Inmates escaped in Honduras prison fire: president

TEGUCIGALPA: Honduran President Porfirio Lobo acknowledged Friday that some inmates caught up in the horrific prison fire this week had escaped, without saying how many prisoners had fled the scene.

Besides those killed in the blaze, "other (inmates) fled, but they will be caught," Lobo told reporters at a press conference, three days after the fire swept through the overcrowded Comayagua jail.

The cause of the inferno, which left 356 dead this week, was still being investigated.

It has emerged since the disaster that around 60 percent of prisoners in Comayagua had not yet been sentenced.

Prison authorities have said it was holding 852 prisoners when the fire started, and that 356 died and remaining 496 were alive.

Only 15 bodies had been identified Friday, when a few burials began.

It was unclear if inmates who allegedly escaped where counted as those who survived, or whether the total number of inmates at the prison was originally larger than first thought. (AFP)