State television Sunday aired video apparently showing that calm had been restored at the facility. The judiciary said the four died of smoke inhalation and that four of the injured were in critical condition. Authorities said the prisoners killed had been convicted of robberies.
The fire erupted Saturday amid ongoing protests, now in their fifth week, sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman arrested by the country’s morality police for failing to properly cover her hair with a hijab.
State media reported that the blaze was extinguished after several hours and no detainees escaped.
The video broadcast by state TV in the fire’s aftermath showed scorched walls and ceilings in a room it said was the upper floor of a sewing workshop at the prison.
“This fire was caused by a fight between some prisoners” in the sewing workshop, said Tehran Gov. Mohsen Mansouri. “The workshop was set up to create jobs” for prisoners, he said.
Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency, citing one senior security official, had reported Saturday that inmates in one ward fought with prison personnel. The official said prisoners set fire to a warehouse full of prison uniforms.
Later, Tehran prosecutor Ali Salehi said that the unrest was not related to the protests which have swept the country following Amini’s death.
Some information in this report came from Reuters and The Associated Press.
Voice of America
