Four Kordofanis suffocate in northern Sudan gold mine

An interruption to the oxygen supply in a deep gold mining shaft in Sudan’s Northern State left four people dead and two more on respirators in hospital on Monday night.

An official from Wadi Halfa locality, on Sudan’s northern border with Egypt, said that six people were working in the shaft in El Atmur desert on Monday night when the air supply failed. He said that two of the miners were able to be rescued and have been transferred to Dongola hospital.

Four of them were already beyond help when the rescuers arrived. The dead and the survivors are all from the Bara area of North Kordofan.

Community services

Mukhtar Ahmed, the secretary-general of the committee on environmental advocacy for the victims of mining in South Kordofan, has contradicted the announcement made by the Minister of Minerals to the Parliamentary committee on Tuesday about mining companies’ provision of community services in the state.

In an interview with Radio Dabanga, challenged the Minister of Minerals to mention a school or a hospital that has been constructed by the mining companies in South Kordofan, except sandy roads at Talodi and Gadeer for the services of those same companies.

Also he described the Minister’s statement as “false and baseless” and called for the need to treat all of the country's regions with justice and equality since other people have refused those factories too.

There have been protests and outcries across Sudan's mining areas to ban the use of toxic chemicals such as mercury and cyanide for gold extraction.