At least 46 people, including 12 children, died when a bus crashed and caught fire in western Bulgaria, officials say.
The bus was registered in North Macedonia and most of those on board were tourists returning from a trip to Istanbul in Turkey.
It rammed a crash barrier on a motorway south-west of the capital Sofia at about 02:00 local time (00:00 GMT).
Seven people escaped from the bus and were taken to hospital with burns.
Bulgarian Interior Minister Boyko Rashkov visited the “terrifying scene” and said the survivors had been badly burned.
The cause of the disaster was not immediately clear. Bulgarian officials described how the bus swerved off the motorway and tore away a 50m (164ft) section of the crash barrier, but it was unclear if that was before or after it caught fire.
The mayor of the nearby village of Pernik said the motorway was in poor condition on that section and there were often accidents in the area.
The victims have not yet been officially named, but officials said they included children, and young people aged between 20 and 30.
Macedonian TV channel Alsat released a list of names it said were passengers on the bus. Comments by Albania’s foreign minister indicate that most, if not all, the passengers were ethnic-Albanians from North Macedonia.
Earlier, Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said he had spoken to one of the survivors, who told him that passengers were asleep when the sound of an explosion woke them.
“He and the other six survivors broke the windows of the bus and managed to escape and save themselves,” Mr Zaev told reporters.
The bus belonged to Besa Trans, a travel company that organises trips in Europe.
Within hours of the crash, relatives of people who travelled to Turkey with Besa Trans last week gathered outside the firm’s office in Skopje, anxiously looking for information.
Dzelal Bakiu told reporters in the Macedonian capital he was concerned for his nephew and had not heard from him since learning of the crash. He tried to contact the travel agency but had not been able to get any information.
Bulgaria’s interim Prime Minister Stefan Yanev described the incident as “an enormous tragedy”.
The area around the site of Tuesday’s incident on the Struma motorway has now been sealed off. Footage from the scene shows the charred vehicle, gutted by the fire.
Investigative service chief Borislav Sarafov said “human error by the driver or a technical malfunction are the two initial versions for the accident”.
