Two weeks after a tin mine flooded in southwestern China, reports of up to 300 miners being trapped have surfaced in state newspapers as local journalists skirt a media ban.
Officials still deny there were any casualties in the accident.
The official response has followed a similar pattern to several recent disasters in China when local authorities tried to curb the spread of information among increasingly aggressive and Internet-savvy reporters.
The China Daily, the country's official English-language newspaper, was the latest to fuel speculation of a cover-up with a report today that up to 300 people may still be trapped in the mine in Guangxi province.
But Guangxi safety officials say there is no evidence yet that anyone died after the mine flooded on July 17th, contradicting a state media report that 70 bodies had already been found.
"All those newspaper reports were just sheer nonsense," said an official at the Safe Production Office of Guangxi's Economic and Trade Commission.
Journalists who rushed to the scene of the accident last month say they were harassed by mine officials and swiftly censored by local authorities.
But many e-mailed their reports to newspapers in other provinces not bound by the restrictions.