The death toll from Sunday’s huge explosions in Equatorial Guinea’s biggest city Bata has increased from 17 to 20, APA has reliably learnt on Monday.
Some 600 people have been reported injured in the blasts which ripped through a military barracks in the Bata neighbourhood of Mondong Nkuantoma at 4 pm local time on Sunday apparently caused by dynamites.
Speaking on national television, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema blamed the apparent accident on negligence.
Whole neighbourhoods have been completely flattened by the explosions leaving terrified survivors fleeing for their lives.
The country’s Foreign Affairs minister Simen Oyono Esono Angue has held a meeting with diplomats to request for humanitarian aid for the victims.
The Health ministry has also put out a statement requesting for blood donors to help treat the injured.
Huge plumes of smokes have been issuing from the site since the incident with firefighters struggling to smother several huge blazes resulting from the explosions.
Oil-rich Equatorial Guinea has a population of 1.3 million people.
WN/as/APA