Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said on Thursday that safety is a top priority in China's high-speed railway development.

"The high-speed railway development should integrate speed, quality, efficiency and safety. And safety should be put in the first place," said Wen when meeting reporters at the scene of a fatal train crash Saturday.

"Without safety, high-speed trains will lose their credibility," Wen said.

In the recent years, China's high-speed railway has seen a significant progress, Wen said. "However, the deadly accident has reminded us to attach more importance to the safety of the high-speed railway construction."

He urged relevant departments to improve work and management, as well as make breakthroughs in core technologies, in a bid to "make China's high-speed railway exports really safe."

The high-speed train rear-end collision that happened late Saturday near the city of Wenzhou in east China's Zhejiang Province has left 39 people dead and 192 others injured.

(Xinhua News Agency July 28, 2011)