Truck overturns, injuring 86 in eastern Cambodia

Some 86 garment workers got injured when a truck carrying them overturned on Tuesday morning in Cambodia's eastern Svay Rieng province, a police chief confirmed. "The truck overturned and spilt workers onto the street after a front tire burst while driving," Keong Khon, police chief of Svay Rieng province, told Xinhua. The truck carried nearly 100 garment workers to factories in the Manhattan Special Economic Zone when the accident happened at around 5:00 a.m. "Some 86 workers got wounded, 14 of them are seriously injured, " he said, adding that all of them had been sent to hospitals for medical attention. The driver fled the scene after the accident, which was caused by overloading, he said. Casualties from road accidents remain high in Cambodia. Last year, road accidents claimed some 1,900 lives and left more than 7, 000 others injured, according to the Ministry of Public Works and Transport. The ministry estimated that the country lost about 300 million U.S. dollars a year due to the accidents.