<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>Twenty-one people were killed and 38 injured in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province today when a bus collided with an oil tanker and a motorbike, a provincial official said.</b></span><br></div><div><br></div><div>“Early in the morning today, based on the information we have received so far, 21 people were killed” in an accident “between a passenger bus, a tanker and a motorbike”, the provincial governor’s spokesman Mohammad Qasim Riyaz told AFP.</div><div><br></div><div>Another 38 people were injured in the collision, the provincial information department said, updating an initial tally of 11 provided by Riyaz.</div><div><br></div><div>The collision caused the vehicles to ignite, with images shared by the Helmand information department on social media showing charred, twisted metal and the crushed cabin of the tanker.</div><div><br></div><div>The accident took place early this morning on a main highway between the capital Kabul and northern Herat city in the Grishk district of Helmand.</div><div><br></div><div>Deadly traffic accidents are common in Afghanistan due in part to poor roads, dangerous driving on highways and lack of regulation.</div><div><br></div><div>In December 2022, an oil tanker overturned and caught fire in Afghanistan’s high-altitude Salang pass, killing 31 people and leaving dozens more with burn injuries. - AFP&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>