On site of the Ob-Zaisan ocean basin the amalgamation and collision of these two continents resulted in the formation of the Early Palaeozoic Olkhon suture-shear zone in the Baikal region, the Middle Palaeozoic Charysh-Terekta-Ulagan-Sayan suture-shear zones in the Altai-Sayan region, accre-tional and island arcs in Junggar and East Kazakhstan. The Silurian Tuvaella brachio-pod fauna inhabited the Ob-Zaysan ocean basin coastal outskirts, the epicontinental sea and active margins of the Kazakhstan-Baikal continent in subtropical-temperate latitudes. To this continent, the Gondwana-derived continental blocks with the Silurian Retziella brachiopods fauna have been accreting since the Late Palaeozoic. The Silurian Retziella brachiopod fauna inhabited shallow epicontinental marine areas of the continental blocks (Tarim, North China, South China, Australia and New Zealand) during the rifting of Gondwana separated from the Siberian continent by the Mongol-Okhotsk Ocean.