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Nine government officials died fighting a forest fire that occurred early Friday afternoon in Fuping County, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, fire fighters said Saturday.
The dead included the director of the county forestry administration and safety supervision administration, and the secretary of a town committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC).
A dozen others were injured, five of them in critical conditions, by 9 a.m. Saturday, the fire fighters said.
The fire broke out abruptly at around 1 p.m. Friday on a mountain, covered with shrubbery and withered grass, in Tangwan Village, one kilometer to the north of the county town of Fuping.
On hearing the fire alert, the county CPC committee and government immediately sent people from the county forestry administration, policemen and armed police to put out the fire.
Local people say strong wind aggravated the fire, which engulfed fire fighters, killing nine of them and injuring a dozen others. The injured are being treated at the central hospital of Hanzhong City.
Officials from the provincial government are also at the scene directing the fire-fighting efforts.
The fire is still spreading amid strong wind at press time and the cause of it is being investigated.
(Xinhua News Agency March 29, 2003)
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