LA PAZ, May 2 (Reuters) - Thirteen people, including Israeli and Japanese tourists, were killed in southern Bolivia when two tour buses crashed head on and burst into flames, local media reported on Friday.

A container of gasoline on the roof of one of the buses exploded after the collision late on Thursday in Salar de Uyuni, a sprawling salt flat where buses travel on unmarked and unpaved roads.

Five Israeli and five Japanese tourists were among the dead, Julio Cespedes, a police commander in the Potosi department, told Radio Fides.

The Salar site, some 250 miles (400 km) south of La Paz near the Chilean border, is a popular attraction for tourists.

It is home to 1,000-year-old cacti and hotels built entirely from blocks of salt. The area was once a lake that covered a large area of the Andean highlands 40,000 years ago. (Reporting by Carlos Alberto Quiroga; Writing by Kevin Gray; Editing by John O'Callaghan)

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