PARIS, Sept 5: Three teenage girls have confessed to starting a fire in a Paris apartment block which killed 16 people over the weekend, police said on Monday. It was the capital’s third major fire in nine days. The girls — one aged 16 and the others 18 — were held for questioning on Sunday and admitted setting light to letter-boxes in the hall of the 18-storey high-rise in the working-class suburb of L’Hay-les-Roses near Orly airport, police said.

“They said they did it for fun. They didn’t mean to kill but things got out of control,” a police officer said. Two of the girls live in the high-rise, which contains some 110 apartments. A fourth girl was also being held for questioning.—AFP