Assigning blame
Hotel fire: death toll continues to rise
The number of fatalities in the wake of the fire disaster at a Turkish ski hotel has once again been revised upwards. The government announced on Thursday that 78 people had died in the devastating fire on Tuesday. All of the dead have now been identified.
According to the state news agency Anadolu Ajansi, the Turkish Ministry of Justice announced that one of the fatalities was a foreign national. The nationality was not specified. The fire broke out on Tuesday night in a hotel with 238 guests in the north-western province of Bolu. Many were unable to escape the flames.
Mutual recriminations
While anger over the disaster is growing on social media, the central government and those responsible in the municipality of Bolu continue to blame each other. The local mayor, Tanju Özcan from the country's strongest opposition party CHP, said that the Ministry of Tourism was responsible because the hotel was located in a tourist area. Tourism Minister Nuri Ersoy, on the other hand, said that the local fire department had approved the fire safety measures at the hotel.
Numerous deficiencies found
The pro-opposition news agency Anka reported that the Bolu city fire department had carried out an inspection and test at the Grand Kartal Hotel on request around a month before the fire. They found that the emergency exits, signposts and emergency lighting in the building were inadequate. The hotel withdrew its inspection request on December 24 after it was found that instructions on fire extinguishing equipment, detection systems, fire alarms, smoke vents and evacuation were also inadequate.
Almost a dozen arrests
So far, eleven people have been arrested in connection with the investigation - including the hotel owner, the deputy mayor of Bolu and the deputy fire chief. The cause of the fire is not yet known.
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