CROATIA: Twelve people were killed on Saturday in Croatia when a bus transporting Polish pilgrims ran off the road and into a ditch.
According to reports, all 32 still alive passengers had minor injuries and 19 were severely injured.
Three priests and six nuns were part of the journey, which was planned by the Catholic organization Brotherhood of St. Joseph. They were going to the Bosnian Catholic site of Medjugorje.
The Polish Foreign Ministry reported that all passengers were adults from Poland.
Following a prayer ceremony, the bus departed from the Polish city of Czestochowa on Friday night. The foreign ministry reported that the travelers were from different parts of Poland.
When the bus they were riding in drove off the A4 road between Jarek Bisaski and Podvorec, northeast of Zagreb, the accident occurred at about 05:40 local time (04:50 GMT).
Two Polish ministers are traveling to Croatia in response to the catastrophe, and Poland’s justice minister and prosecutor general have directed the Warsaw Prosecutors Office to begin an investigation into the circumstances leading up to the disaster.
Although 11 deaths were first reported, one more passed away later in a hospital.
“Some of the injured passengers are fighting for their lives,” Croatian Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic said.
Andrej Plenkovi, the prime minister of Croatia, sent his condolences to the victims’ relatives and said in a tweet that the emergency services were doing everything they could to assist.
Poland is a very famous destination for pilgrims because of rumors that in the 1980s, local youngsters witnessed an apparition of the Virgin Mary there.
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