London tower may have had illegal material

LONDON — The new exterior cladding used in a renovation on London’s Grenfell Tower may have been banned under U.K. building regulations, two British ministers said Sunday as police continued their criminal investigation into the inferno that killed at least 58 people.

Trade Minister Greg Hands said the government is carrying out an “urgent inspection” of the roughly 2,500 similar tower blocks across Britain to assess their safety, while an opposition lawmaker urged the government to quickly secure documents in the Grenfell renovation for the criminal probe.

Late Sunday, the Metropolitan Police released three photos from inside Grenfell Tower, which showed in close detail how the fire charred the 24-story building that once housed up to 600 people in 120 apartments.

Experts believe the building’s new exterior cladding, which contained insulation sandwiched between two panels, helped spread the flames quickly up the outside of the public housing tower early Wednesday. Cladding has helped fuel spectacular infernos in the Middle East, Europe, Asia and the United States, but some experts said they had never seen a building fire advance so quickly.

Mr. Hands cautioned that officials don’t yet have exact details about the renovation that ended just last year.

Soran Karimi, 31, who lives in the block opposite, said last week that the residential tower of social housing was refurbished last year only so it didn’t look out of place in one of the capital’s richest neighborhoods.

Before the fire, parts of the British population already were seething with anger at growing inequality in living standards.

Bombing at mall kills 3

BOGOTA, Colombia — A homemade bomb placed in a women’s bathroom rocked one of the busiest shopping centers in Colombia’s capital Saturday, killing three people, including a French woman, and wounding nine others.

Witnesses told of being evacuated from movie theaters and stores after the blast at the upscale Centro Andino in the heart of Bogota’s tourist district. Injured were taken to a hospital, where two later died.

Mayor Enrique Penalosa called it a “cowardly terrorist bombing,” and attention immediately focused on the National Liberation Army, which is the last rebel movement still active in Colombia. Leaders of the group, known as the ELN, denied involvement in the latest bombing.

FARC, one of the country’s largest rebel groups and which is in the process of disarming after signing a peace deal with the government last year, also denied its involvement.

Gunmen kill two in attack

DAKAR, Senegal — Four gunmen stormed a camping resort outside Mali’s capital on Sunday, killing two people before escaping in a shootout with soldiers from an antiterrorism unit, a security ministry official said.

One civilian and one soldier were wounded in the attack on Sunday afternoon, according to the official, Amadou Sangho, head of communications for the Security Ministry. One of the attackers was wounded and managed to escape with his comrades, Mr. Sangho said. He added that the situation at the resort had been contained but that the gunmen were still at large.

Also in the world...

A Taliban attack Sunday on a police headquarters in the southeastern Afghan province of Paktia ended after nearly 10 hours.