Rescue teams were in the final stages of clearing the wreckage of a five-storey building that collapsed in Pakistan’s megacity of Karachi, killing 27 people, officials said on Sunday.
Residents reported hearing cracking sounds shortly before the apartment block crumbled around 10 am on Friday in Karachi’s impoverished Lyari neighbourhood, which was once plagued by gang violence and considered one of the most dangerous areas in Pakistan.
“Most of the debris has been removed,” Hassaan Khan, a spokesman for the government rescue service 1122, told AFP, adding that the death toll stood at 27 on Sunday morning.
He expected the operation to finish by the afternoon.
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Authorities said the building had been declared unsafe and eviction notices were sent to occupants between 2022 and 2024, but landlords and some residents told AFP they had not received them.
“My daughter is under the rubble,” 54-year-old Dev Raj told AFP at the scene on Saturday.
“She was my beloved daughter. She was so sensitive, but she is under the burden of debris. She got married just six months ago,” he said.
Roof and building collapses are common across Pakistan, mainly because of poor safety standards and shoddy construction materials in the South Asian country of more than 240 million people.
But Karachi, home to more than 20 million, is especially notorious for poor construction, illegal extensions, ageing infrastructure, overcrowding, and lax enforcement of building regulations.
AFP
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