The pre-dawn crash occurred in Hunan province when a train going from the provincial capital Changsha to the southern city of Shenzhen collided with another train heading to Shenzhen from Tongren in Guizhou province, said the official. He refused to give his name, a common practice among Chinese authorities.
"The two trains hit each other on the side and cars from both trains derailed," he said, adding that the cause is under investigation.
The official Xinhua News Agency said the railway minister had traveled to the station at Chenzhou, where the crash occurred at 2:34 a.m. (00:04 IST), to oversee rescue operations.
Telephone calls to the Chenzhou station, the city's government offices and main hospital all rang unanswered.
Last year, 72 people were killed and hundreds were injured when a high-speed passenger train jumped its tracks and slammed into another in eastern Shandong province.
The accident was the worst train crash in China since 1997, when 126 were killed in Hunan, the China Daily newspaper reported last year, citing Xinhua.
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