The 28 miners were killed in the colliery in Shaanxi province, in the country's northwest, after electrical cables caught fire late Saturday night at the Xiaonangou coal mine in Hancheng city, Xinhua news agency said.

Police detained Guo Yungang, the owner of the Xinxin Mining Co, which ran the colliery where the accident took place, the report said.

Local authorities have launched an investigation into the accident and ordered province-wide safety inspections.

As of early Sunday, five bodies had been retrieved from the mine, while rescuers were having difficulty bringing up the other victims as the fire in the pit was still smouldering, it said.

China's vast coal mining industry is notoriously accident-prone due to lax regulation, corruption and inefficiency as mines rush to meet soaring demand.

China relies on coal-generated power for about 70 of its electricity needs.

A total of 2,631 miners were killed in China last year, according to official figures, but independent labour groups say the actual figure could be much higher as many accidents are covered up to avoid costly mine shutdowns.

In other accidents Sunday, two miners were killed in a blast in a coal mine in Hunan province in central China, while 13 workers were trapped in a flooded colliery in Gansu province in the nation's northwest, Xinhua said in separate reports.

On Saturday, eight coal miners were killed in a blaze in a pit in Henan province, which neighbours Shaanxi, the agency reported earlier.

On June 21, an explosion killed 47 coal miners at a privately-owned mine in Henan's Pingdingshan city when a store of gunpowder kept underground detonated, state press reports said.

A police investigation found that the mine was operating illegally as its mining license had expired, they said.

In March, a flood at the huge, unfinished Wangjialing mine in the industry's northern heartland of Shanxi left 153 workers trapped underground. A total of 115 were recovered alive, in what was seen as a rare successful rescue.

Yet despite numerous pledges after that accident and other big mining disasters, there is virtually no let-up in the regular reports of deadly mishaps.

Zhao Tiechui, head of the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, said in February that China would need at least 10 years to "fundamentally improve" safety and reduce the frequency of such disasters.

As part of efforts to increase safety standards, the central government has levied heavy fines and implemented region-wide mining shut-downs following serious accidents.

earlier related report
China mine collapses as heavy rains persist
Beijing (AFP) July 16, 2010 - A lead and zinc mine in eastern China has caved in due to heavy rain and threatens to contaminate a popular lake, state media said Friday, in the latest of series of flooding-related disasters.

A river feeding Zhejiang's Qiandao Lake -- one of the province's major tourist attractions -- has turned grey after slag from the collapsed mine leaked out, the Xinhua news agency said.

The extent of any possible pollution was not known, said the report, adding that work had been lauched to divert flood waters away from the mine.

Nearly every province in the country's southern half, including Zhejiang, has seen deadly flooding triggered by torrential downpours since the beginning of July.

So far, 135 people have died in floods and landslides, and another 41 are missing, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

Authorities are also bracing for the arrival of Typhoon Conson, which killed 23 people and left dozens missing in the Philippines.

It could make landfall on Hainan island off China's southern coast later Friday, the National Meteorological Centre said.

The centre has warned that Hainan, nearby Guangdong province, and the Guangxi region can expect torrential rain.

The typhoon could worsen problems along the Yangtze River basin, which acts as an unofficial dividing line between the north and south of the country and has seen rivers and lakes swelled by days of rainfall.

The head of the flood control office at the Yangtze River Water Resources Commission told AFP on Thursday that if the region continued to be drenched, China could experience the worst floods in 12 years.

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