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Bangladesh Factory Collapse Death Toll Crosses 1,000

The death toll in last month's collapse in Bangladesh of an eight-story building that housed garment factories has surpassed 1,000.

Officials said 1,021 bodies had been pulled from the rubble, according to The Associated Press. It's unclear what the final toll will be from the April 24 disaster outside the capital, Dhaka; more than 2,500 people have been rescued since the collapse.

As NPR's Scott Neuman wrote Wednesday, "The April 24 collapse of Rana Plaza, where apparel was made for several Western retailers, has sparked an international outcry over substandard working conditions in Bangladesh, where workers have some of the lowest wages in the world and the garment industry is largely unregulated."

The collapse was blamed on poor construction and safety regulations that were flouted.

But some of the strongest opposition to laws being enforced to prevent such tragedies come, as NPR's Jim Zarroli reported, from the country's powerful garment sector.

Several people have been arrested since the building's collapse, including the man who owned it.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Krishnadev Calamur is NPR's deputy Washington editor. In this role, he helps oversee planning of the Washington desk's news coverage. He also edits NPR's Supreme Court coverage. Previously, Calamur was an editor and staff writer at The Atlantic. This is his second stint at NPR, having previously worked on NPR's website from 2008-15. Calamur received an M.A. in journalism from the University of Missouri.

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