Lahore - Ten women and three children were killed and dozens of others trapped under rubble when a factory collapsed in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Monday, officials said.
The three-storey building used to manufacture veterinary medicines came crashing down, probably the result of a boiler and a gas cylinder explosion at the premises in the congested Multan Road area, police said.
Rescue workers dug through the rubble with their bare hands, desperate to answer trembling cries for help from people trapped beneath concrete slabs as sobbing relatives urged rescuers to do everything possible to recover their loved ones.
Police said the Orient Labs (Private) Limited factory was illegal as it was not properly registered, and they were hunting down its three partners.
The accident at the 25-year-old factory is likely to highlight poor safety procedures among Pakistani manufacturers and, with young boys among the dead, the use of child labour.
“The death toll has risen to 13 and we have pulled out 13 people alive from under the rubble. We hope to find more alive people overnight and the rescue operation is in progress,” an emergency services official told journalists.
Senior police official Shoaib Khurram earlier said nine people were confirmed dead and 16 others wounded, as rescue workers turned on flood lights to carry on the recovery operation after dusk.
Amid chants of “Allahu akbar” (God is greater) rescue workers recovered a 10-year old boy alive.
“We peeped through a hole drilled in one of the concrete slabs and saw a boy. He talked to us, we pulled him out,” rescue worker Mohammad Asif told reporters.
“He had no serious injuries but he fainted in shock after seeing the scene.”
Officials identified the dead as 10 women and three boys, aged 12, 14 and 16.
An AFP correspondent saw rescue workers carry out one of the dead children and put his body into an ambulance to be driven to hospital.
“The search will continue throughout the night. We have to be very careful, it is the question of human lives,” said police official Ghulam Mehmood Dogar.
It was unclear how many victims remained trapped, but different officials earlier estimated between 35 and 50 people had been buried under the rubble. Most were believed to be women and children, who were hired to package the medicines.
Mohammad Akram, 50, said he ran to the site shortly after 8am (03h00 GMT), desperately worried about his 10-year-old son, Asad, a packer.
“I came here rushing and weeping but luckily my son has been rescued. He is injured and alive. But my 12-year old nephew is still missing.”
The main working hours were 8am to 5pm, but employees were quite often required to work late into the night as well, Akram said.
The rescue effort was hampered by narrow lanes and it took time for heavy cranes and excavators to reach the area.
“It's a big disaster. It is too early to say when we'll finish. We want to recover alive as many people as possible,” said rescue worker Ahmed Raza.
Workers and volunteers used everything they could - hammers, axes, chisels and shovels - to shift the rubble and pull out the injured, coated in dust, as relatives stood by, sobbing, and a crowd of residents gathered to watch.
The street was littered with books, files, pamphlets, receipts and sale vouchers. A twisted signboard near the collapsed building offered jobs for women workers at the factory.
“Hard-working women are invited for jobs of packing up medicines,” it read.
A small group of about 15 to 20 workers protested at the site, carrying the red flags of Pakistan's Labour Party and shouting: “Who is accountable for the (deaths) of these innocent workers? We want an answer.”
Eight million people live in Lahore, 250km southeast of the capital Islamabad. It is considered Pakistan's cultural capital and perhaps the most liberal city in the conservative Muslim country.
- Sapa-AFP-IOL
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