14 September 2022

Jordanian officials rescue infant from collapsed building

14 September 2022

Jordanian teams have rescued an infant and are working to save others from the rubble of a collapsed building, as officials say they had arrested three people in connection to the disaster.

State media said at least eight people were killed and others remained missing on Wednesday, a day after the four-story building collapsed in the Jordanian capital, Amman.

Authorities said another 10 people were injured.

It remained unclear what caused Tuesday’s collapse.

The country’s Prime Minister has ordered an investigation.

Jordanian Civil Defence rescue teams conduct a search operation (Raad Adayleh/AP) (AP)

Amman’s public prosecutor, Hassan Al-Abdallat, told the official Petra News Agency that three people have been charged with multiple counts of causing death and harm.

He said his office will form a technical committee to determine the cause of the collapse and identify those responsible.

State media identified the suspects as one of the building’s owners, its maintenance contractor and its maintenance technician.

Rescue crews, meanwhile, continue to dig through the ruins in hopes of finding survivors.

The Petra agency said an infant had been rescued and evacuated.

Jordanian teams on Wednesday rescued one person alive and worked to save others from the rubble of the collapsed building, officials said (Raad Adayleh/AP) (AP)

Brigadier General Hatem Jaber, director of the civil defence department, said rescuers are working on the assumption that everyone trapped inside is still alive.

“We work with cautious optimism,” he said.

The building is in Jabal al-Weibdeh, an older district of the Jordanian capital which is popular among wealthier residents and expatriates but also includes some poorer areas.

Jordan is a close Western ally that has long been seen as a bastion of stability in the volatile Middle East.

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