http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/04/05/2535159.htm?section=justin

46 dead Afghans found in truck container

Posted Sun Apr 5, 2009 5:17am AEST

The dead bodies of up to 46 Afghans have been found crammed into a truck container in south-western Pakistan that was believed to have been bound for Iran, police say.

The container was found about 20 kilometres south of Quetta, capital of oil and gas rich Baluchistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, police say, adding it was unclear where it came from or where it was going.

"The death toll is 46," police official Ghulam Dastagir said.

"Forty-five people are unconscious and have been admitted to hospital," the official added.

Police earlier said they counted 44 bodies pulled out of the container.

"We have been able to talk to some of the people, who were trapped in the container. They were all Afghans in the container and the container was going to Iran," senior police official in Quetta, Wazir Khan Nasir, said.

"When the condition of people inside the container deteriorated, the driver fled, leaving the container."

Survivor Nizar Ahmed, 15, who is in hospital, says that he came from the province of Baktia in eastern Afghanistan.

"We have all come from Afghanistan and we were going to Iran," he said without being able to explain why they were bound for the Islamic republic, which borders both Pakistan and Afghanistan, or when they left home.

Police official Mohammad Zaman Karim says that around 110 people were crammed into the trucking container, adding that the driver and his assistant apparently fled after suspecting that people inside the container had died.

Local inhabitants and police realised there were people inside when they heard sounds coming from within the container, police said.

4/6/2009 11:20:03 AM

damn, 110 people in one container. that's crazy.

4/6/2009 11:21:46 AM

no pics no care

4/6/2009 11:21:56 AM

4/6/2009 11:23:19 AM

East bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
a'we gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long why to go and a short time to get there
I'm east bound just watch ol'Bandit run

4/6/2009 11:24:30 AM

the driver just took off...i find humor in that
but the people that were still alive while in that thing with the dead bodies is terrible...imagine the smell

4/6/2009 11:30:26 AM

yeah it is pretty humorous he just up and left.

4/6/2009 11:31:10 AM

Hasn't this happened a couple of times with illegal immigrants coming into the US?

4/6/2009 12:09:28 PM

This reminds me of Rijal fi-al-shams by Ghassan Kanafani. It was made into a movie called "The Dupes" by Tawfik Saleh. Three Palestinian men try to cross the border in the tank of a water truck (it was empty). Interesting movie, but they all died and were abandoned too.

4/6/2009 12:34:52 PM

whatever happen to those dumb niggs overloading boats a few days ago. did all of them die yet?

4/6/2009 12:40:11 PM

I would assume so

4/6/2009 2:24:19 PM