Road accidents kill 576 people in Cambodia in first 3 months

The number of road fatalities in Cambodia rose to 576 people in the first three months of 2014, up 3.5 percent from the 556 deaths for the same period last year, said a report by the Interior Ministry's public order department Thursday. Some 1,273 cases of road accidents were reported during the January-March period, up 10 percent from 1,159 cases recorded the same period last year, the report said. Besides the deaths, the accidents had injured 2,115 others, a rise of 13 percent on year, it said. "Main causes of the accidents are over-speed driving, alcohol driving, neglect driving and traffic law violation," Preap Chan Vibol, director of the transport department at the Ministry of Public Work and Transportation, said Thursday. He said the country currently has about 410,000 registered cars, trucks and buses, and 2 million registered motorcycles. Traffic accidents claimed 1,950 human lives in 2013. The Ministry of Public Work and Transportation estimated that the accidents cost the country about 300 million U.S. dollars a year.