The Vietnamese courts today sentenced six defendants, including four police officers, to up to eight years in prison for the fire that killed 32 people at a karaoke parlor in September.
A court in southern Vietnam, where the tragedy occurred, found the owner of the nightclub, a contractor who participated in its construction and four police officers guilty of violating fire regulations and negligence.
The judge in Binh Duong province sentenced the bar owner to eight years in prison and the contractor to five years in prison, while the police officers were sentenced to between four and seven and a half years in prison, the official news portal Vietnam+ reported.
The fire occurred on the night of September 6, 2022, in a three-story karaoke bar in the city of Thuan An, located about 20 kilometers north of Ho Chi Minh City.
The exits of the establishment, which had 30 rooms and a built area of more than 1,500 square meters, were closed when the fire started, causing panic among many customers and employees.
There were around 70 people inside the premises at the time of the fire, some of whom jumped from balconies and windows from a height of eight meters.
The incident shocked the country and prompted the government to launch a campaign to review tens of thousands of similar establishments, leading to the closure of around 15,000 karaoke establishments.
In recent years, Vietnam has been the scene of several deadly fires, raising suspicions that basic safety rules are not being respected.
In September 2023, another fire in a ten-storey residential building, also located in a narrow alley in a residential area of Hanoi, left 56 people dead and 37 injured.
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