Chinese authorities on Thursday formally detained the president of Tianjin Port and nine other officials deemed responsible for the chemicals warehouse explosion that killed at least 139 people this month.
Authorities are under pressure from the public to explain the speed and apparent irregularities in the issuing of permits for the company that owned the warehouse, which Chinese media have linked to the son of a former official in charge of security at Tianjin Port. Also unexplained is whether the responding firefighters, who make up about half of the dead, had any training in chemicals fires, writes Lucy Hornby in Beijing.
The blast has highlighted questions over the management of China's ports, which are riddled with internal fiefdoms, given their importance to world trade and the growing volumes of dangerous goods they handle.