At least 15 people were killed and 27 injured when a bus carrying undocumented immigrants overturned in Van province in Turkey on Thursday. The accident occurred on the Van-Özalp highway after the driver lost control of the vehicle, which began to roll downhill, Daily Sabah reported.

“The efforts to rescue the injured and their transfer to the hospital continue,” Governor Mehmet Emin Bilmez said. “So far 15 people died, more than 20 others injured.”

Bilmez added that the nationalities of the immigrants were yet to be confirmed. He said that many children were among those who died.

Authorities dispatched ambulances and National Medical Research Teams to the site of the accident. Over 10 lakh immigrants and refugees, fleeing conflicts and poverty in West Asia and Africa, have passed through Turkey in recent years to get to countries in the European Union, Reuters reported.