{"id":323382,"date":"2026-01-28T21:45:26","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T13:45:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=323382"},"modified":"2026-01-28T21:45:26","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T13:45:26","slug":"sudan-gold-mine-collapse-kills-13-miners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=323382","title":{"rendered":"Sudan gold mine collapse kills 13 miners"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bssnews.net\/assets\/news_photos\/2026\/01\/28\/image-355678-1769606331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"433\" height=\"242\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>KHARTOUM, Jan 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; A partial collapse of a gold mine has\u00a0killed 13 miners and wounded six others in southern Sudan, the state mining\u00a0company said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The collapse occurred in &#8220;five abandoned shafts&#8221; of the Umm Fakroun mine in\u00a0South Kordofan state last Friday, the Sudanese Mineral Resources Company\u00a0(SMRC) said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since conflict erupted between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support\u00a0Forces in April 2023, both sides&#8217; war efforts have been largely funded by\u00a0Sudan&#8217;s gold industry, in addition to foreign backers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;The shafts had been abandoned and shut down, but some miners snuck in and\u00a0were working illegally,&#8221; the statement said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The war has devastated Sudan&#8217;s already fragile economy and left much of the\u00a0country out of work, yet SMRC announced a &#8220;five-year high&#8221; in production of\u00a070 tonnes in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But officials lament that much of the gold is smuggled across borders\u00a0including through Chad, South Sudan and Egypt before reaching the United Arab\u00a0Emirates, the world&#8217;s second-largest gold exporter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of last year&#8217;s 70 tonnes, only &#8220;20 tonnes have been exported through official\u00a0channels&#8221;, army-aligned Finance Minister Gibril Ibrahim said this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Africa&#8217;s third-largest country is one of the continent&#8217;s top gold producers,\u00a0but artisanal and small-scale gold mining, like Umm Fakroun, accounts for the\u00a0majority of gold extracted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These mines lack proper safety measures and use hazardous chemicals that\u00a0often cause widespread diseases in nearby areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Before the war pushed 25 million Sudanese into acute food insecurity,\u00a0artisanal mining employed more than two million people, according to industry\u00a0figures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The war has left tens of thousands killed and around 11 million displaced. &#8212; NNN-AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>KHARTOUM, Jan 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; A partial collapse of a gold mine has\u00a0killed 13 miners and wounded six others in southern Sudan, the state mining\u00a0company said on Wednesday. The collapse occurred in &#8220;five abandoned shafts&#8221; of the Umm Fakroun mine in\u00a0South Kordofan state last Friday, the Sudanese Mineral Resources Company\u00a0(SMRC) said in a statement. Since [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":323383,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[213],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323382"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=323382"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323382\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":323384,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323382\/revisions\/323384"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/323383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=323382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=323382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=323382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}