A particularly deadly road accident mourned Egypt on Saturday. Twenty people were killed when their minibus overturned in a canal in the Nile delta, in the north of the country, the prosecution said, accusing the driver “who was on the phone while driving”.
The driver, who was injured, “was surprised by an oncoming car. He was going too fast to be able to dodge it, ”added the prosecution. He was arrested and initial analyzes revealed that he was under the influence of narcotics. The accident also injured eight people.
Frequent accidents
The minibus, which was pulled out of the water, was badly damaged. The police set up a cordon to keep away a crowd of onlookers.
Traffic accidents are frequent in Egypt where the roads are often poorly maintained and the Highway Code is not respected. Officially, 7,000 people were killed in traffic accidents in 2021 in the country of 104 million inhabitants.