Israeli rescuers say last missing body found in collapsed building

Israeli rescuers said Saturday the last missing body was found in a collapsed Tel Aviv construction site, five days after the accident, bringing the death toll to six.

A military notice said the soldiers with the Home Front Command have located the place of the body but were still trying to extract it from the rubbles of the four-story car park, which collapsed on Monday in a high-tech business quarter of Tel Aviv.

Earlier on Saturday, police spokeswoman Luba Samri said in a statement that two other bodies were extracted from the site of collapsed car garage overnight.

"The bodies were transferred to the national forensic institute to ascertain their identity," Samri said.

Israeli authorities have identified three bodies, so far: Ahed Rimawi, 34, from Beit Rima, a Palestinian village outside the West Bank city of Ramallah; Denis Dianchko, 28, a citizen of Ukraine; and Oleg Yakobov, 60, an Israeli citizen from Tel Aviv.

All of the victims were construction workers at the site, which was still under construction at the time of the accident.

Dozens of construction workers at the site were injured. The car park was supposed to become usable in two weeks, with about 600 parking slots.

The reasons for the collapse were unclear. The police have launched an investigation into the collapse.

The car park was constructed by Africa-Israel, a construction company based in Israel that won a tender to build to the site from the Tel Aviv municipality.

Israel has a high number of construction accidents, compared to other developed countries. According to figures from the Economy and Industry Ministry, 30 workers were killed in construction sites since the beginning of 2016.

Source : XINHUA