Monitoring Desk
KABUL: Dozens of people, who incurred financial losses in an apartment fire in capital Kabul, staged a protest rally and demanded the closure of Ahmad Yar fuel station.
A week back, an apartment known as Kabul Tower in the limits of the ninth police district of Kabul caught fire and as a result, three people were killed and 42 others sustained burn injuries. More than 50 people who lost their residences and shops in the blaze protested today at the Abdul Haq Square in Kabul and blocked the road for traffic for several hours.
Naqibullah, one of the protestors, who lost his home in the incident, told Pajhwok Afghan News that the apartment caught fire due to recklessness of Ahmad Yar fuel station workers.
He said the fuel station should be closed and those whose properties were gutted in the fire should be compensated.
Mohammad Fazl, another protestor who lives in Kabul Tower area, said he lost all his belongings in the fire. “All my belongings were destroyed in the incident, I currently live in a mosque in Macro Ryan area, the government should help us.”
He said they would continue their protest if their demands were ignored.
The protestors asked the government to address their problem and allocate the building of Ahmad Yar near Kabul Tower as their temporary residence.
After the incident, the Ministry of Interior (MoI) tasked a team with investigating the cause of the fire. However, no result of the probe has so far been revealed despite the passage of one week.
On the other hand, owner of the Kabul Tower blocks and a number of eyewitnesses and residents of the building told Pajhwok that the fire first erupted in Ahmad Yar fuel station and then spread to the Kabul Tower.
Haji Zirak, owner of Kabul Tower residential blocks, said the fire erupted when one of the gas tanks of Ahmad Yar fuel station was being evacuated.
He said that 90 percent of his apartment had been torched and he suffered $20 million loss.
However, a person who introduced himself as owner of Ahmad Yar fuel station, said if the fire had started from a gas tanker, it would have torched all other tanks at the station. He said the fire had erupted somewhere else. He said the fire first started at Barg Hotel located in the same area. (Pajhwok)
