{"id":6102,"date":"2026-08-30T10:41:39","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T10:41:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/?p=6102"},"modified":"2026-08-30T10:41:40","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T10:41:40","slug":"pakistan-suspends-eight-officials-after-deadly-infant-ward-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/?p=6102","title":{"rendered":"Pakistan Suspends Eight Officials After Deadly Infant Ward Fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pakistan’s prime minister said eight officials were suspended and called for criminal proceedings against them, after 14 infants were killed in a fire in the maternity ward of a hospital<\/a> in the country’s capital<\/p>\n

A preliminary report conducted by a four-person committee formed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif found the deadly blaze had engulfed the unit “within approximately two minutes” just after 6:30am (0130 GMT) on Wednesday, with a nurse only able to save one of the 15 infants in the hospital’s care<\/p>\n

Among those suspended were hospital staff including its executive director and the head of the neonatal department, as well as the director-general of Islamabad’s emergency services<\/p>\n

Sharif said late Saturday “those responsible for criminal negligence do not deserve any concession” and that they will be “brought to justice”<\/p>\n

He also approved taking action against the company responsible for the hospital’s security, without naming them<\/p>\n

Emergency services were called within six minutes of the fire breaking out, with the first rescue services arriving at the scene 15 minutes later, the report said<\/p>\n

Parents and other witnesses told AFP the response had been slow and guards had reportedly prevented people from leaving the building<\/p>\n

The hospital did not have detailed operating procedures or fire and emergency training, according to the preliminary report<\/p>\n

Two nurses, a woman security guard and another officer were in the ward when the fire started, but there were no supervising staff, the report stated<\/p>\n

Earlier Health<\/a> Minister Mustafa Kamal said that a spark from an air conditioner is believed to have caused the fire. The report clarified an ignition<\/p>\n

Health Secretary Aslam Ghori, the country’s top civil servant for the department, was sacked on Wednesday following the devastating incident<\/p>\n

Fires in large buildings are frequent in Pakistan, often due to poor<\/a> safety laws and building codes as well as lax enforcement<\/p>\n

In January, more than 65 people were killed in a shopping center fire in the port city of Karachi<\/p>\n

At least 11 people were killed in another shopping mall fire in Karachi in 2023<\/p>\n

In 2012, at least 250 laborers died at a garment factory in Karachi<\/p>\n

“);
\n googletag.cmd.push(function() { onDvtagReady(function () { googletag.display(‘div-gpt-ad-3341368-4’); }); });
\n }<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pakistan’s prime minister said eight officials were suspended and called for criminal proceedings against them, after 14 infants were killed in a fire in the maternity ward of a hospital in the country’s capital<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6104,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[714,1333,277,762,1332],"class_list":["post-6102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-parenting","tag-after","tag-eight","tag-officials","tag-pakistan","tag-suspends"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6102"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6102\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6103,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6102\/revisions\/6103"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lumeamara.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}