It is feared that thousands of people could lose their jobs as a result of the blaze
Arson is being blamed for a huge fire at a garment factory in Bangladesh which makes clothes for Western brands, fire and police authorities say. The fire gutted a 10-storey building at Gazipur, 40km (25 miles) from Dhaka. Firemen are battling to extinguish flames in four adjacent buildings.  Police say that the fire follows protests by garment workers to demand higher wages and better conditions. A garment factory collapse in April killed more than 1,100 people.No-one was reported injured in Friday's fire. The fire inside the Standard Group garment factory warehouse is believed to have caused million of dollars worth of damage The blaze also destroyed numerous trucks carrying garments for export, officials say A large consignment of clothes for export abroad was damaged in the fire A Reuters photographer at the Standard Group garment factory said that burnt garments were strewn at the scene bearing brand names from US and other international retailers. Officials say that the factory was one of the biggest in the country and as many as 18,000 people worked there. At least 15 trucks carrying garments were also reported to have been set on fire. "We think it's an act of arson committed by workers from both inside the factory complex and outside," Mosharraf Hossain, a senior officer... |
