It was revealed yesterday that the iron mine in Anhui Province which collapsed on Saturday causing the deaths of three people was operating illegally.

 

The permit for the mine in Dalongshan Township, Anqing City, had expired last July, according to Cheng Chuanru, head of the Anhui Provincial Workplace Safety Supervision Administration.

 

And in fact the permit had lapsed because the mine had failed production safety checks, Cheng said.

 

Two bodies have been found, but yesterday morning rescuers were forced to abandon their efforts to recover a third body because of difficult conditions inside the shaft, a local government official said.

 

Saturday's collapse trapped eight miners 130 meters underground. As well as the three who died five remain in a critical condition in hospital.

 

Suffering a fractured rib and kidney damage one of the rescued miners Zheng Yujie was yesterday able to drink milk. All four other survivors have developed pneumonia.

 

Doctors at the Anqing City Hospital, where the survivors are hospitalized, said next week could be difficult as there was the potential for complications to arise.

 

Two other coal mine accidents in the past two days, one in northeast China's Jilin Province and another in southwest China's Guizhou Province, killed two people and left nine others missing, the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS) said on its website.

 

Yesterday morning, a roof collapsed at a coal mine in Jilin Province, killing two miners. Their bodies have been retrieved, officials said.

 

In Guijing Coal Mine in Guizhou Province a gas explosion trapped nine miners working underground on the afternoon of May 16.

 

(China Daily May 18, 2006)