70 confirmed dead in tin mine disaster

More than 70 miners have been killed in a south China tin mine that flooded, the Communist Party’s leading newspaper confirmed today, after days of official denials.

People’s Daily also confirmed that efforts were made to cover up the accident last month. A government minister was dispatched to Guangxi province Friday to investigate.

The mine owner has been detained, the newspaper said.

As recently as Friday, Guangxi government safety officials had said that investigators had found no deaths at the mine. Mine and government officials had said Chinese media reports of casualties were untrue.

But People’s Daily said more than 70 were now confirmed dead in the accident in Guangxi’s Nandan county on July 17.

People’s Daily said the mine flooded when miners drilled into a disused shaft that had been filled with water to stop it from collapsing. Miners ‘‘had no way to escape’’, it said.

The head of the Communist Party branch in Guangxi said officials who knew about the accident but failed to report it must be punished, People’s Daily said.

Media organisations in Guangxi heard of the accident 10 days after it happened, the newspaper said. But reporters who went to the area to cover the disaster were tailed and blocked.

‘‘The people responsible tried to hide the truth,’’ it said.