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A fuel truck exploded and set fire to a village in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, killing at least 221 people and injuring almost an equal number, the Red Cross says.
Helicopters provided by the United Nations mission in the country evacuated injured villagers to hospital, officials said.
Desire Kama from the Congolese Red Cross said according to a provisional estimate at 1100 GMT, there were 221 deaths -- of whom 61 were children and 36 women -- and 214 were injured.
A UN mission source told AFP on condition of anonymity that five Pakistani troops were among the dead, but this was denied by MONUSCO's spokesman Madnodje Mounoubai, who said no UN soldiers were among the victims.
A military source in MONUSCO's command said he had no reports of any victims from the peacekeeping mission and said verification was going on with units present in the zone.
Earlier a MONUSCO source gave a toll of "223 dead and 110 injured."
"What is certain is that the toll will get higher. It seems that what happened was truly horrible," the source said on condition of anonymity, adding that the search was still going on "for more charred bodies."
"A tanker truck coming from Tanzania overturned in the village of Sange. There was a crush (of people) and a petrol leak, there was an explosion of fuel oil which spread through the village," regional government spokesman Vincent Kabanga told AFP.
The village is located around 70 kilometres (40 miles) south of the Sud-Kivu county town of Bukavu, close to the border with Burundi.
