At least 10 people were killed and six others injured after a fuel tanker exploded on the Hamedan-Sanandaj highway in western Iran on Saturday, according to Iranian national broadcast media.

The explosion was triggered by a road crash. The governor of Sanandaj, the capital of Iran's Kurdistan province, said the accident was caused by a technical fault in the braking system of the vehicle carrying the tanker.

Local officials said the resulting fire was brought under control immediately. They did not provide further details on the identities of those killed. The governor noted that casualty figures were based on initial reports.

The incident adds to a long history of deadly road accidents in Iran, where poor road conditions, ageing vehicle fleets and heavy freight traffic have made such collisions a recurring hazard.

At least 13 people were killed in 2018 after a fuel tanker struck a bus that had stopped to pick up passengers near Sanandaj.

According to a May 2017 report by a Tehran-based financial newspaper, more than 20,000 people are killed and 800,000 are injured annually in road accidents in Iran. Sources have reported that Iran's rate of traffic crashes is 20 times the global average, attributed to poor roads and lax traffic enforcement.