Diyarbakir: The death toll from the raging fire in southeast Turkey’s Kurdish southeast last week has risen to 15, hospital sources said Monday, suggesting experts may have miswired it.
A fire between the cities of Diyarbakir and Mardin on Thursday left 12 people dead and five others fighting for their lives.
The state news agency Anadolu said on Sunday that three people were seriously injured.
Hospital sources said two people were in intensive care on Monday.
Hundreds of animals were also killed in the wildfires, which raged across the arid landscape.
The government cited “burning straw” as the cause, but the Diyarbakir branch of the Turkish Chamber of Architects and Engineers (TMMOB) identified the fault and suggested it was caused by faulty electrical wiring.
“The fire may have been caused by power cables,” he said in a report issued late on Sunday, saying there was “no electricity” in the area and the power grid was in poor condition.
“The cause of the fire was not straw. The electric cables and poles were uncontrolled and dangerous,” he said, adding that there were “no fire prevention measures around the poles.”
It also accused DEDAS, the private electricity distributor responsible for maintaining the power lines in the area, “replacing and repairing poles the day after the fire, thereby hiding the evidence”.
