ASTANA, November 25 (RIA Novosti) - A passenger coach slammed into a residential building in Kazakhstan in the early hours Saturday, leaving 7 people dead and 13 others injured, the Central Asian republic's emergencies ministry said.

"A Mercedes bus, with 20 passengers on board, crashed into a private house at 1:20 a.m. local time [9:20 p.m. GMT] in the Karaganda province [in central Kazakhstan], 884 kilometers [549 miles] into the Almaty-Yekaterinburg highway," the ministry said in a news release.

The driver and two passengers, who had sustained severe injuries, were taken to a hospital in the provincial capital of Karaganda, while the other ten passengers were hospitalized in a nearby village with minor injuries.

Police are investigating what caused the vehicle to veer off the road.