Iraq fire: Around 100 killed in blaze at wedding party in Qaraqosh

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At least 94 people have died and 100 others are injured after a fire broke out during a wedding in Iraq's biggest Christian town on Tuesday night.

Hundreds were celebrating at a banqueting hall in Qaraqosh, in Nineveh province, when the tragedy happened.

Witnesses and civil defence officials said the fire was sparked by fireworks set off as the bride and groom danced.

Highly flammable metal and plastic composite panels that covered the hall fuelled the blaze, they added.

Security forces arrested 10 of the venue's staff, its owner and three people involved with the fireworks on Wednesday.

In the afternoon, hundreds of mourners attended a funeral for more than 40 of the victims at a cemetery in Qaraqosh, which is also known as al-Hamdaniya and Bakhdida. Some carried portraits of their deceased loved ones.

 

• 'It was like Hell's doors opened'
• What we know about wedding blaze in Iraq's Qaraqosh

 

In an address, Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako described the fire as a "complete and total catastrophe", according to Iraqi Kurdish news agency Rudaw.

Alsumaria TV, meanwhile, showed footage of a man at the funeral who it identified as the groom. BBC Verify ran an image of his face through facial recognition software, comparing it to a picture of the groom before the wedding, and is confident that the report is correct.

Civil defence officials told BBC News Arabic that both the groom and his bride survived, though initial reports said they had perished.

 

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Horrific beyond words ………