Seventeen people have been killed and 29 injured after a public bus and a heavy transport truck collided on a desert highway in southwestern Egypt.

The accident occurred on Wednesday on the Assuit-Kharga highway, some 400 kilometres southwest of Cairo, in New Valley province that shares a long border with Libya, medical and security sources said.

Twenty-six ambulances were dispatched to the scene to ferry the injured to hospitals, a health ministry statement said.

It was not immediately clear how the accident occurred.

Local daily el-Shorouk quoted an unnamed official as saying that the bus slammed into the truck which was "nearly parking" on the road.

It reported the bus was carrying 45 people heading to the capital, Cairo.

Reckless driving, lax traffic rules and poor road conditions cause many vehicular crashes in Egypt.

Road accidents left 7101 people dead in Egypt in 2021, a 15.2 per cent increase compared with 2020, statistics agency CAPMAS said in a report last year.

with AP