One dead and dozens missing in Burma due to collapse in jade mine

One person died and between 70 and 100 more are missing on Wednesday after the collapse of a jade mine in northern Burma (Myanmar), local media reported.
The landslide occurred during the early morning in the remote town of Hpakant, in Kachin state, and could have dragged more than a hundred people, according to The Irrawaddy newspaper.
Last weekend there was another similar accident that left six dead in the same mining complex, the largest in the world dedicated to jade, reported the local portal Mizzima.
Such events are common in Hpakant, where miners work in extremely precarious conditions.
In July 2020 an avalanche buried more than 160 miners while they were extracting the coveted jade from the slopes dug in torrential rain, and a year earlier at least 54 people died from a landslide at another point of the mining complex, located about 800 kilometers north of the capital. Naypyidaw.
The jade mines, to which the foreign press is barred, have become a magnet for thousands of impoverished Burmese from all over the country, but in most cases the benefits are scarce and the risks are high.
Burma is the world’s largest producer of jadeite, a prized variety of jade that is mined mainly in the Kachin Mountains and is especially coveted in neighboring China, where most exports go.

Original source in Spanish