A little more than 90 kilometers from Cali, in Colombia, the flames have devastated this Tuesday morning with a part of the Tuluá prison (Valle del Cauca). Due to the fire, the number of deceased already amounts to 51.
The director of the National Penitentiary and Prison Institute (Inpec), General Tito Castellanos, has specified on Caracol Radio that 49 of them have died inside the facilities and two have been transferred to medical centers.
According to the first versions, the fire started after one in the morning and, although the Tuluá firefighters have arrived quickly to control the fire, most of the victims have died from smoke inhalation.
General Castellanos explained that, supposedly, the tragedy began with a fight followed by a riot in which some prisoners set fire to mattresses, which has caused a fire that spread throughout much of the medium security prison.
The Tuluá prison houses 1,267 inmates and has an overcrowding of 17%. The president-elect, the leftist Gustavo Petro, has affirmed on social networks that "what happened in Tuluá forces a complete rethinking of prison policy in the face of the humanization of the prison and the dignity of the prisoner."
Petro has also expressed his condolences to the relatives of the dead prisoners and has added that "the Colombian State has looked at the prison as a space for revenge and not for rehabilitation."
The Colombian president, Iván Duque, who is on a working visit to Portugal, has also lamented the tragedy and has expressed his solidarity with the families of the victims.
Duque has said on his Twitter account that he is in contact with the director of Inpec and has given "instructions to carry out investigations that will clarify this terrible situation." These will be in charge of the Technical Investigation Corps (CTI), of the Prosecutor's Office.
