29 dead, 16 injured in Nigeria bus crash: police

Motorists queue during a traffic jam at Mile 2 bus stop in Lagos in 2010. By Pius Utomi Ekpei (AFP/File)

LAGOS (AFP) - Two buses collided head-on and burst into flames in northern Nigeria's Yobe state on Friday, killing at least 29 people, police said.

"Two Toyota Hiace Buses... travelling in opposite directions had a head-on collision and thereafter went off in flames. Twenty nine persons -- eleven of them burnt beyond recognition -- have so far been confirmed dead," national police spokesman Frank Mba said in a statement, adding that 16 people were also injured.

Police said the accident happened at 1:00 pm (1200 GMT) in the state's Nengere area and the injured were taken to a hospital in the neaby city of Potiskum.

The statement lamented the "incessant cases of accidents" on Nigeria's highways, considered some of the most dangerous in the world.

More than 17,000 people died in about 31,000 road accidents across Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, between 2007 and 2009, according to the federal road safety agency's 2010 report, the most recent published.

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