Fire at mall in Iraq leaves at least 60 dead, officials say
BAGHDAD - A massive fire in a hypermarket in al-Kut city in eastern Iraq has left at least 60 people dead and 11 others missing, the city's health authorities and two police sources told Reuters on Thursday.
Videos circulating on social media showed flames engulfing a five-storey building in al-Kut overnight as firefighters tried to contain the blaze.
Reuters could not independently verify the videos.
"We have compiled a list of 59 victims whose identities have been confirmed, but one body was so badly burned that it has been extremely difficult to identify," a city health official told Reuters.
"We have more bodies that have not been recovered still under fire debris," city official Ali al-Mayahi told Reuters.
The cause of the fire was not immediately known, but the province's governor said initial results from an investigation would be announced within 48 hours, the state news agency (INA)reported.
"We have filed lawsuits against the owner of the building and the mall," INA quoted the governor as saying. REUTERS
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Two brothers - Darwin Hernandez, a 30-year-old barber, and 23-year-old house painter Yeison Hernandez - were arrested alongside Suarez in February. They arrived home to their parents and other family members in central Valencia on Tuesday. "I asked God only for freedom, but more than anything that my family also be alive, to be able to leave and be with them like we are now," said Darwin Hernandez, a husband and a father to a six-year-old daughter. ABUSE ALLEGATIONS Suarez and Hernandez both said guards at the CECOT prison told detainees they would only leave dead, and Suarez said some detainees considered suicide. Their comments tallied with other allegations of abuse made by former prisoners in videos broadcast on state television, including during a program with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Monday night. Venezuela's attorney general said on Monday his office will investigate El Salvador President Nayib Bukele and other top officials over the alleged abuse. Bukele's office did not respond to requests for comment on the alleged torture, but he said on social media late on Monday that the Maduro government was "indignant" because they realized they no longer held "hostages from the most powerful country in the world," - a reference to ten Americans formerly held in Venezuela who were freed under the deal. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, State Department and White House did not immediately respond to comment requests. Reuters was not able to immediately confirm the abuse allegations. Eighty Venezuelan prisoners - including opposition politicians - held within Venezuela are also supposed to be released in the swap. Judicial NGO Foro Penal said on Monday it had verified 48 releases. The Venezuelan opposition has regularly critiqued the Maduro government for holding activists and others in abusive conditions within Venezuela. Andry Hernandez, a gay make-up artist who was detained at the U.S.-Mexico border during the Biden administration, had an active asylum case when he was deported to CECOT. The U.S. alleged gang membership based on his tattoos. His parents were anxiously awaiting him in Capacho, near the Colombian border, on Tuesday. "All this time I've slept badly. My wife would serve me a plate of food and I would wonder 'is he eating?'" said Hernandez's father Felipe. Hernandez, who said he suffered sexual abuse at CECOT in a video broadcast on state television on Monday, was able to call his parents to say he was on his way. His mother, Alexi Romero, says she told him she is waiting with open arms. REUTERS
