Harmony death toll now up to 76

Minister of Mining Susan Shabangu described the tragedy as the worst in recent memory at an illicit mine in South Africa, and vowed after a visit to the site to fight the kingpins behind the illegal gold mining syndicates.

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters)  - 

The bodies of 15 more illegal miners were brought to the surface on Thursday, raising the death toll from a fire at a disused gold mine to at least 76, the mine's owners said.

Minister of Mining Susan Shabangu described the tragedy as the worst in recent memory at an illicit mine in South Africa, and vowed after a visit to the site to fight the kingpins behind the illegal gold mining syndicates.

The unauthorised miners were killed after a fire they are thought to have started raged for days at the abandoned mine owned by Harmony in the central Free State province where many disused mines hold enough deposits to attract illegal mining syndicates.

"Another 15 bodies were brought up today by their fellow illegal miners," said Tom Smith, a senior official at Harmony Gold Mining Co..

"Anything is possible," Smith said when asked if he knew whether more bodies were likely to be recovered.

The previous death toll on Tuesday was 61.

Gold prices near record highs have made the risks taken by well-organised illegal mining syndicates even more worthwhile.

Miners, most of them illegal immigrants, break through concrete seals covering closed shafts. Sometimes they sneak past security or bribe guards and stay underground for months digging for gold before leaving by shafts several kilometres away.

The miners died at Eland shaft near the town of Welkom, in a part of the mine that runs to depths of up to 1.4 km (0.9 miles).

South Africa, the world's third biggest gold producing country, has the world's deepest gold shafts.

Harmony, the world's No. 5 gold producing company, is particularly exposed to plundering by illegal miners, because it was built on a strategy of buying old, unwanted gold shafts and mines. The mines soon ran out of commercially viable amounts of gold and were abandoned.

There are no figures to quantify the value of gold mined by the illegal syndicates.

© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved

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