A picture taken from the Moroccan region of Oujda shows an Algerian border guard patrolling along the border with Morocco, Nov. 4, 2021. (Credit: AFP)
Eleven people, mostly agricultural workers, have died in a road accident in Morocco, the health ministry said Thursday.
The death toll of the accident "has risen to 11," and "the injured are in stable condition," Fouad Kharmaz, a health ministry official in the Khemisset province told AFP.
The crash happened Wednesday and local authorities initially reported five dead and 27 injured.
Nine of the 11 dead were female farm laborers, Kharmaz said.
Their minibus slammed into a tree after the driver lost control in the rural town of Brachoua, local officials said.
Road accidents are common in Morocco, where many poor citizens use coaches and minibusses to travel in rural areas.
In August, 23 people were killed and 36 injured when their bus overturned on a bend east of Morocco's economic capital Casablanca, in what was one of the deadliest accidents in recent years.
An average of 3,500 road deaths and 12,000 injuries are recorded annually in Morocco, according to the National Road Safety Agency, with an average of 10 deaths per day.
The figure last year was around 3,200.
Since the worst bus accident in the country's history, which left 42 dead in 2012, authorities have set out to reduce the mortality rate by 50 percent by 2026.
The death toll of the accident "has risen to 11," and "the injured are in stable condition," Fouad Kharmaz, a health ministry official in the Khemisset province told AFP.
The crash happened Wednesday and...