DOHA // A fire ripped through a labour camp in southwestern Qatar killing 11 people and injuring 12 others, the interior ministry said late on Thursday.
An investigation is under way to determine the cause of the fire which broke out on Wednesday at a camp for labourers working on a waterfront tourism project, it said.
“11 people died and 12 injured in the fire and they are hospitalised. Investigation is going on to identify the causes of the fire,” the ministry tweeted.
Pictures posted online, purportedly from the site of the fire, showed black smoke rising hundreds of feet into the air.
Qatar’s interior ministry said that civil defence teams contained the blaze and that firefighters managed to prevent it from spreading.
The identity of the victims was not immediately known.
The fire comes two months after another blaze broke out at an $825 million mall under construction near a stadium for the 2022 World Cup. Some 14,000 labourers and staff had to be evacuated in that fire, though there were no reported injuries.
Wednesday’s fire was believed to be the deadliest in Qatar since a 2012 blaze at the high-end Villaggio shopping mall in the capital, Doha. That fire killed 19 people, including 13 children.
In February, a 35-year-old Indian worker was killed in a fire which ripped through a labour camp in the town of Al Sheehaniya, west of Doha.
* Agencies
