A powerful blast ripped through a coal mine in Kazakhstan on Sunday, killing 23 people, a spokesman for the Central Asian state's Emergencies ministry said. "Twenty-three dead have been recovered. Three injured miners have been taken to hospitals," the spokesman said by telephone from the Kazakh capital Astana. He said there were 87 people working underground when the blast struck the Shakhtinskaya mine near the northern city of Karaganda at 3:15 am (2115 GMT on Saturday).
"There are no more people left in the mine at the moment. We have evacuated all the survivors," he said.
The coal mine belongs to Kazakhstan's steel giant Ispat-Karmet, which is part of LNM Holdings NV, owned by Indian-born, London-based magnate Lakshmi Mittal. Karmet contributes a sizeable share to Kazakhstan's gross domestic product.
There was no immediate information on the cause of the blast, the spokesman said, adding that an investigation was under way.