(Bogota) Rescue services were on Monday in a race against time to save 11 workers stranded for three days by flooding at an illegal gold mine in Neira, northwestern Colombia.
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“We still have 11 missing people […] we hope that in less than 48 hours ”they will be rescued, Luis Velasquez, governor of the department of Caldas, where Neira is located, told reporters.
The miners are stranded in a well 17 m deep, flooded Friday following heavy rains. According to the National Mines Agency (ANM), the emergency services activated pumps to evacuate the water.
PHOTO LUISA GONZALEZ, REUTERS
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“We have problems because communication is very difficult, access to the area too,” admitted the Minister of Mines and Energy, Diego Mesa, in a video sent to the media. He added that it was an “unauthorized” mine.
Accidents of this type are frequent in Colombia, where income from illegal mining operations exceeds that from drug trafficking, according to the prosecution.
Several armed groups in this country, which have been facing a complex internal war for nearly sixty years, fund themselves mainly through these two activities.
Since the start of the year, mining accidents have already killed 33 people, according to the ANM, against 171 in 2020 and 82 in 2019.
Legally extracted minerals, along with oil, represent Colombia’s main export resources, Latin America’s fourth largest economy.
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