A collapsed gold mine in Sudan’s West Kordofan state has effectively become a mass grave after efforts to recover bodies were halted, local Sudanese media reported on Thursday.
The development marks a sharp deterioration from earlier reports that residents and rescuers were still searching the Al-Zara mine near En Nahud, where at least 82 people have been confirmed killed and 50 injured.
Local sources told Darfur24 that all rescue and body-recovery operations at the mine had now stopped, while the final number of people still buried underground remained unclear.
The sources said a Rapid Support Forces unit operating from the nearby Al-Rageeg mine arrived at the collapsed shafts in a Land Cruiser and prevented residents from approaching the site.
Six adjoining mining shafts collapsed at Al-Zara earlier this week, trapping large numbers of artisanal miners underground.
The Sudan Times reported on Wednesday that the confirmed death toll had risen to 82, citing a local administration official and an RSF source who spoke to AFP. An unknown number of miners were still believed to be beneath the rubble at the time.
Darfur24’s latest report did not provide a revised casualty figure, citing earlier local estimates of more than 60 deaths and saying the lack of records identifying miners and their families had complicated efforts to determine the full toll.
The mine shafts had previously been abandoned before miners returned to work there independently using a practice known locally as “komaji.”
Sources said overcrowding at Al-Zara increased after production declined at the nearby Angareeb mine, one of the area’s largest gold-mining sites, driving more artisanal miners towards Al-Zara.
With recovery attempts now abandoned, local sources described the collapsed shafts as a “mass grave.”
Witnesses also reported the smell of decomposing bodies coming from inside the mine, indicating that victims remain trapped underground.
