At least 28 people were killed Sunday when an express train derailed in southern Pakistan, the railway minister said, with an emergency declared at local hospitals struggling to deal with with dozens of injured.
Accidents and derailments occur frequently on the country’s antiquated railway system, which has nearly 7,500 kilometres (4,600 miles) of track and carries more than 80 million passengers a year.
“This is quite a big accident,” railway minister Khawaja Saad Rafique told reporters.
“According to the information so far, 28 passengers have been killed and many are injured.”
Rafique said at least 1,000 passengers were aboard the Hazara Express when it derailed on a section of track where no faults had been reported.
“There can be two reasons: first that it was a mechanical fault, or the fault was created — it might be a sabotage. We will investigate it.”
The…
