Dozens of refugees missing after blaze

LONDON -- More than two dozen refugees remained missing Saturday after fires and rioting in Europe's largest asylum-seekers' detention center this past week, and police said some may have been killed in the chaos.

Bedfordshire Police said the latest figures suggested that as many as 25 people remained unaccounted for after Thursday night's apparent attempted mass breakout at the Yarl's Wood complex. The destruction of the records office complicated the police search.

"We are hoping they will all be traced and found safe, but there is a possibility they may not have escaped and obviously we cannot rule out that they could have died," a police spokeswoman said.

Police have recaptured 15 refugees who escaped the center during the unrest and fire, which reduced half the newly built complex 50 miles north of London to smoldering ruins.

Police and immigration officials were continuing to investigate the series of fires, which were estimated to have caused $50 million in damage.

The first fire began shortly after 8 p.m. Thursday in the reception area, the Fire Service said. Firefighters contained it, but several others soon began in the same wing and then spread to an accommodation block.

Staff at the center said detainees then snatched keys from two security workers and used them to open gates leading out of the compound.

John Bates, of Group 4, said almost all the center's several hundred CCTV cameras were smashed and he had also heard reports that detainees stormed the high-tech control room to destroy equipment and records.

Ed Blissett of the GMB union, which represents 170 workers at the center, said inmates had locked four nurses in a room during the fires.

Six people, including two police officers, were injured.

No sprinklers installed

Immigration Minister Lord Rooker, who inspected the devastation Friday, said it seemed extraordinary that no water sprinklers were installed at the complex, despite recommendations by fire officials to do so more than a year ago.

Blissett said the GMB had repeatedly raised concerns with the Home Office about problems at the site.