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Mayors sacked over mines
10/08/2005 08:17 - (SA)
Beijing - Two mayors in southern China have been suspended for not properly supervising mines in their area after an unlicensed mine flooded at the weekend, with 123 people presumed dead, state media said on Wednesday.
The first body was pulled from the Daxing Coal Mine in Xingning city in Guangdong province on Wednesday, four days after the mine flooded, but hopes were fading for another 122 miners still underground.
The government suspended the mayor of Xingning and of Meizhou, which governs Xingning, for dereliction of duty for failing to supervise coal mine production in the area under their jurisdiction, Xinhua news agency said.
Rescue teams continued pumping water from the shaft on Wednesday in the faint hope the miners would be found alive.
But An Yuanjie, a spokesperson for the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, told AFP the trapped miners' chances of survival "are becoming slimmer and slimmer."
State media said the mine was unlicensed and ignored orders to shut down - an example of how China's hunger for coal to power its economic growth is leading to profits being placed ahead of lives.
- AFP
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