Train collision kills 17 in Pakistan (2nd Roundup)

Nov 3, 2009, 12:38 GMT

   Islamabad - A passenger train collided Tuesday with a freight train in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi, killing at least 17 people and injuring 38, officials said.

   The crash occurred near the Juma Goth railway station on the city's outskirts. Negligence on the part of the driver of the Karachi-bound Allama Iqbal Express was blamed.

   'The driver did not follow the red signal and slammed into the parcel train,' said Aftab Ahmad Memon, chief railway official in the region.

   Muzafar Sheikh, senior superintendent of the railway police, said recovery work was continuing at the accident site and of the 17 dead, three bodies had yet to be retrieved from the wreckage, Sheikh said.

   Nearly all those killed and injured were in the carriage directly behind the locomotive, which bore the brunt of the impact. Two women and an infant were among the dead.

   'Most of the injured have suffered simple fractures, cuts and bruises,' Seemi Jamali of Jinnah Hospital told the Geo News television channel.

   Television footage showed grieving relatives at the accident site as rescuers removed bodies and injured by cutting through the wreck.

   In July 2005, more than 125 people died and hundreds suffered injuries when three trains ploughed into each other in Pakistan's southern province of Sindh, of which Karachi is the capital. Authorities also blamed one of the drivers for that crash.