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Mourners pay respects to firefighters killed in warehouse blaze

Thousands of people gathered at the Minsk city office of the emergency management ministry on Thursday to pay their last respects to the four firefighters killed in a warehouse blaze on May 11, BelaPAN reports.

The mourners filed past the bodies as they lay in state.

Flags were flown at half mast and had black ribbons attached near the office.

Those killed are Vadzim Lesik, 32; Dzmitry Lowdar, 34; Andrey Mukhin, 40; and Yury Sysoy, 31. Four more firefighters were hospitalized with various injuries.

All of the firefighters were injured as the roof of the burning warehouse, which is rented out by the Minsk Computing Equipment Plant, collapsed, burying them under the debris.

Investigators said that the blaze was most likely to have been caused by welding work at the plant's workshop next to the warehouse.