Rescuers and volunteers have pulled at least 78 dead miners and more than 160 survivors from an abandoned South African gold mine

The prospectors were trapped underground for months as police, on orders from South Africa’s government, attempted to starve them out.

Arguing that the miners had entered the mine without permission, authorities reportedly cracked down by cutting off their access to food and water.

Rescue workers retrieved at least 78 bodies from an illegal gold mine in South Africa, where police cut off food and water supply.

The death toll in a monthslong standoff between police and miners trapped while working illegally in an abandoned gold

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -South African authorities have pulled at least 60 bodies from the shaft of a closed gold mine more than 2 km (1.2 miles) underground where an unknown number of men are still feared trapped,

South Africa's police have launched a manhunt for an alleged "kingpin", who is accused of controlling operations at an abandoned gold mine where 78 corpses were discovered last week. The police force said officials had helped James Neo Tshoaeli, a Lesotho national also known as Tiger, to escape after he was pulled up from the mine in Stilfontein.

South African police are searching for 'Tiger,' a gang leader involved in an illegal gold mine where 78 bodies were found. Surviving miners report starvation as gang leaders hoarded food. The incident has raised questions about accountability,

By Nellie Peyton JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -South African police are hunting a gang leader from Lesotho believed to have controlled operations at an illegal gold mine where 78 bodies were recovered last week after months of police siege.