13 boys die in Yangon Islamic school blaze

A fire caused by faulty electrical equipment killed 13 boys at an Islamic school in Yangon on Tuesday, the fire service said, although some Muslims voiced concern because it came after a wave of anti-Muslim violence in Buddhist-majority Myanmar.

The boys suffocated after the fire broke out in a dormitory of the school in the central, multiethnic Botataung district of the former capital at about 2:40 am, neighbors and officials said.

The Yangon Region Fire Service said it was setting up a team to investigate the fire with the police, the electricity company and representatives from Muslim groups.

"The fire, caused by the transformer overheating under the staircase, spread, trapping the boys sleeping in the attic. As a result, 13 boys died of suffocation after inhaling smoke," a duty fire officer said, reading from a statement.

Armed riot police cordoned off the area, but the crowd that had assembled in the area remained peaceful.

According to official records, electrical faults and overheating are major causes of fires in Yangon.

Violence feared

"The whole country is worried now for Yangon and is wondering whether this was a crime," Ye Naung Thein, secretary of the Muslim organization Myanmar Mawlwy federation, told AFP at the scene.

Hundreds of mourners, many praying and weeping, packed into a Muslim cemetery in a suburb north of Yangon as burials began for the victims, with many among the crowd voicing suspicions the fire was started deliberately.

A teacher who was awakened as the fire tore through the building and evacuated survivors said he had smelled gasoline during the blaze, echoing the testimony of several witnesses.

"I think someone started the fire intentionally," said Khin Maung Hla, 35, adding that the victims were aged between 12 and 15.

Nyunt Zaw wept uncontrollably as she waited to bury her 13-year-old boy. "I lost my youngest son. I am devastated," she said.

Emergency services had to break down locked doors to free the children sleeping in a dormitory, according to government spokesman Ye Htut.

Police promised to establish a committee - including Muslim leaders - to investigate the cause, while the government urged people to avoid spreading rumors.

"Please don't believe some news on the Internet portraying this case as a religious conflict," Ye Htut posted on his Facebook page, adding that initial findings were that the fire was caused by faulty wiring.

Communal tensions are running high in the former army-ruled country after at least 43 people died last month in a wave of sectarian violence that saw mosques and homes burned down in several towns in central Myanmar.

The government has imposed emergency rule and curfews in some areas.

Lingering suspicion

Some Muslim leaders, however, said they believed the fire was not an accident because students and teachers said they had slipped on an oily liquid on the ground floor while escaping.

"The oil smelled like gasoline or diesel," said Shine Win, a Muslim leader, urging the government to "reveal the truth". Myanmar Mawlwy federation's Ye Naung Thein urged people to wait for the result of government investigations into the fire.

Yangon has been tense but mostly peaceful after the clashes, which were apparently triggered by an argument in a gold shop in the town of Meiktila that sparked a riot that later spread.

The conflict poses a major challenge for President Thein Sein, who has won international praise for his reform efforts since taking office two years ago.

The situation has calmed in recent days after the former general on Thursday vowed a tough response over the violence, which he blamed on "political opportunists and religious extremists".

Sectarian strife involving Buddhists and Muslims in the western state of Rakhine last year left at least 180 people dead.

Reuters - AFP

(China Daily 04/03/2013 page10)