January 07, 2007	Sunday	Zilhaj 16, 1427

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MUZAFFARABAD, Jan 6: Rescue teams concluded their operation on Saturday evening after clearing the Kotli-Rawalpindi road for traffic. They recovered three wounded people and 15 bodies from the crushed van buried beneath a huge rock.

The rock fell from a roadside mountain on a Kotli-bound passenger van (RIR 3877) near Holar Bridge on Friday.

Initial reports had suggested that there were 20 people on board, but officials retracted the earlier figure and said there were only 18 people in the trapped vehicle of whom 15 had died.

Similarly, reports that a car was also trapped under the rock also proved wrong.

Kotli SSP Sardar Gulfraz Khan told Dawn that last body was recovered at 2am on Saturday.

He said that the road had been opened for traffic at 7pm on Saturday.

The dead have been identified as driver Ghulam Murtaza alias Manoh, Rashida Bibi and her son Waqar, Ghulam Mustafa, Asya Bibi, Shazia Bibi, Wasim Shah (residents of Kotli), Yasir (Bagh), Barkat Hussain (Poonch), Taj Mohammad (Abbottabad), Akram and his wife Nasrin Akhtar (Sargodha), Lans Naik Amir Zaman (Attock), and Sepoy Shabbir (Talagang).