BAGHDAD — Thirteen prematurely born babies were killed in a fire that broke out early on Wednesday in a maternity ward in a Baghdad hospital and was probably caused by an electrical fault, Iraqi authorities said.

Eleven or 12 other babies and 29 women were rescued from the Yarmuk hospital’s maternity ward and transferred to other hospitals, officials said.

Firefighters and hospital staff took about three hours to put out the blaze that engulfed the ward, according to one medic. Yarmuk is a major hospital on the western side of the capital, with emergency care facilities among others.

Health Minister Adila Hamoud offered to resign if the investigation proved that the fire was caused by negligence at her department. She also announced in a statement the sacking of the hospital
director.

The incident intensified public accusations of state corruption and mismanagement.

Pictures posted on social media showed the hospital in a state of neglect, with cockroaches crawling out from between broken tiles, dustbins overflowing with rubbish, dirty toilets and patients lying on stretchers in the courtyard.

Thirteen years after the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, the oil-rich Arab state still suffers a shortage of electricity, water, schools and hospitals.

Shaima Hussein, 36, and her husband were inside the hospital and on their way to see their two-day-old son when the fire broke out. Their path was blocked by a wall of thick smoke.

Hussein survived after somebody broke a window to help her escape.

“I looked at the victims, I saw them charred,” she said. “It was a horrible scene… After all these efforts I received a charred body.”