Safety risks in 3 more bldgs identified

Engineers appointed by ILO have identified safety risks in three more buildings that accommodate apparel factories and requested the official review panel to take necessary measures, officials said.
The units are Fashion Export International at Chittagong, Eraf Composite at Fatullah and Mujib Fashion at Siddhirganj, they added.
Syed Ahmed, Inspector-General of the Department of Inspection of Factories and Establishments (DIFE), also head of the panel, confirmed having received a list of three factories from the engineers.
The DIFE will review their findings shortly, he added.
In January last, International Labour Organisaiton (ILO) hired two companies -- TUV-SUD Bangladesh Pvt Ltd and Veritas Engineering and Consultant-to assess garment factories that remained outside the purview of western retailers' assessment programmes.
The two companies were entrusted with the task replacing Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) because the latter failed to show progress in time, they added.
Since November 2013, the BUET engineers have already inspected a total of 500 garment factories. They referred two factory names to the official panel. But a factory authority shut their units accordingly due to safety concern.
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