At least four killed as passenger train derails near Multan in Pakistan
A passenger train derailed on the outskirts of Multan in Pakistan's Punjab province early Tuesday, killing at least four people and injuring at least 17 others, according to emergency services. The cause remains unknown, though President Asif Ali Zardari has ordered a transparent investigation into the incident. Pakistan's railway network, which carries over 80 million passengers annually across aging infrastructure, continues to experience recurring derailments despite modernisation efforts.
Switch levels to reread the same story more simply, or in more depth.
At least four people were killed and more than a dozen others injured when a passenger train derailed early Tuesday near Multan in Pakistan's southern Punjab province, according to emergency services and rescue workers who spoke to AFP. Farooq Ahmed, a spokesman for Punjab's emergency services department, reported that four people had died and at least 17 were injured, while a rescue worker at the scene cited a higher figure of 25 injured.
Eleven ambulances and 30 rescue workers were dispatched after the accident was reported at 5:21 am local time. An AFP journalist at the scene observed the body of one victim inside a train carriage. The cause of the derailment has not yet been determined.
President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif both expressed concern over the incident, with Zardari ordering authorities to conduct transparent investigations to determine the cause of the accident. Pakistan's railway network, which carries more than 80 million passengers a year across roughly 7,500 kilometres of track, includes infrastructure dating back more than 150 years. Derailments remain a recurring problem despite ongoing modernisation efforts linked to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
Summary produced automatically from the cited sources, then adapted to three reading levels.