MOSCOW (AP) -- Five people were killed and two were unaccounted for after a fire raced through a paint factory in central Russia, the Emergency Situations Ministry said Friday.
Viktor Beltsov, the ministry spokesman in Moscow, said that rescue officials had reduced the number of dead from six to five early Friday morning. Fourteen people were hospitalized, eight of them with burns.
The blaze broke out Thursday in a paint workshop rented from a privately-owned factory in the town of Yoshkar-Ola, the capital of the Mari-El region. It consumed about 1,000 square meters (1.200 square yards).
Vladimir Nasonov, a regional fire official, told Rossiya state television that the workshop had operated without permission from fire safety officials.
Beltsov said that 35 people had been in the workshop when the fire broke out.
According to a preliminary investigation, the fire was sparked by a paint mixture explosion, Beltsov said.
