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Major fire breaks out at shopping mall in Kazakhstan’s Almaty

ASTANA, November 17, /ITAR-TASS/. A major fire has broken out at the shopping mall Kulager on an area of more than 3,000 square metres on the outskirts of the city of Almaty, the largest Kazakh city in the south of the country, on Sunday. As many as 245 people and 41 units of special machinery, including a helicopter Ka-32, were involved in the fire-fighting efforts, the republican Ministry of Emergency Situations reported on Sunday.

“The fire is localized now. According to preliminary reports, no casualties were reported in the fire,” the ministry said.

The Almaty emergency situation department has formed the group of detectives to investigate the reasons for the fire, the ministry said in its press release.

Meanwhile, the ministry noted that, according to the results of the inquiry, which was conducted on October 11, 2013, 13 fire safety violations were exposed at this shopping mall. Meanwhile, the city emergency situation department seeks in the court to suspend the shopping mall Kulager for full elimination of the violations. The lawsuit is being tried.

This is already not the first major fire at the Almaty shopping centre. Another major fire on an area of more than 5,000 square metres broke out at a shopping centre in September in the city.

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