A massive fire tore through a newly opened shopping mall in the city of Kut, southeast of Baghdad, on Wednesday night, leaving at least 60 people dead and dozens more missing, according to Iraqi authorities.
The blaze broke out at the Corniche hypermarket, located in the heart of the city, just seven days after it had opened its doors. Although the fire has since been brought under control, footage released by state media agency INA shows flames engulfing several floors of the building as firefighters battled the blaze.
“A tragedy and a calamity have struck us,” said regional governor Mohammed al-Miyahi, who announced that legal action would be taken against the mall’s owner. He also declared three days of official mourning and confirmed that an investigation into the cause of the fire is underway, with preliminary findings expected within two days.
In a statement cited by AFP, the Interior Ministry reported that 61 people had died, most of them from suffocation in the building’s restrooms. Fourteen of the recovered bodies were severely burned and have yet to be identified. Additionally, 45 people were rescued alive by emergency teams, who continued transporting the injured to hospitals in the city into the early hours of the morning.
Videos circulating on social media show people trapped on the roof during the fire, while other clips reveal the mall’s charred interior.
Entire families are among the victims. Nasir al-Quraishi, a 50-year-old doctor, told AFP he lost five relatives in the fire. “We went to the mall to have dinner and escape the power outages at home. An air conditioner exploded on the second floor and the fire spread quickly. We couldn’t get out.”
Another man, Ali Kadhim, 51, was frantically searching for his cousin, his wife, and their three children in local hospitals. “We don’t know what happened to them,” he said.
Moataz Karim, 45, identified the bodies of two relatives Thursday morning, one of whom had just started working at the mall three days earlier. “There was no fire suppression system,” he told AFP, while waiting for news about a third missing family member outside the forensic department.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani expressed his condolences to the victims’ families and called for an immediate investigation to determine the cause of the fire. He also urged the Interior Ministry to identify any safety failures and enforce strict measures to prevent similar incidents in the future.
The tragedy has reignited concerns about lax safety standards in Iraqi construction projects, which have long been plagued by mismanagement and corruption. In 2023, a fire at a Christian wedding in northern Iraq claimed over 100 lives, and in 2021, more than 90 people died in a hospital COVID-19 isolation ward fire in the city of Nasiriyah.
The Corniche hypermarket, which included a restaurant, had only been operating for a week. Today, it stands as a symbol of grief, negligence, and the urgent need for reform.
