At least 14 suspected illegal miners were killed and eight others injured after a mine collapsed in South Africa’s North West province on Monday night, police have confirmed.
Search and rescue operations were under way to locate an unknown number of people believed to be trapped at the site, situated near Rustenburg, according to provincial police commissioner Arthur Peter Adams, citing a Reuters report.
The collapse occurred while miners were searching for platinum group metals at an abandoned waste dump located on a private company’s property, Adams explained.
The eight injured miners are nationals of Lesotho, while the nationalities of those killed have not yet been confirmed.
Illegal mining has plagued South Africa for decades, ranging from small-scale theft to large operations controlled by organised criminal networks.
Undocumented miners frequently enter abandoned commercial mines to extract remaining ore deposits, sometimes operating under the control of violent gangs.
Illegal mining costs the government and the mining industry hundreds of millions of dollars per year in lost sales, taxes, and royalties.
Source: Diário Económico
Original article: https://www.diarioeconomico.co.mz/?p=530295
