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The police have opened an investigation for the traffic accident killing 11 people in Russia’s Transbaikalia region, a source in the press service of the Regional Office of the Interior Ministry told TASS.

Earlier Russia’s Investigative Committee launched a probe into the bus accident under Article 238 of the Russian Criminal Code (rendering services not meeting safety requirements). Spokesman for the regional branch of the Russian Investigative Committee Yegor Markov told TASS that investigators are seeking to establish the circumstances of the accident.

A passenger bus had flipped into a ditch and overturned in the Petrovsk-Zabaikalsky District, seven kilometers west of the Khokhotui settlement, along the 702nd kilometer of the Baikal highway. The bus was carrying 51 people, 11 of them died and more than 40 suffered injuries.

According to District Administration Head Andrei Kuznetsov, road works were underway in the place where the accident happened. He confirmed that the bus had been carrying pilgrims travelling home after taking part in a sacred procession in Varlaam’s monastery located in the Urluk settlement.