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Search for miners called off
( 2001-07-29 16:39 ) (7 )

Rescue workers on Sunday called off the search for survivors in China's worst mining disaster this year, with officials saying the final death toll was 92.

Eighty-eight bodies had been found so far while the bodies of four more miners remain inside the mine, which collapsed after an explosion on July 22, an official at the rescue operation office said.

It was too dangerous to dig for the four remaining bodies as the mine continued to crumble and there had been several smaller collapses during the rescue work, the official said. The blast happened 260 meters into the mine.

The final death toll stood at 92, the official said. Earlier report 89 bodies had been found so far, but the official said the figure was actually 88.

The explosion trapped a total of 105 miners in the mine located in a village in Xuzhou, eastern Jiangsu Province.

Thirteen miners had been rescued and were in stable condition.

Investigators had not yet determined the cause of the blast, Xinhua said.

The death toll makes the accident one of the country's worst in recent years.

The owner of the mine, a farmer named Zhuang Jincai, has been arrested while the investigation continues.

The mine had reportedly been illegally reopened by Zhuang on July 15 after being shut down a month previously for safety reasons.

China is the biggest consumer and producer of coal in the world but the industry has an abysmal safety record.

A series of fatal mine accidents have killed at least 3,000 miners in the first half of this year alone. Last year nearly 5,000 miners died in accidents underground, according to official figures.