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Blaze in Paris apartment building leaves eight dead

September 2, 2015

A fire in an apartment building in northern Paris that killed eight people, including two children, might have been started intentionally, officials say. The blaze took more than 100 firefighters to contain.

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Frankreich Paris Feuer in Wohnhaus
A firefighter works at the scene where a fire in an apartment building in Paris killed eightImage: Getty Images/AFP/K. Tribouillard

Speaking on French TV BFM, Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said the dead included two children. Four survivors were hospitalized.

Criminal investigators took over the probe after the fire - the deadliest in Paris since 2005 - broke out in two separate places in the building. The firefighters extinguished a small paper fire around 2:23 a.m. (0023 UTC) in the building, located in Paris' famed Montmartre district. They were called back two hours later for a new fire that began in a ground floor stairwell and quickly engulfed the building's upper stories.

Some victims died leaping from the burning building's windows, Brandet said. A witness told BFM she'd seen building inhabitants screaming "Save us!" from windows while the fire raged.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve were on the scene early Wednesday. Hidalgo said the building had not had any previous problems and had been in good condition.

President Francois Hollande said in a statement: "Everything is being done to shed light on the cause of this tragedy."

dr/kms (AP, AFP)