Bangladesh police charge 13 over deadly garment factory fire

The police in Bangladesh have laid the first charges over the nation’s deadliest-ever garment factory fire thirteen months ago.

Police charged the owners, along with security guards and managers, over the blaze that killed more than 111 people in November 2012.

“Delwar Hossain and his wife Mahmuda Akter … and 11 others have been charged with death due to negligence,” media outlets quoted Mohsinuzzaman Khan, the police investigator in the case, as saying.

At a hearing on December 31, a magistrate court and prosecutors will decide whether to proceed with the trial and issue arrest warrants. All 13 could face life in prison if convicted.

The country’s huge garment trade has been under the spotlight over a series of deadly incidents.

In April 2013, the Bangladeshi industry suffered a far worse tragedy when the Rana Plaza garment factory complex collapsed in Dhaka’s outskirts, killing more than 1100 people in the world’s worst industrial disaster.

A probe into the incident revealed that the building was poorly constructed and the hired engineers and factory owners had allegedly instructed the workers to continue working despite having knowledge of cracks in the building.

This is while the factory workers have been staging rallies demanding higher wages and better working conditions for several months in industrial districts. Over the past few months, police in Bangladesh have heavily cracked down on garment factory workers .

A Bangladeshi garment worker takes home less than USD 40 a month, a wage that has been condemned as akin to slave labor.