Thousands Feared Dead Or Injured in N. Korea Train Blast

The number of casualties could reach 3,000, South Korea’s all-news cable channel YTN said, citing unidentified sources on the Chinese side of the border, according to the Associated Press.

The North Korean leader, Kim Jong Il, had apparently passed through the station hours earlier as he returned home from a rare foreign visit to China, YTN also reported.

The North Korean government went on to declare a type of state of emergency in the area around the explosion, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said.

“The area around Ryongchon station has turned into ruins as if it were bombarded,” Yonhap quoted witnesses as saying.

“Debris from the explosion soared high into the sky and drifted to Sinuju,” a North Korean town on the border with China, the agency said.

Yonhap, quoting witnesses in the Chinese city of Dandong on the North Korean border, said the explosion occurred about 1 p.m. at Ryongchon, a city about 12 miles from the Chinese border.

The trains were reportedly carrying oil and liquefied petroleum gas. The cause of the collision was unclear.

North Korea appears to have cut international telephone lines to the area to prevent further news of the explosion getting out, Yonhap added, citing no sources. The North Korean government is known for its secrecy and often does not report its own accidents.

“We have not yet received official information on the accident. We are trying to confirm the report,” said a spokesperson from the Unification Ministry in Seoul. The ministry is in charge of relations with North Korea.

A railway worker on the Chinese side of the Dandong border crossing told Reuters he had not heard of a blast and had seen no signs of any emergency effort under way.

“The closest station to here in North Korea is in Sinuiju (on the border), and I would have heard it. But I didn’t hear anything,” he said by telephone, according to the news service.

North Korea’s official state-run media broke their silence on Kim’s three-day trip to Beijing Thursday — suggesting Kim was safely back in Pyongyang. No mention was made of the reported explosion.

Kim met with President Hu Jintao and other Chinese leaders during his visit to China and agreed to “push ahead” with a peaceful resolution to the standoff over its nuclear weapons programs, the North’s official KCNA news agency and central television network reported earlier Thursday.