ISLAMABAD: At least 18 passengers were killed after a fire erupted in a bus on M-4 Motorway in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province, Motorway Police said on Sunday.
The bus was en route to Islamabad from Karachi when it caught fire at a distance of 7 kilometers from Pindi Bhattian, according to the Motorway Police.
“The fire broke out due to a short-circuit,” a spokesman for the Motorway Police said in a statement. “Fifteen others were injured in the mishap.”
The bodies and the wounded passengers were shifted to the Tehsil Headquarters Hospital in Pindi Bhattian.
The South Asian country has poor road safety controls and thousands of lives are lost to road crashes each year, particularly in the southwestern Balochistan province.
Earlier this month, a Portuguese tourist was killed when a speeding pick-up truck hit his motorbike near Dalbandin in the southwestern Chagai district, a day after he had entered Pakistan from the Pakistan-Iran border.
Also in August, seven people from the same family were killed and six others injured after a passenger van collided with a truck in Layyah district of Punjab.











