11 children killed in school fire outbreak in Uganda

Eleven children were killed Tuesday in a school fire outbreak in the central Ugandan district of Mukono, police said, reported Xinhua.

A police statement issued here said the tragic incident occurred at Salama School of the Blind at about 1 a.m. local time.

"The cause of the fire is currently unknown but so far 11 deaths as a result of the fire have been confirmed while six are in critical conditions and admitted at Herona Hospital in Kisoga," the statement said.

School fires are common in Ugandan schools. The last fire was in January when four children died in a fire outbreak in a school in Kampala, Uganda's capital. In 2018, at least nine students were killed in a fire that broke out at a high school in central Uganda. Before the 2018 incident, another fatal school fire happened in 2008, killing 19 pupils at Budo Junior School in the Wakiso district in the central region.