JEDDAH: The Civil Defense has said it is treating a fire at a girls' secondary school in Al-Jami'a on Tuesday as arson. Police have taken up the investigation. The Civil Defense chief in Jeddah said that initial investigations uncovered no evidence pointing to a deliberate fire, but that upon inspection the air-conditioning unit in the classroom where the blaze broke out was found to have been stuffed with piles of paper. He said it was the third such incident at the school. The fire, described as “limited and minor”, started before the beginning of the school day. Only two days earlier, firefighters were called to a blaze at another girls' school in Jeddah believed to have been caused by short circuits in two air-conditioning units.
