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BEIJING: China's cabinet has blasted local officials and companies for failing to ensure workers' safety across the nation after a deadly rail crash earlier this week, state press said on Friday.
Seventy-one people were killed and more than 400 injured on Monday when a train travelling from Beijing to Qingdao – site of the Olympic sailing events – derailed at a railway construction site and slammed into an oncoming train.
Preliminary investigations have blamed local rail authorities for failing to order the Qingdao-bound train to slow down at the construction site where an additional rail line is being built for the Summer Games, officials have said.
"The work safety situation remains serious as some regions and enterprises are not taking responsibility and are not implementing safety measures," the People's Daily said, citing a cabinet-level report on the accident.
"A large amount of hidden dangers remain in areas where work safety accidents occur regularly, including coal mines, transportation networks and shipping."
Three top officials of the Jinan Railway Bureau, which oversees the rail line, have been sacked in the aftermath of the accident.
An ongoing investigation is focused on the foundation of the rail line at the construction site where workers are trying to complete a new railway from Jinan city to Qingdao before the August Games, officials said earlier.
"In this investigation, we need to clearly grasp factors in several areas – the first is the foundation of the track, whether or not it is stable," Wang Jun, China's top work safety official, told state media on Tuesday.
The crash was the most severe railway mishap in China in more than a decade. Eighteen railway workers were killed when a high-speed train ploughed into them in January, also in Shandong province.
- AFP/so
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