Swedish embassy in Seoul damaged by fire

SEOUL, Sept. 29 (Yonhap) -- The Swedish embassy in Seoul has been closed indefinitely due to a fire that broke out over the weekend, embassy officials said Tuesday.

The officials said the Swedish embassy's office, located on the eighth floor of a
21-story building in Namdaemun-no in downtown Seoul, was damaged by a fire that
occurred on the 7th floor of the same building on Saturday morning.
No casualties or injuries were reported, but the fire that lasted about an hour
damaged documents, computers and communications lines in the Swedish embassy
after burning most of the seventh floor, they noted.
The embassy said it has opened a temporary office at a nearby building in
Myeongdong and resumed most of its operations, excluding the reception of visa
applications.
"We are trying to figure out the scale of damage and making efforts to resume the
visa service as soon as possible," an official at the embassy said.
An average of 500 South Koreans, mostly students, have applied for Swedish visas
every year since the two nations established diplomatic relations in 1959.
ejkim@yna.co.kr