On Wednesday, almost 70 people were missing and one of them was confirmed dead due to a landslip in northern Myanmar, at a jade mine, addressed by rescue team AFP.
A rescue team member, Ko Nyi addressed, around 70 to 100 people are missing in the landslip that took place approx. at 4:00 am in Kachin state, at Hpakant mine.
After a landslide in Myanmar, at Jade mine, around 100 people are feared missing.
However, the rescue team is desperately searching for missing people in a nearby lake and most of the victims are considered to be illegal miners and among them, one person is confirmed dead.
On Wednesday (21:30 GMT Tuesday), in the Hpakant area of the northern Kachin state, at around 04:00, the landslide took place.
Whereas Myanmar is also known as Burma and is the greatest source of jade, but its mines have faced countless accidents.
It is believed that the landslide is caused due to the overflow of rubble thrown away from lorries to the open-pit mines.
However, the rubble generates huge slopes in an area denuded of trees that can be dangerous, pressurizing those people looking for particles of semi-precious stones to work hard in these hazardous conditions.
From the Hpakant and the neighbouring town of Lone Khin combined search and recovery efforts at the site of the landslide, and the rescue team including of around 200 people. However, Boats were utilized to search the missing people in a nearby lake.
Ko Nyi addressed; we have sent around 25 injured people to the hospital while one was found dead and verified around 100 people were missing.
Although Jade mining is banned in Hpakant, the local citizens frequently disobey the regulations, due to poverty-stricken conditions and lack of employment opportunities that have made worse conditions from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Since February’s military take-over landmines at sites are not unexpected and the operations have also been thriving in the area.
A few days ago, in Hpakant at a jade block, more than 10 unskilled miners went missing in an alternate landslide.
In the year 2020, almost 160 people were died and most of them were migrants in one of the most dangerous disasters after mining waste collapsed in the lake in Hpakant.
In the year 2018, the law of a new gemstone mining was passed, but authorities say that the government has very few inspectors and that is with very limited authorities to terminate the illegal practices.
The defenders have blamed the drug dealers, military, insurgent groups, and the Chinese business activity for being in charge of jade trade and providing more safer and sustainable misuse of the valuable gemstone.
According to the report, the trade of Myanmar jade is worth beyond $30 billion which is 24 billion pounds per year along with Hpakant as being the site of the world’s greatest jade mine.
