12 workers charged in mall fire case

Dubai police have charged 12 workers with negligence for causing a fire that gutted the Oasis Centre early on Friday morning.

The team of workers was conducting renovation work when the fire broke out in the shopping mall on Shaikh Zayed Road.

Police said they released an engineer working for the sub-contracting company involved in the renovation who had been detained.

The Civil Defence, meanwhile, said the shopping mall's fire alarm system which should have been connected to the fire station's operations room had been disconnected while the maintenance work was continuing.

"Experts are looking into the cause of the fire," said Mahmoud Hamad, Head of Information and Documentation at the Civil Defence.

The owners of the Oasis Centre yesterday estimated the loss from the fire at Dh300 million. The finance director of the Landmark Group, which owns the centre, said everything was destroyed except for the Tranquility Spa and the offices on the ground floor where the company's records were kept.

All 800 employees of the mall's shops have been relocated throughout the group's other outlets, he said.