China has deployed a team including medical experts to North Korea to investigate the cause of the accident and “assist with emergency rescue and treatment options”, AFP reported Lu as saying.
Thirty-two Chinese tourists and four North Korean nationals were killed in a bus crash in North Korea, according to Beijing’s foreign ministry. Two other Chinese nationals were injured in Sunday’s accident south of the capital Pyongyang, ministry spokesman Lu King said at a press briefing.
China has deployed a team including medical experts to North Korea to investigate the cause of the accident and “assist with emergency rescue and treatment options”, AFP reported Lu as saying.
Few details of the crash have emerged except a Twitter post by China’s state broadcaster CGTN that was later deleted. In the tweet, CGTN said that a tour bus had fallen from a bridge in North Korea and posted pictures of the overturned vehicle, rescue vehicles and of doctors attending to a patient.
The tour group was travelling by bus from Kaesong to Pyongyang when the accident happened, according to the independent Seoul-based website NK News, which cited an unnamed source.
While North Korean roads are largely poor and potholed, the route from Pyongyang to Kaesong, where the accident reportedly happened, is one of the best in the country.
Chinese visitors form the majority of tourists to North Korea; China and North Korea share a long land border, with flights being operated between the two countries.
Chinese tourism to the North has continued even though Beijing has enforced a slew of United Nations sanctions over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme.