Bodies of 25 illegal miners recovered from abandoned South African gold shaft

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Police recovered 25 bodies, believed to be those of illegal miners, from a disused Harmony Gold mine shaft, near an area where 76 illegal miners died in 2009 in what was one of South Africa's worst mining disasters.

The bodies were recovered from the Eland shaft near the town of Welkom, following a gas explosion late last week, in an area where disused mines without commercially viable amounts of gold still hold enough deposits to attract illegal mining syndicates.