A fire broke out in a commercial building in southeastern Jiangxi province, killing at least 39 people and injuring nine others, state media said.
Officials for the Yushui district of Jiangxi province said that the fire broke out in the basement of a shopping area in the afternoon.
In addition to rescue workers, firefighters and police, local government officials were deployed to the scene.
A preliminary investigation found that the fire was caused by unauthorised welding during construction work in the basement, local officials said.
State broadcaster CCTV later reported that rescue operations were complete and that no people remained trapped in the building, which it said housed an internet cafe in the basement and tutoring centres on upper floors.
Chinese President Xi Jinping issued a statement about the blaze, noting that it was yet another safety tragedy.
He called on the government and Communist Party to “resolutely curb the frequent occurrence of various safety accidents and ensure the safety of people’s lives and property, and overall social stability.”
The statement included orders for the State Council’s Work Safety Committee to close any gaps in safety measures.
The local government said that the cause of the fire was under investigation.
People in China are lashing out at their officials over the fire which killed many students.
The accident was a trending topic on Chinese social media yesterday.
Some people went beyond just offering the usual condolences, criticising local officials for failing to ensure the building was safe. Popular posts on social media said officials were too busy carrying out various campaigns ordered by their superiors and producing “wordy reports”.
“They really have no time to implement safety work and could only take pictures, fill out forms and issue a statement,” one person wrote on Weibo. “Having accidents happen is inevitable.”
Another person suggested local officials “do less of this formalism”.
“What’s the use of the mayor bowing and apologising?” they wrote. “Many problems could have been avoided in the first place.”
Xinhua reported that Xi urged local officials to “curb the repeated occurrence of various kinds of safety accidents”. — AP/Bloomberg
