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Hotel fire, mine blast kill 22 in China

SHANGHAI: A fire at a hotel in central China has killed 12 people and left 18 others hospitalised with injuries, a state newspaper said on Tuesday.

The fire broke out on Sunday evening in a third-floor beauty parlor at the Golden Spring Hotel in Xiangtan, a city in Hunan province, and spread through the three floors above, the Liberation Daily newspaper said.

China has suffered a series of disastrous fires in hotels, shopping malls and other public buildings blamed on poor safety standards, faulty wiring or negligence.

It took 800 firefighters with 20 trucks in Xiangtan more than an hour to put out the blaze, the newspaper said. Four of those hospitalised were public-security personnel.

The exact cause of the fire is under investigation, the report said.

Xiangtan is a city of 300,000 people about 750 miles southwest of Shanghai.

Moreover, an explosion 110 metres below ground at a coal mine killed 10 people in eastern China, a state newspaper said on Monday.

The cause of the explosion Saturday evening at the mine in Laiwu, a city in Shandong province, is under investigation, the People's Daily newspaper said.