A GOLD mine shaft has collapsed in north-eastern Sudan, killing at least 11 miners and injuring 30, with a search continuing for more who are missing under the debris.

It was the second collapse of an informal gold mine in the country in a week.

The mines are among thousands of small-scale and informal mines scattered across Sudan, which has been engulfed in a war that has at times pushed parts of the country into famine.

At least 82 people were killed on September 13 when shafts collapsed at another gold mine in the country’s west, in an area controlled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary group which has been fighting the Sudanese military for over three years.

Abdalhay Kharif Abakar, who worked in the area, said the collapse in Oni, a remote area in the north-eastern state of Red Sea, had begun on Saturday night.

An official at the state-owned Sudanese Mineral Resources Company said 11 bodies had been recovered by Sunday, with 30 people rescued.

Large quantities of gold have been smuggled out of the country to finance the RSF, which controls gold-producing areas in the Darfur and Kordofan regions, according to experts commissioned by the United Nations.