At least eight miners died in Zambia Today after being trapped in a rockfall at a mine in the Copperbelt region, less than a month after a fire killed scores of illegal miners in South Africa, dpa quoted state media as reporting today. The miners who died Thursday were also suspected to be working illegally. The accident took place in a disused shaft belonging to Zambia's largest cobalt producer, Chambishi Metals. The miners were believed to be hunting for leftover cobalt and copper deposits. The victims bodies were discovered after a survivor of the accident, who was seriously injured, managed to escape and inform a passerby, who in turn alerted the mine police. Copperbelt Minister Mwansa Mbulakulima confirmed the incident to the German Press Agency dpa. Illegal mining is rampant in resource-rich southern Africa. In Zambia, Africa's largest copper producer, dealers employ poor people to scavenge for copper, which they then sell on the black market. In South Africa, illegal miners target disused gold mines, particularly when gold prices are high. In one of the worst mining accidents in the region in recent years, at least 82 illegal miners were killed in South Africa in May after a fire broke out underground at a disused mine owned by Harmony Gold, the world's fifth-largest gold producer.
