ANKARA, Dec 4, 2017 (BSS/AFP) – A minibus smuggling people from Syria into Turkey hit a truck on the Turkish side of the border on Sunday, killing 11 people on board and injuring nine others, local authorities said.
The head-on collision happened in Hatay province in the afternoon after a team of Turkish police tried to stop the minibus from evading a checkpoint near the Syrian frontier, officials said.
Among the dead were six children and the driver of the minibus, the authorities said, adding that the victims were “foreigners” without specifying their nationality.
According to the Anadolu news agency, the ten dead passengers were Syrian.
“At the checkpoint, the minibus ignored an order to stop and fled. Unfortunately it collided with a truck on a curve,” Hatay governor Erdal Ata told Anadolu.
Photographs published by local media showed rescue teams around the crushed remains of the minibus, which had been sealed off by white tape on the edge of a country road.
Turkey hosts more than three million refugees, mostly from Syria.