Arson at karaoke bar in Vietnam’s Hanoi kills 11, police say

Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security says suspected perpetrator confessed to starting blaze after dispute with staff.

A suspected arson attack at a cafe and karaoke bar in Vietnam’s Hanoi has killed 11 people and injured two others, police have said.

Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security said on Thursday that it had arrested a man who confessed to starting the blaze on the ground floor of the building following a dispute with staff.

Rescue workers who rushed to the scene brought seven people out of the building alive, two of whom were rushed to hospital, police said.

Footage that circulated on social media showed a multistorey building engulfed in flames as firefighters worked at the scene while surrounded by a crowd of onlookers.

“At that time, we saw many people screaming for help but could not approach because the fire spread very quickly, and even with a ladder, we could not climb up,” the Lao Dong newspaper quoted a witness as saying.

The Tien Phong newspaper quoted a witness as saying there was a strong smell of petrol at the scene.

“Everyone shouted for those inside to run outside, but no one called for help,” the witness said.

CCTV footage published by the VnExpress news site appeared to show a man carrying a bucket towards the cafe seconds before the blaze began shortly after 11pm (16:00 GMT) on Wednesday.

Fires are a common hazard in Vietnam’s tightly packed urban centres.

Between 2017 and 2022, 433 people were killed in some 17,000 house fires in the country, most of them in urban areas, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

In September last year, 56 people, including four children, were killed and dozens injured in a fire at an apartment block in Hanoi.

This October, a court in southern Binh Duong province jailed six people, including four police officers, over safety lapses related to a fire at a karaoke complex that killed 32 people in 2022.