Smoke rises after a fire broke out at Wang Fuk Court, a residential estate in the Tai Po district of Hong Kong's New Territories, Nov. 26 2025. AP-Yonhap
HONG KONG — Hong Kong filed manslaughter charges against several people and companies on Wednesday over the world's deadliest residential building fire in decades, which killed 168 people at a public housing estate last year.
The massive blaze, which engulfed seven of the eight high-rise apartment blocks at the Wang Fuk Court estate in November, prompted a months-long investigation into the cause.
Public hearings were told that almost all life-saving fire safety measures had failed on the day of the blaze because of human errors.
The directors of the construction contractor and the consultant firm involved in Wang Fuk Court's renovation at the time of the fire, as well as an inspector, were accused of manslaughter along with their companies, according to charge sheets seen by AFP.
