31 killed in Saudi hospital fire

An overnight fire at a hospital in the southwestern province of Jizan has killed at least 31 people and injured over 100, says Saudi defense according to AP.

Saudi Civil Defense spokesman Maj. Yahya bin Abdullah al-Qahtani says the cause of the blaze remains unknown.

Upon contacting officials at Bangladesh embassy in Riyadh and Consulate in Jeddah told The Daily Star that they have no information about the Bangladeshis in the hospital yet.

Fire at a hospital in Saudi Arabia on Thursday kills 25 people and injures 107 others. Photo: Okaz.com.

But they are monitoring the incidents closely.

“Our officials are on the way to know whether any Bangladeshi was in that hospital or not,” said Mokammal Hossain, labour counselor at Bangladesh Consulate in Jeddah.

According to AP the fire broke out in the early hours of Thursday around the hospital's intensive care, maternity and neonatal care wards.

There was no immediate breakdown of the victims available.

The kingdom has suffered a number of large-scale accidents this year, namely a crane collapse that killed 111 and a stampede that killed at least 2,400 during the hajj pilgrimage in September, according to an Associated Press count.

Around 1.5 million Bangladeshis are working in different sectors in Saudi Arabia, according to Bangladesh mission there.