“She was a wonderful woman, always thinking of her children and how to treat and educate them well,” Abdulhafız Muhammed Emin said, sobbing during a phone interview.
“My heart is really broken, I cannot bear it.”
Xinjiang has been under harsh lockdowns for more than three months to combat the spread of the coronavirus under China’s zero-Covid policy. The country has grappled with a wave of cases in recent weeks, causing rolling lockdowns and rigid travel restrictions affecting hundreds of millions of people.
Videos circulated on social media showed an arc of water from a distant fire truck falling short of the fire, sparking waves of angry comments online. Some said fire engines had been blocked by pandemic control barriers or by cars stranded after their owners were put in quarantine, but the reason why the truck was far away was unclear.
Many Xinjiang residents are frustrated with China’s harsh Covid-19 controls. In September, some reported hunger amid spotty food deliveries.
Xinjiang “is an open-air prison”, Muhammed Emin said. “The Chinese government doesn’t care about their lives.”
Urumqi Mayor Memtimin Qadir apologised to the city’s residents during a press conference late Saturday and announced the formation of a government team to investigate the fire.
During the press conference, Urumqi authorities said fire escape doors were not locked and residents were permitted to go downstairs “for activities” since the community was designated as a “low Covid-19 risk area”.
“Some residents’ ability to rescue themselves was too weak ... and they failed to escape in time,” said Li Wensheng, head of the Urumqi City Fire Rescue department.
Muhammed Emin disputes that account, citing social media posts saying that many apartment residents were locked in their homes due to Covid-19 controls. Another post said residents were permitted downstairs for only a few hours a day, and were not free to come and go from the building. The Associated Press could not independently verify the claims in the social media posts.
Urumqi has not experienced a major recent outbreak, with just 977 cases, almost all of them asymptomatic. However, as in many parts of China, local officials fearful of losing their jobs are leaning towards more extreme measures to prevent outbreaks within their jurisdictions.
The tragedy comes days after 38 people died in a fire at an industrial trading company in central China caused by welding sparks that ignited cotton cloth.
Four people have been detained over the fire Monday in the city of Anyang and local authorities ordered sweeping safety inspections to root out potential dangers.
