At least 65 people have been killed and others injured in a train fire in Pakistan's southern Punjab province.
Health officials said a number of the injured suffered severe burns and that their condition was very serious, while some passengers died after jumping from the moving train to escape the flames.
Security officials said initial investigations indicated that the fire broke out because passengers used a small stove to prepare breakfast, destroying three train cars.
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#UPDATE #Pakistan: Death toll rises to 62, in incident where fire broke out in Karachi-Rawalpindi Tezgam express train in Liaqatpur near Rahim Yar Khan, earlier today. https://t.co/lZV8UIMuoe pic.twitter.com/xF2L6VeqYP - 🇮🇳अभिषेक द्विवेदी🇮🇳 (@ dwivedi344) October 31, 2019 |
"Two cooking stoves exploded," Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told Geo TV.
"Most of the deaths were caused by jumping off the train."
The minister said that the introduction of passengers stoves secretly with them on trains to prepare meals on long flights is a common problem in the country.
It is noteworthy that the state of the railway network of Pakistan dating back to the colonial era has deteriorated in the past few decades due to lack of investment and poor maintenance.
Eleven people were killed in another train accident in July, while four people died in September. A train crash in Sindh province killed about 130 people in 2005.