"This is a pretty big accident... According to information so far, 28 passengers have died and many are injured," Pakistan Railways Minister Khawaja Saad Rafique told reporters on August 6, according to AFP.
Meanwhile, Reuters quoted a report from local news site Geo News saying that at least 30 people were killed and more than 80 injured in the tragedy.
Scene of the train derailment in Pakistan on August 6
Mr Rafique said there were at least 1,000 passengers on board the Hazara Express when it derailed on the same stretch of track, with no fault reported. "There could be two reasons: one, it was a mechanical fault, or it was a deliberate fault - maybe sabotage. We will investigate," the official told AFP.
The derailment occurred near Sahara railway station, outside the city of Nawabshah in the southern Pakistani province of Sindh. Eight coaches were derailed, according to Mohsin Syal, a railway official. A senior police officer said some passengers were still trapped in one coach.
Minister Rafique said a state of emergency had been declared in local hospitals where doctors were working to treat the injured.
The Hazara Express is a daily passenger train that departs from the southern port city of Karachi and takes about 33 hours to reach Havelian in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, about 1,600 km to the north.
Accidents are common on Pakistan's aging railway system, which stretches nearly 7,500 kilometers and carries more than 80 million passengers a year.
In June 2021, two trains collided near Daharki in Sindh province, killing at least 65 people and injuring about 150. At least 75 passengers were burned to death in a fire on the Tezgam Express in October 2019, while a collision between two trains at Ghotki killed more than 100 people in 2005.
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