Turkey: At least 32 people were killed and several others injured in two significant traffic accidents in southern Turkey on Saturday.
According to local officials, at least 16 people were killed and 22 injured in a multiple-vehicle collision in the city of Gaziantep. Gaziantep Governor Davut Gul told reporters at the scene that three firefighters, four medical workers and two journalists were among those killed in the tragic accident.
According to Gul, rescuers were initially called to the scene of a minibus accident on the highway between the city center of Gaziantep and the Nizip neighborhood near the Syrian border.
According to Gul, rescue workers and two journalists who had gone to the scene to cover the initial car accident, later died after a bus crashed into them.
He said a broadcast truck and an ambulance were hit by the bus as the bus overturned and slid 200 metres.
According to state news agency TRT, both the journalists belonged to news agency HA. Hours later, a truck lost control in the city of Mardin, some 300 kilometers to the east, killing another 16 people and injuring 29, eight of whom were critical, according to Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
"We are devastated by a second traffic accident," Koca tweeted, adding that the truck's brakes had failed before hitting a crowd in the Derrick district of Mardin, close to the Syrian border.
Images of the truck falling into a crowd of speeding people were broadcast on state television.
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