Nine killed in Cairo tourist bus fire

Nine people were killed and 28 injured when a bus carrying Canadian and European tourists overturned and caught fire in Egypt's Sinai peninsula yesterday, official sources said.

The state news agency Mena said the injured included 14 Russians, three Ukrainians, two Canadians, two Italians and two Egyptian policemen.

Two of the dead were Egyptian policemen but it has not yet been possible to determine the nationalities of the other dead because the bodies were so badly burned, said Said Isa, the head of ambulance services in south Sinai.

The bus was travelling from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to the capital Cairo and overturned on a sharp bend in the road near Ras Sidr, about 50 kilometres south of the city of Suez.

Mr Isa said that of the 28 injured, 10 received first aid near the scene and did not go to hospital. Five have been taken to the hospital in Suez because they have serious injuries.

Another fatal accident happened in suburban Hong Kong yesterday when a tour bus packed with elderly members of a religious group struck a roadside barrier and overturned, killing at least 18 people and injuring 44 others, officials said.

Police said the bus was travelling with 61 passengers from a group that worships a Chinese god when it overturned in the New Territories district of Sai Kung.

It took firemen three hours to free them all after the accident happened around 9 a.m. local time. Police charged the injured driver with dangerous driving, but the cause of the accident, the worst in five years, is still under investigation.