Fourteen killed, 31 injured in China bus fire

Beijing: Fourteen people were killed and 31 injured in an inferno on a public bus in northern China on Tuesday morning, officials said.

The vehicle "suddenly caught fire" near a public square in Yinchuan, officials in the capital of the remote Ningxia region said on a verified social media account.

The cause of the blaze was still being investigated, the post said, adding that 31 people were being treated in hospital.

Traffic accidents are relatively common in China where safety standards are often lax.

In 2013 a suicidal man also started a fire on a bus in eastern China that killed 47 people including himself, state media said, the worst of a series of incidents on public transport vehicles.

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