About 120 workers are still thought to be trapped in a coal mine in western Turkey where a collapse killed 238 miners in one of the country’s worst industrial disasters, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Recep Erdogan said yesterday.
Erdogan arrived to inspect the site in the town of Soma in Manisa Province where an electrical fault caused an explosion the previous day, leading parts of the mine to collapse. Most of the deaths have been caused by carbon monoxide poisoning and three days of national mourning have been declared.
Meanwhile, Turkish police fired tear gas and water cannons at around 800 protesters in Ankara who accused the government and the mining industry of negligence.
Photo: EPA
The protesters, mostly students, hurled stones at the police and shouted anti-government slogans as they tried to march to the Turkish Ministry of Energy, a reporter said.
Fires and toxic gases were complicating the rescue efforts of 400 rescue workers, said Turkish Minister of Energy Taner Yildiz said.
“I must say that our hopes about rescue efforts inside [the mine] are fading,” he added.
The miners are all thought to have gas masks, but it was not clear how long they would last.
Earlier reports said 787 workers were underground when the blast occurred. Yildiz said 363 had been saved as of early yesterday.
Only a handful of miners were seen pulled from the collapsed mine in the morning, many of them already dead, a reporter said.
As victims were taken away on stretchers, friends and relative desperate for news of their loved ones tried to pull away the sheets covering their corpses.
Harun Unzar, a colleague of the missing miners said he had lost a friend previously, “but this is enormous.”
“All the victims are our friends,” he said as he wept.
SECURITY: As China is ‘reshaping’ Hong Kong’s population, Taiwan must raise the eligibility threshold for applications from Hong Kongers, Chiu Chui-cheng said When Hong Kong and Macau citizens apply for residency in Taiwan, it would be under a new category that includes a “national security observation period,” Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. President William Lai (賴清德) on March 13 announced 17 strategies to counter China’s aggression toward Taiwan, including incorporating national security considerations into the review process for residency applications from Hong Kong and Macau citizens. The situation in Hong Kong is constantly changing, Chiu said to media yesterday on the sidelines of the Taipei Technology Run hosted by the Taipei Neihu Technology Park Development Association. With
CARROT AND STICK: While unrelenting in its military threats, China attracted nearly 40,000 Taiwanese to over 400 business events last year Nearly 40,000 Taiwanese last year joined industry events in China, such as conferences and trade fairs, supported by the Chinese government, a study showed yesterday, as Beijing ramps up a charm offensive toward Taipei alongside military pressure. China has long taken a carrot-and-stick approach to Taiwan, threatening it with the prospect of military action while reaching out to those it believes are amenable to Beijing’s point of view. Taiwanese security officials are wary of what they see as Beijing’s influence campaigns to sway public opinion after Taipei and Beijing gradually resumed travel links halted by the COVID-19 pandemic, but the scale of
A US Marine Corps regiment equipped with Naval Strike Missiles (NSM) is set to participate in the upcoming Balikatan 25 exercise in the Luzon Strait, marking the system’s first-ever deployment in the Philippines. US and Philippine officials have separately confirmed that the Navy Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) — the mobile launch platform for the Naval Strike Missile — would take part in the joint exercise. The missiles are being deployed to “a strategic first island chain chokepoint” in the waters between Taiwan proper and the Philippines, US-based Naval News reported. “The Luzon Strait and Bashi Channel represent a critical access
Pope Francis is be laid to rest on Saturday after lying in state for three days in St Peter’s Basilica, where the faithful are expected to flock to pay their respects to history’s first Latin American pontiff. The cardinals met yesterday in the Vatican’s synod hall to chart the next steps before a conclave begins to choose Francis’ successor, as condolences poured in from around the world. According to current norms, the conclave must begin between May 5 and 10. The cardinals set the funeral for Saturday at 10am in St Peter’s Square, to be celebrated by the dean of the College