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A collision between a bus and a truck crash kills 10 people in Zimbabwe

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — A collision between a bus and a haulage truck killed 10 people in central Zimbabwe on Wednesday, police said, bringing the country’s death toll from major road crashes to 41 in May.

Police spokesperson Paul Nyathi said the victims in Wednesday’s crash died after a bus carrying 36 passengers attempted to overtake and collided with a truck near the city of Kwekwe. More details would be released later, he said.

Road accidents involving buses, minibus taxis and unregulated sedan taxis are common in the southern African country of around 15 million people and are often blamed on speeding and poor road conditions.

At least 24 people died in major crashes over the past week, including eight Roman Catholic parishioners whose vehicle plunged into a river. Earlier in May, another 17 people were killed when a bus crashed in northern Zimbabwe, most of them Malawian nationals returning home from South Africa.

Across Africa, road crashes kill about 300,000 people annually, roughly a quarter of the global toll, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, which says the continent has the world’s highest road fatality rate.

Zimbabwe is among the countries with the worst record, with 94% of road accidents attributed to human error, according to authorities.

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AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa

Beijing bans 4 New Zealand lawmakers from entering China because they visited Taiwan

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Beijing banned four New Zealand lawmakers from traveling to China for a year and demanded they apologize because they visited Taiwan on a parliamentary trip, according to a message from the Chinese embassy conveyed via parliamentary officials and shown to The Associated Press on Thursday. China has hit lawmakers from other countries with sanctions related to contact with Taiwan before, but it's the first time for New Zealand parliamentarians, the government in Wellington said. Beijing has been increasing pressure in recent years on the democratically governed island that it claims as its own territory. Two lawmakers reached by the AP on Thursday rejected the demand for an apology, while the other two could not be immediately reached. New Zealand's government said it would express concern about the travel bans to Beijing. The elected officials visited Taipei in May, as New Zealand parliamentarians have done “for decades,” a spokesperson for Foreign Minister Winston Peters said in a statement.
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