Ten killed, more then dozen injured in tanker truck fire in Afghanistan

Kabul, Dec 18 At least 10 people were killed and more than 20 sustained injuries in a fuel truck fire in the high-altitude Salang Tunnel in the Afghan province of Parwan, Abdul Afzali, head of the provincial disaster management department, said on Sunday.
Earlier in the day, the provincial security chief said that one person died and 34 were injured as a result of the incident. The truck was going from the province of Baghlan to Kabul and caught fire inside the tunnel.
“As a result of the accident in the Salang Tunnel, 10 people were killed, more than 20 were injured,” Afzali said in an address broadcast by local media.
According to the state-run Bakhtar News Agency, the road has already been cleared and is now open to traffic.
The Salang Tunnel is located at an altitude of over 3,200 meters (10,499 feet) above sea level in the area of ​the eponymous pass in the Hindu Kush mountains. The tunnel was built in 1958-1964 by Soviet specialists, mainly Moscow metro builders. The only road connecting Kabul with the northern provinces of Afghanistan passes through the tunnel.