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LAST THING THEY NEEDED

10,000 People Left Homeless After Fire Guts Dhaka, Bangladesh, Shantytown

A massive fire took just four hours to destroy thousands of makeshift huts in an overcrowded shantytown. Police do not believe anyone died in the blaze.

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Mohammad Ponir Hossain/Reuters

By Barbie Latza Nadeau

Police said Monday that more than 10,000 people were left homeless after a weekend fire gutted a shantytown in a slum district of Dhaka, Bangladesh. The blaze took just four hours to destroy more than 2,000 makeshift huts where more than 10,000 low paid workers from the city’s substantial garment district lived. Authorities say that only four people were injured and so far no one is known to have died because the majority of the residents were celebrating at a local Muslim festival for Eid al-Adha. “Otherwise, the damage would have been bigger,” Golam Rabbani, a local police chief told CNN.

Read it at CNN

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