Inside China Today

Loufan landslide kills over two hundred

On August fourth, a serious landslide at an ore dressing plant has killed more than two hundred people. The ore plant was on Tai Gang Jian Shan and located in Loufan, Shanxi province. The official news agency, Xinhua, however, reported only eight deaths. The public has angrily criticized official media for this deception.
According to villagers, the accident took place on midnight the first of August. Rescue efforts, however, didn’t start until eleven am the next morning, wasting precious time.

The iron ore mine started production in nineteen ninety seven. Due to a lack of suitable waste disposal sites, the plant has for many years dumped waste in Sigou village. The landslide was caused by the earth underneath giving way to weight of the slag on top.

Power shovels were used to dig out bodies. The bodies however, when dug out were missing limbs, and only a mess of organs were recovered. The public was not allowed close to the scene. Villagers exclaimed, “So much injustice has been done to the deceased, so much that even their corpses couldn’t be whole. Where is justice in this world?”

A county official also confirmed that the reason for the landslide was the iron mine’s dumping of slag. He said that rescue efforts are continuing. A special incident response unit has been organized, consisting of several teams. The death toll is been reported directly to higher authorities, but not through the county government.

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