In Iraq, thirty people have been killed and many more injured in fire in a five-story hotel in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah in northern Iraq. According to Iraqi national news agency three Americans and four women and four children are among the dead in the incident. The police chief Brig. Gen. Najim-al-Din Qadir said the dead also included people from Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Canada, Ecuador, Venezuela and China, with some working for foreign oil companies. He said that the fire began last night in the Soma Hotel and was sparked by an electrical short. A number of foreign oil companies operate in the oil rich Kurdish areas in northern Iraq.