UAE road accident victims down 21% in H1

Road accidents killed 391 people in the UAE in the first half of 2010, a decline of nearly 21 per cent over the same period of last year, when 495 people died, a police report showed Saturday.

The number of accidents also dropped by around 25.5 per cent to 3,773 from 5,034 in the same period, showed the report, published in the Sharjah-based Arabic language daily Al Khaleej.

According to the report by the Traffic Coordination Department at the Interior Ministry, the accidents resulted in 4,373 injuries in the first half of this year, down by 27 per cent from 6,012 injuries in the first half of 2009.

The report said the number of road mishaps also dropped by around 23.5 per cent to 2,544 from 3,325 and attributed the decline to intensified police patrols and the enforcement of a unified traffic law, which involved stiffer penalties.