Two girls died and a boy and girl were injured in a fire in a second-story apartment in Tokyo's Minato Ward late Wednesday, police and fire officials said.</PARAGRAPH>
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<TD><FONT SIZE='1'><B>Firefighters try to put out a fire early Thursday that killed two small children at an apartment in Tokyo's Minato Ward.
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<PARAGRAPH>The victims' mother, Kumiko Yamamoto, 32, was out when the fire broke out at around 11:25 p.m. and the children were rescued from the apartment by firefighters.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>However, two of the girls, Kaho, 7, and Moyu, 5, died later of burns to their entire bodies, while Yamamoto's oldest daughter, 12, and son, 10, are being treated in a hospital for smoke inhalation, the officials said, without naming the two survivors.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>The fire appears to have started in the apartment and there were no signs of arson, police said. The fire destroyed about 60 sq. meters of the apartment.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>According to neighbors, the surviving daughter and son told them the fire broke out while they were asleep, and they couldn't open the door.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>Neighbors said the two older children took good care of their younger sisters until their mother came home from work, usually around 9 p.m.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>Two other residents on the same floor of the building complained of sore throats, the firefighters said.</PARAGRAPH>
<PARAGRAPH>The reinforced-concrete building has nine floors and one basement level. It is located across the street from the residence of Prince Takamatsu, an uncle of Emperor Akihito.</PARAGRAPH>
<SUBHEAD> Fukushima fire</SUBHEAD>
<PARAGRAPH>FUKUSHIMA –
A fire broke out early Thursday morning at a home in Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, and the bodies of two men and a woman were found in the rubble, police and firefighters said.
The fire, which started around 5 a.m., gutted the living room on the first floor of the two-story house. Homeowner, 63-year-old Mikio Suzuki, his wife and a son are unaccounted for.