A woman carries a portrait of her father who was among 213 miners killed in a gas blast at the Sunjiawan colliery on Monday, on her way to the municipal funeral parlor in Fuxin, Liaoning Province, yesterday. Two miners were still missing in the country’s worst mining disaster since 1949. — Xinhua

The death toll in China's worst reported mine disaster in decades rose yesterday to 213, the government said, as families laid their loved ones to rest.
The gas blast on Monday occurred about 242 meters underground at the state-run Sunjiawan mine in the northeast Liaoning Province.
Among the dead was 49-year-old Zhang Weiguo, who had started working in the Sunjiawan mine as a teenager more than 30 years ago.
Zhang was cremated yesterday morning at a ceremony attended by relatives, city government and local mining officials.
Meanwhile, rescuers continued to search for two missing miners still trapped underground yesterday, five days after the blast.
The disaster also injured 29 miners who are being treated at a local hospital for carbon monoxide poisoning, burns and fractures.
The head of the country's work safety administration would head an investigation into the disaster.
Workers said they felt a sudden, strong tremor - "like an earthquake" - shake the mine 10 minutes before the blast. Moments later, gas detectors lost their signals and one of the mine's main pits filled with smoke.
Hollows in the ground from decades of mining cause layers of rock to shift - creating underground "quakes."
The Sunjiawan colliery has 3,100 workers and two coal mines. The Haizhou coal mine, the one where the disaster took place, produces 1.5 million tons of coal annually.
In another development, a total of 453 people were punished in the northern Hebei Province last year for their roles in causing or failing to prevent coal mine accidents, according to the provincial bureau for supervising safety at collieries.
A source with the bureau said that 26 people will face lawsuits, 16 people were given disciplinary punishment within the Party, 370 were given disciplinary sanction and 41 people face other forms of punishment.
The Hebei Provincial Bureau for Supervising Safety at Collieries and its branches investigated and checked safety work in 3,997 mines across the province, helping clear up 15,412 hidden safety risks.
The bureau ordered nine collieries to suspend production and urged local mines to strengthen worker training on safety awareness and dealing with possible risks.
(AP/Xinhua)