By Matters India reporter
Yangon, April 26, 2019: Cardinal Charles Maung Bo, head of the Catholic Church in Myanmar, has mourned the death of 54 people in mine tragedy on Easter Monday 22.
“Sorrow and sadness engulf the hearts of Myanmar people in the Easter week. 54 of our country men and women were buried alive. Hope is fading of finding anyone alive as mountains of mud swallowed these poor souls who were looking for pieces of jade in the garbage mountains,” the cardinal wrote to Bishop Francis Daw Tang of Myitkyina in Kachin state in northern Myanmar
The jade miners, most of them migrant workers, died when a mud filter collapsed in a mine at Hpakant in Kachin state on April 22 night, causing a landslide that hit the miners’ sleeping quarters. It buried the sleeping men and 40 pieces of heavy machinery.
Rescue operation began at the mine, which is about 30 meter deep, only on April 23 morning retrieving only three bodies from the mud.
The Salesian cardinal, who is also President of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences, lamented that it was not the first time the poor are buried under mudslide and mountain collapse.
“Hundreds have perished in the past. The greed of the corporates and their cronies inflict death sentence on the hapless multitude of this nation. They are sacrificed on the altar of greed and callousness,” the cardinal bemoaned.
A major landslide in November 2015 left more than 100 dead.
Myanmar’s first cardinal condemned the lack of minimum protection mechanism and appalling safety standards maintained saying, “We strongly condemn burying the poor alive.”
The cardinal further said, “While [we] strongly condemn the callousness of the corporates and their cronies we demand compensation for the families of those buried alive.”
While sending condolences and assurance of prayers to the families of affected ones, the cardinal called on the government, “to proactively take stringent measures to deter any more repetition of this inhuman tragedy.”
The jade industry is largely driven by an insatiable demand from neighboring China.
Watchdog Global Witness estimated that it was worth some US$31 billion in 2014, although very little reaches state coffers.
Northern Myanmar’s abundant natural resources — including jade, timber, gold and amber — help finance both sides of a decades-long civil war between ethnic Kachin insurgents and the military.
The fight to control the mines and the revenues they bring frequently traps local civilians in the middle.
A 17-year ceasefire broke down in 2011 and since then more than 100,000 people have been displaced by fighting.
On coming to power in 2016, civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi promised to make the peace process with the country’s myriad armed groups her top priority — a pledge that has yet to yield significant results.