JOHANNESBURG?Fire raged through an orphanage in South Africa on Tuesday killing 15 people, including 13 children, police and government officials said.

Nine people were injured in the blaze at Newcastle in the eastern province of KwaZulu-Natal, a police spokesman told AFP.

"Police were called to the scene at 6:00 am (0400GMT) and the house was still alight," spokesman Jay Naicker said.

"Police helped the fire department to put out the fire but it was too late, the house burnt down. Nine people have been taken to the hospital with burn wounds."

The cause of the fire was not immediately known, he added.

Authorities could not say how many people were living at the Hope in Christ Home orphanage as most documents burned in the blaze.

"Fire broke out this morning. We have not established the cause. We have employed the services of a Pretoria-based company to investigate," Mandla Ngema, spokesman for the provincial social development department, told AFP.

The dead included the director of the home and her four children, Ngema said.

Not all of the children placed at the home were orphans, he added, saying social workers sometimes used it as a shelter for other children in danger.

It was believed the dead children were aged between two and 15, Ngema said.

South Africa's crippling AIDS epidemic has left the country with an estimated 1.5 million orphans -- in a country of 48 million people.

A study by the Institute of Race Relations predicted that by 2015, one third of all the children in South Africa would have lost one or both parents.

The government currently provides support to about 238,000 AIDS orphans and to more than 20,000 homes where older children care for younger siblings after their parents died from the disease.

Nearly 495,000 AIDS orphans are in foster care, but the government is encouraging more adoptions so orphans can have permanent families.

But only a tiny fraction of the AIDS orphans, about 1,900, were adopted by South Africans in 2008, a drop of nearly 13 percent from the previous year.

Parliament is expected to approve a new child protection act in April, which will set out new rules for adoptions while setting out new measures to combat trafficking and other abuses against children.