High-rise fire threat stirs push to change rules across country

Fire control authorities will try to push local governments to slow the development of high-rise buildings and reduce the security risks of existing ones to prevent human and property losses, a senior official said.

China now has 619,000 buildings taller than 24 meters and apartment buildings taller than 27 meters, according to the Fire Control Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security. It said 42,000 of them have illegally used flammable external insulation materials.

Of all high buildings, 6,457 are super-high-rises of more than 100 meters, and the number has been growing by 8 percent a year - 2.5 times of the world's average growth rate of such super high buildings, said Du Lanping, deputy director of the bureau.