Twenty-three South Korean kindergarten children died in a fire yesterday at a dormitory near the west coast city of Hwasung, authorities said.
"We have found the bodies of 23 kindergarten children. The search is almost completed and it is unlikely we will find any more dead," a Hwasung spokesman said. Two children and an adult were hurt, but their injuries were not life-threatening.
President Kim Dae-jung expressed his sorrow and ordered the government to step up safety measures on public facilities, especially those frequently used by children.
Hundreds of kindergarten and elementary school children were staying in the three-storey dormitory at the Sea Land summer camp in Hwasung, about 100 km south-west of Seoul, when the blaze broke out at about 1.40 a.m. (local time), the spokesman said.
He said 454 people were in the building. The fire broke out on the second floor of the dormitory and quickly spread to the third floor, a police spokesman said.
"The damage seems to have increased because the building partially collapsed as a result of the fire," he said.
Survivors described the despair of trying to rescue children as flames engulfed the largely wooden structure.
A teacher said: "The rooms were filled with smoke. I rescued some children. Children were stuck in their rooms, sitting on the floor, crying and calling out `teacher'. I could not enter some of the rooms because of the heat and thick smoke."
Many family members, wailing and screaming, crowded into a nearby coffee shop to await news of their children after riot police prevented them from reaching the fire site, accessible by a mostly single-lane, dirt road.
The cause of the blaze was still under investigation, but initial speculation by fire-fighters was that a faulty electrical system had sparked the fire, the spokesman said.
The bodies were taken to the National Institute of Scientific Investigation, where senior researcher, Dr Lee Wan-tae, said identification would take about two months.
"The bodies were badly damaged. It is going to be a difficult process, and we ask for the full co-operation from the families of the deceased," Dr Lee said.
Twenty-six fire brigades and eight ambulances, many from neighbouring towns, responded to the fire.