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I wouldn't have thought refuelling was the most sensible thing to do but I can't imagine it was too dangerous...
The fire was on components under the bodywork, not internal to the engine and definitely not in the fuel tank. The refuelling hose is clamped tightly shut to the fuel tank inlet it must be so due to the pressure involved (else it would spray fuel all over the place every time they fuelled). There can't have been any way for fuel, liquid or vapour, to get to the flames and ignite under normal circumstances.
The recent pitstop fuel fires (Austria 2003 comes to mind) have been due to the fuel hose not sealing correctly and fuel from there igniting on the exhausts. The presence of a flame in a similar area presents no further risk than hot exhausts. If the engineers were confident there was no problem with the fuel rig then there was no more significant risk of a fire than under any other refuelling situation.
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