China

Three receive death penalty over deadly hotel fire in NE China

A court in northeast China on Saturday sentenced three people to death for setting fire to a bar which spread to a budget hotel on the upper floors, leaving 11 dead and two others severely injured.

The Intermediate People's Court in Tonghua city, Jilin province, convicted five prime suspects of arson, sentencing three of them to death. They were accused of setting fire to a basement bar in the wee hours of May 1 this year to retaliate the bar's owner who they had disputes with, the court found.

Eleven people, including hotel tenants and firemen who came to rescue, were killed as the fire spread to a Karaoke bar and later the guestrooms of budget hotel chain Home Inns. The fire also caused about 1.8 million yuan (283,464 U.S. dollars) in economic losses.