The clampdown on illegal mining cut off food and water to hundreds of miners underground. At least 78 bodies were pulled from a mining shaft this week, and more are believed to remain underground.

Hundreds are still trapped at the Stilfontein gold mine, a rights group said. Authorities tried to flush out the miners by depriving them of food and water.

The prospectors were trapped underground for months as police, on orders from South Africa’s government, attempted to starve them out.