At least 39 people, most of them undocumented US-bound migrants who had just survived a perilous jungle crossing, died in a bus crash in Panama on Wednesday, officials said.
Maria Isabel Saravia, Panama's deputy director of migration, said 28 people were also injured in the accident.
The bus plunged down a ravine and hit a minibus about 400 kilometers (250 miles) west of the capital Panama City, the National Migration Service said in a media statement.
It said the injured, including children, were being treated at various hospitals and clinics and the latest death toll was based on "preliminary information."
Saravia said 66 people were on the bus, meaning at least one victim was likely from the vehicle it hit. She said 20 of those on the bus were minors.
UNICEF said in a note to AFP that at least three children were among the dead.
The bus was transporting migrants who had crossed the Darien Gap, an inhospitable jungle area bordering Colombia.
They were moving westward toward Costa Rica and from there aimed to continue their journey through Central America and Mexico to the United States.
The bus had traveled almost 700 kilometers in close to 14 hours and was on its way to a hostel in Gualaca near the Costa Rica border, where the passengers were to rest before continuing their journey.
Local media said the crash happened as the driver was turning the bus around after missing the hostel.
The vehicle apparently left the road on a bend and plunged down a ravine, hitting a rock and a minibus on a road below.
"We saw it coming and dived under the seats, the driver and myself, and because of that nothing happened to us," Edgar Guerra, one of two people inside the minibus, told local media.
The nationalities of the occupants have not been revealed but Cuba's foreign minister Bruno Rodriguez said on Twitter that Cubans were among the dead.
