35 bodies identified as authorities issue arrest warrants for four people over blaze
A fire tore through a nightclub in North Macedonia early Sunday, killing 59 people, apparently after on-stage fireworks set the place ablaze, authorities said, announcing arrest warrants for four people.
They said 155 injured people had been taken to hospitals across the country, 18 of them in critical condition. Some of the serious cases were to be taken to other European countries for treatment.
The blaze started in the Club Pulse in the eastern town of Kocani around 3am, as the place was packed with more than 1,000 mostly young fans attending a concert by a a popular hip-hop duo called DNK.
“Initially we didn’t believe there was a fire. Then there was huge panic in the crowd and a stampede to get out,” one young woman who was at the concert told local media outside a hospital in the capital Skopje.
Fire crews and paramedics responded quickly and “tried to resuscitate people […] but it wasn’t enough”, said the woman, who was waiting outside for one her friends, who was being treated for burns to his hand.
Friends and relatives of the victims gather in front of a hospital following a fire in a nightclub which killed 51 people in Kocani, a town some 100 kilometres east of the capital Skopje, on March 16, 2025 — AFPFriends and relatives of the victims gather in front of a hospital following a fire in a nightclub which killed 51 people in Kocani, a town some 100 kilometres east of the capital Skopje, on March 16, 2025 — AFP
The fire was probably caused by the use of pyrotechnic devices “used for light effects at the concert”, said Interior Minister Pance Toskovski, who visited the scene with Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski.
“Sparks caught the ceiling, which was made of easily flammable material, after which the fire rapidly spread across the whole discotheque, creating thick smoke,” Toskovski said.
The interior ministry announced that arrest warrants had been issued for four people in relation to the tragedy, and a criminal investigation opened. They did not immediately give further details about those targeted by the warrants.
“According to the information that we have, there are 59 persons deceased of which 35 are identified. Of the identified, 31 persons are from Kocani and four from Stip,” Toskovski said.
“The number of wounded, according to latest information up to noon (1100 GMT), is 155 persons who are in hospitals across the country,” Toskovski said.
