Workers rest after retrieving the bodies of miners who died in a coal shaft in Baicheng County, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. A gas blast killed 14 men in the mine on Tuesday. — Xinhua

Corruption and collusion between officials and mine operators is behind the rash of coal mine disasters in China, senior officials said.
Underscoring the government's determination, officials are describing the mine safety crisis using the harsh language of "problematic worms," "blood-stained coal" and "gross domestic product stained with blood."
The Chinese government is determined to root out top local officials who have misbehaved in handling coal mine safety issues, said Li Zhilun, head of the Ministry of Supervision.
"China is determined to bring all of them to justice," said Li.
Authorities have determined to close 8,648 or 40 percent of the country's mines. Many of them are operating illegally, and some are just small pits.
The country has witnessed numerous and frequent coal mine tragedies, killing dozens of miners at a time.
In one of the latest disasters on Monday, more than 30 miners died in central China's Henan Province.
China will take the strictest measures to punish officials who try to deceive investigators by hiding the truth or obstructing their probes, said Li.
Some officials were quite likely to have received kickbacks from mine owners to look the other way, he said.
Corruption is one of the key factors behind mine disasters. Hundreds of officials had been unveiled as "problematic worms" in probes carried out by both central and local authorities, said Li.
"Corruption by local officials has appeared in every single procedure that relates to the approval, licensing, production and sale practices of coal mines," he said.
Corruption by those officials who looked the other way and did not enforce safety rules has aggravated the risks for miners.
Severe punishment of corruption is the key to finally solving the mine safety problem, said Li Yizhong, head of the State Administration of Work Safety.
"We will work to get rid of 'the coal stained with blood' or 'gross domestic product with blood stains,"' he said.
(Xinhua)