Fatal fire blamed on cigarettes

A 50-year-old man has died after an early morning house fire in Stranraer in the south west of Scotland.

The blaze in the ground floor bedsit broke out at about 0530 GMT in Corsewall Crescent.

Dumfries and Galloway firefighters required breathing apparatus and managed to recover a man from the house, but he failed to survive.

Investigators later blamed the fire on discarded smoking materials which lit combustible materials in the house.