France's Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, centre, flanked by France's Minister for Interior and Overseas Gerald Darmanin, second from right, Mayor of Nice Christian Estrosi, third from right, and Nice's First Deputy Mayor Anthony Borre, right, arrive on the site of a fire that broke out overnight at a residential building of a working-class neighbourhood in Nice, southern France, on July 18.VALERY HACHE/Getty Images
Seven people, including three children and their mother, died early on Thursday in what authorities suspect was arson that devastated a crowded seventh-floor apartment in a building in Nice, the largest city on the French Riviera.
Acting Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, who travelled to the area, told reporters the investigation was making progress and that a search was on for three individuals.
He did not provide further details.
The fire started around 3 a.m. local time and spread so quickly through the apartment that only the people who were close to the windows could be saved, Hugues Moutouh, the local representative of the Interior Ministry, told TV station BFM.
The fire killed one man, a teenager, two women and three children, he said. One of the victims jumped through the window tied to a mattress, he added.
“The family’s mother went to take her children to safety beside the window and then went back into the blaze to get her three little ones and never came back,” he told reporters.
The city’s prosecutor, Damien Martinelli, has opened an investigation into a possible voluntary and criminally motivated fire.
“I will have to give more elements on the investigation later but we are starting with an arson,” he said.
The city’s mayor, Christian Estrosi, said people wearing balaclavas were spotted by closed-circuit television footage in the area.
The building is located in the Moulins neighbourhood, an area of rundown social-housing towers, similar to many “banlieues” in France.