Victims of the traffic accident are treated in a Dingxi hospital in Gansu Province on February 26, 2005. A bus accident in the province killed 11 and injured 19. (xinhua photo)

A five-year-old girl is treated in a Dingxi hospital in Gansu Province on February 26, 2005. A bus accident in the province killed 11 and injured 19. (xinhua photo)

    BEIJING, Feb. 26 -- Two bus accidents killed 27 people and injured nearly 50 in China on Friday.

    Sixteen died when a speeding, overloaded bus filled with 50 passengers plunged off a highway into a deep ditch near Shaoguan city in southern Guangdong province early Friday morning.

    Half the 30 passengers injured in the accident were in critical condition at a local hospital, it said.

    Another accident in western Gansu province killed 11 and injured 19 when a passenger bus collided with a van in the early hours of Friday morning, Xinhua said in a separate report.

    Both accidents were under investigation, the official agency said.

    Traffic accidents killed nearly 107,000 people last year, about 300 every day, due in part to bad driving, poor infrastructure and skyrocketing car demand.

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