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Dozens Die in Iraq Hotel Fire

16 July 2010 17:41 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. A hotel in the northern Iraqi city of Sulaimaniya burned to the ground overnight, killing at least 29 people, according to a government official in Erbil, the provincial capital, APA reports quoting â€œThe New York Timesâ€.
Another 20 people were injured, and the death toll could climb higher. The five-story hotel, the Soma, caught fire because of an electrical short, the government official said.
Terraseis, a company headquartered in Dubai that works with oil companies to conduct geographical surveys and compile seismic data, said a number of its workers were staying at the hotel. The owner of the hotel, Newroz Abdulla, said that Americans, Canadians, Australians and Britons were staying in the hotel.
Sulaimaniya is 160 miles north of Baghdad, in the semiautonomous Kurdish region of Iraq, and some of the victims may have worked for foreign oil companies, The Associated Press reported. At least four children were among the dead, according to The A.P.