MOSCOW: Ten people died overnight in an explosion and fire at a cafe in a market in Russia’s southern Orenburg region, local news agencies reported on Monday. Investigators suspected “premeditated murder through arson,” ITAR-TASS quoted Galina Maiorova, an aide to the regional prosecutor, as saying. “Currently all possible versions are being considered. Witnesses are being found and questioned,” she said.

Footage on state television showed law enforcement officials removing corpses in body bags from the “Yantarny” cafe, a blackened and badly damaged one-storey corrugated iron structure.

All 10 victims, apparently including the cafe’s owners, were found in one corner of the bar.

According to the independent Gazeta.ru news website the dead comprised five women and five men.

One theory being worked on is that the fire was started to cover up an earlier crime.

The state-run news channel Vesti quoted sources saying that one of the bodies bore a stab wound. Vesti also reported witnesses claiming to have heard what may have been gunshots.—AFP