DHAKA, Feb 25: A six-storey building housing shops and offices collapsed in the Bangladeshi capital on Saturday with about 100 workers inside, killing at least 18 people and burying dozens of surrounding shanty homes, officials and witnesses said.

Rescue workers pulled 13 bodies from the rubble of the building in Dhaka’s central Tejgaon industrial district, Brig-Gen Nizam Ahmed, who was overseeing the operation, told The Associated Press. Another five died on the way to hospital, Ahmed said.

Local residents said that most of those injured or killed appeared to be construction workers who were adding a new storey to the building, which was being converted into a 500-bed medical centre. Witnesses said passing pedestrians were also among the victims, which included dozens of injured who were taken to hospital.

More than two dozen tin-roofed, one-room shanty homes were also buried by the building as it collapsed.

Rescuers feared a dozen slum dwellers, mainly family members of day labourers who were working elsewhere at the time, were trapped inside.

Soldiers and fire fighters used bulldozers, hammers and crowbars to clear and sift through the rubble of the building looking for survivors or bodies.

“We are working very carefully so no trapped survivor is hurt,” Ahmed said.

The owner of the building was not available for comment.—AP