A gas explosion at a Chinese coal pit has killed at least 74 miners.
Thirty-two miners were still missing in freezing temperatures at the Liuguantun colliery in Tangshan, 108 miles east of Beijing in Hebei province, after yesterday's blast.
Xinhua news agency said initially that 186 miners had been working in the pit at the time but later revised the figure to 106. The State Administration of Work Safety put the number in the pit at 123.
Police struggled to hold back hundreds of relatives crowding around the mine's entrance hoping for information. But with high gas levels inside the shaft, rescue efforts were going slowly.
Families of the dead would each be compensated 200,000 yuan (€20,000), state television said.
China has been struggling to clean up its mining industry, which killed 2,700 people in the first half of 2005 alone, but there has been a rash of accidents in recent weeks.
An explosion in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang in late November killed 171 miners. Flooding at another Hebei mine days earlier trapped 18 underground. Three managers fled the scene, leaving rescuers with no guide to the underground warren.
Last week, 42 miners were trapped by flooding at a mine in the central province of Henan. Three mine officials fled that accident but were later caught by police. The mine had been operating without a safety permit.
Booming demand and high coal prices mean regulations are often ignored, production is pushed beyond safe limits and closed mines reopen illegally.