Bus crash kills dozens of migrants just deported back to Afghanistan by Iran

[Desmond Milligan 0]

Seventy-six people were killed in a collision between a bus carrying Afghan migrants and two other vehicles in western Afghanistan, a provincial official said Wednesday.

"Seventy-six citizens of the country ... lost their lives in the incident, and three others were seriously injured," Mohammad Yousuf Saeedi, Herat provincial government spokesman, said in a statement.

Map shows city of Herat, in western Afghanistan. / Credit: Google Maps

The dead included at least 17 children, provincial government spokesman Ahmadullah Muttaqi told the Reuters news agency.

Police in the Guzara district outside Herat city, where the accident occurred Tuesday night, said the bus collided with a motorcycle and a truck carrying fuel, sparking a fire.

The bus was carrying Afghans recently returned by Iran to the Afghan capital of Kabul, Saeedi told AFP on Tuesday. Muttaqi also said they'd been deported by Tehran.

At least 1.5 million people have returned to Afghanistan since the start of this year from Iran and Pakistan, both of which have sought to force migrants out after decades of hosting them, according to the U.N. migration agency.

The state-run Bakhtar News Agency said Tuesday's accident was one of Afghanistan's deadliest in recent years.

Traffic accidents are common in Afghanistan due in part to poor roads after decades of conflict, dangerous driving on highways and a lack of regulation.

In December, two bus accidents involving a fuel tanker and a truck on a highway through central Afghanistan killed at least 52.

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