KABUL: More than 50 people were killed on Tuesday in western Afghanistan when a passenger bus carrying migrants recently returned from Iran collided with a truck and a motorcycle, local police and a provincial official said.

Police in Herat province said the accident was caused due to the bus’s “excessive speed and negligence”.

The bus was carrying Afghans recently returned from Iran and en route to the capital Kabul, provincial official Mohammad Yousuf Saeedi told AFP.

The returnees are part of a massive wave of Afghans deported or forced out of Iran in recent months.

“All the passengers were migrants who had boarded the vehicle in Islam Qala,” said Saeedi, referring to a border crossing point.

Police in Guzara district outside Herat city, where the accident occurred, said a motorcycle was also involved.

The majority of those who died were on the bus, with two people travelling in the truck killed and another two on the motorcycle.

Traffic accidents are common in Afghanistan, due in part to poor roads after decades of conflict, dangerous driving on highways, and a lack of regulation.

In December last year, two bus accidents involving a fuel tanker and a truck on a highway through central Afghanistan killed at least 52.

Published in Dawn, August 20th, 2025