Beijing - Police have detained 12 people after a blaze caused by fireworks engulfed a new hotel tower in central Beijing, state media said on Thursday.

The 12 detained included four employees of state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV), which owns the tower, and eight workers from the company which set off the fireworks on Monday night, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Among those detained was Xu Wei, CCTV's construction manager for the nearly completed tower, who was suspected of "starting the fire by using banned fireworks," the agency quoted Beijing police as saying.

The eight employees of the fireworks company were arrested in the nearby city of Langfang after they fled the scene of the fire, the police said.

CCTV hired a company to let off hundreds of giant fireworks outside the 159-metre tower, in which a Mandarin Oriental hotel was scheduled to open later this year.

"Owners of the property ignored police warnings that such fireworks were not allowed," Luo Yuan, Beijing's deputy fire chief, said earlier.

CCTV apologized to the public on Tuesday afternoon, saying it was "deeply saddened by the great loss of state assets."

A 30-year-old firefighter died from smoke inhalation early Tuesday, while six other firefighters and a construction supervisor also needed emergency hospital treatment.

Firefighters rescued two workers from the 14th floor of the otherwise empty building after the fire broke out.

More than 1,000 local residents were evacuated and several main roads and a nearby underground railway line closed.

The Chinese capital celebrated the end of the two-week festival marking the Chinese New Year by letting off tens of thousands of fireworks on Monday evening.

The fireworks used at the tower, which is next to the new CCTV headquarters, were "much more powerful and explosive" than those on sale to the public and needed special approval for use in the city centre, Luo said.

The tower stands 200 metres from the iconic "twisted arch" headquarters of CCTV, recently completed and designed by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas and German architect Ole Scheeren. (dpa)