South Africa’s government says it will not help a group of illegal miners inside a closed mine in the country’s North West Province who have been denied access to basic supplies as part of an official strategy against illegal mining.
The workers in the mineshaft in Stilfontein are believed to be facing a lack of food, water and other basic necessities after police closed off the entrances used to transport their supplies underground.
It is part of the police’s “vala umgodi (“close the hole”) operation, which includes cutting off miners’ supplies to force them to return to the surface and be arrested.
Photo: AP
Police had earlier indicated that information received from those who recently helped bring three miners to the surface indicated that up to 4,000 workers might be underground.
However, on Thursday afternoon, police spokeswoman Athlenda Mathe said that they believed the number was exaggerated and might be far fewer than that, estimating a figure of 350 to 400 miners.
“We feel that the numbers are being exaggerated. We have deployed maximum resources to this case including our intelligence operative who are on the ground who have engaged with all stakeholders,” Mathe said. “We have managed to estimate the numbers to be between 350 and 400.”
South African ministers of police and defense were expected to visit the mine to engage with officials and community members on the ground, she said.
Stilfontein is one of the mines that were targeted by police as they intensified their operation in North West from Oct. 18.
It was unclear how long the current group of miners have been underground, as the groups are reported to often stay underground for months, depending on supplies of basic necessities like food and water from the outside.
“We have taken a decision that no police officer, no soldier or government official will go down to an abandoned mine. There is a high risk of loss of life,” Mathe said.
Mathe said they had information that the miners might be heavily armed, adding that since embarking on operations against illegal miners since December last year, police had seized more than 369 high-caliber firearms, 10,000 rounds of ammunition, 5 million rand (US$275,000) in cash and 32 million rand of uncut diamonds.
In the past few weeks, more than 1,000 miners have surfaced at mines in North West, with many reported to be weak, hungry and sickly after going for weeks without basic supplies.
Police on Thursday continued to guard areas around the mine to catch all those appearing from underground.
Cabinet Minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni told reporters on Wednesday that the government would not send any help to the illegal miners, because they are involved in a criminal act.
“We are not sending help to criminals. We are going to smoke them out. They will come out. Criminals are not to be helped. We didn’t send them there,” Ntshavheni said.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
RSS