Nairobi | A fire ravaged Tuesday morning the central prison of Gitega, an overcrowded prison in the capital of Burundi, raising fears of a high number of victims, we learned from witnesses and the police.
Witnesses told AFP that “huge flames” completely charred parts of the prison, which housed 1,539 prisoners (for 400 places) at the end of November, according to figures from the prison administration.
No official official responded to AFP’s requests on Tuesday morning.
The fire, of unknown origin, broke out around 4 a.m. (2 a.m. GMT) and was under control by late morning, witnesses said.
A detainee contacted by phone told AFP that prisoners had perished in the flames.
“We started screaming that we were going to be burned alive when we saw the flames rising very high, but the police refused to open the doors to our neighborhood, saying ‘these are the orders we have received’. I don’t know how I escaped from it, but there are prisoners who were burned to the ground, ”he said.
A witness told AFP that at least 20 wounded had been evacuated to hospital. The surroundings of the prison were blocked by a large deployment of soldiers and police. According to a police source, the emergency services were slow to get there. A fire truck arrived two hours after the start of the fire, said the source.
On August 21, a fire had affected an area of the central prison, without causing “human damage”, the Ministry of the Interior, Community Development and Public Security said on Twitter, specifying that the fire was due to “A short-circuit”.