A FIRE has killed at least 25 people in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, including 23 teenage students and two teachers in the worst fire disaster to strike the country in two decades, according to officials.
An official claimed bodies of the dead were piled on top of one another, leading to claims that a stampeded may have occurred as people attempted to evacuate through the building’s only exit.
Nine fire engines from four stations rushed to the Darul Quran Ittifaqiyah school alongside the Klang river, with the bodies of the fire’s teenage victims taken to the Kuala Lumpur Hospital.
Seven people were injured in the fire, while a further 11 were rescued before the inferno could harm them.
A fire and rescue spokesperson said: “Based on our information at the moment, 25 students and teachers have died in the fire.
“Our personnel are still at the scene.”
He added: “It really does not make sense for so many to die in the fire.
“I think it is one of the country’s worst fire disasters in the past 20 years.
“We are now investigating the cause of the fire””
Loga Bala Mohan, the government’s federal territories deputy minister, said: “We sympathise with the families.
“It is one of the worst fires involving so many lives.
It follows concerns over the safety of religious schools in the country, with 211 fires breaking out since 2015.
The horrifying death toll could rival the tragic 1989 blaze in Kedah, where 27 students at an all–girls school were killed after a blaze broke out and spread to eight nearby wooden hostels.