More Than 70 Killed, Including Over a Dozen Kids, After Bus Catches Fire in Crash
NEED TO KNOW
- A bus crash in Afghanistan has killed at least 75 people, including 17 children, who were being sent back from nearby Iran, a local official said
- The bus was on its way to Kabul in Afghanistan when it crashed into a motorbike and a car
- "The car was carrying fuel and it caught fire after a head-on collision with the bus, fully loaded with passengers,” an Afghan government authority said
A bus crash in Afghanistan has killed at least 75 people — including 17 children — who were being sent back from nearby Iran, a local official said.
The incident occurred in the Herat province on Tuesday, Aug. 19, when a bus on its way to Kabul crashed into a motorbike and a car, Afghan government authority Ahmadullah Muttaqi said, according to NBC News.
It's not clear who was at fault, but everyone aboard the bus died, along with two others who were involved in the incident.
“The car was carrying fuel and it caught fire after a head-on collision with the bus, fully loaded with passengers,” Muttaqi said, according to the outlet. “The bus also caught fire and the majority of people on the bus died of burn injuries.”
On Wednesday, Aug. 20, the Taliban said it had arrested the leader of the transportation business involved in the crash, according to CBS News.
Iranian authorities have recently sent back almost 1.8 million Afghan citizens, accusing them of staying in the country illegally, the Associated Press reports. Pakistan and Turkey are implementing similar deportation measures.
“These Afghan refugees were returning home after spending a long time in Iran, but they could not reach their destination as their bus met with a tragic accident,” Muttaqi said, according to NBC News.
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Both Iran and Pakistan began cracking down in October 2023 on people they said were living in the countries illegally. NBC News reported that many of the people who have been sent back to Afghanistan have been living outside of the country for decades.
Since the beginning of 2025, more than two million people have returned to Afghanistan after living in Iran and Pakistan, U.N. human rights officials said, according to NBC News. While both countries deny targeting Afghans in deportation efforts, experts allege many Afghan migrants have returned home after being forced to do so, or after being intimidated, harassed or threatened.
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