Fire Guts Iraq Shopping Center, killing at least 61 people, authorities say

Baghdad – A fire in a newly opened shopping center in the province of Wasit de Iraq oriental killed more than 60 people, including women and children, Iraqi officials said Thursday. The Ministry of Interior of the Nation said in a statement that 61 people died, most of them by suffocation, in the fire that exploded on Wednesday night in the city of Al-Kut.

Among the dead were 14 carbonized bodies that remain unidentified, the ministry said.

The French news agency News cited the ministry saying that most of the dead were found in the bathrooms.

Civil Defense teams were able to rescue more than 45 people trapped inside the building, according to the statement.

The shopping center, which opened just a week ago, was in a five -story building that also contained a restaurant and a supermarket.

The Iraqi state agency reported that people were still missing. The photographs and videos in the local media showed the building completely wrapped in flames.

Provincial Governor Mohammed al-Mayyeh in a statement declared three days of mourning. He said that the cause of the fire is under investigation, but that the legal cases were presented against the owner of the building and the owner of the mall. It did not specify what the charges were.

“We assure the families of innocent victims that we will not be indulgent with those who were directly or indirectly responsible for this incident,” Al-Mayyeh said.

The results of the preliminary investigation will be published within 48 hours, he said.

Iraqi prime minister, Mohammad Shia Al-Sudani, said in a statement that he had ordered the Interior Minister to go to the fire site to investigate and take measures to avoid recurrence.

The deficient construction standards have often contributed to tragic fires in Iraq. A fire in July 2021 in a hospital in the city of Nasiriyah that killed between 60 and 92 people was determined to have been fed by a type of “highly flammable” sandwiches panel, which is illegal in Iraq.

In 2023, more than 100 people died in a fire in a wedding room in the predominantly Christian area of Hamdaniya in the province of Nineveh after the roof panels on a pyrotechnic machine explode in flames.

The deficient construction standards have often contributed to tragic fires in Iraq. In July 2021, it was determined that a fire in a hospital in the city of Nasiriyah that killed up to 92 people was fed by a type of highly flammable “sandwich panel” coating that is illegal in Iraq.

In 2023, more than 100 people died in a fire in a wedding room in the predominantly Christian area of Hamdaniya in the province of Nineveh after the roof panels on a pyrotechnic machine explode in flames.