The South African government has launched a rescue operation at an abandoned gold mine in the country’s North West province, where at least 109 men have died, a group representing the miners said, after local authorities cut off vital supplies in a dramatic bid to crack down on the country’s illegal mining trade.

Six more bodies have been pulled up from a South African mine as efforts continue for a second day to help scores of illegal miners still thought to be at least 2km (1.2 miles) underground, a national umbrella body for NGOs,

Using a cage-like device, South African rescuers have brought at least 60 bodies and 92 survivors to the surface from one of the country's deepest mines.

Rescuers are sending a cage-like structure into one of South Africa’s deepest mines in an attempt to bring out survivors among hundreds of illegal miners trapped for months in an abandoned shaft

Authorities launched an operation in November to force the illegally operating miners out by cutting off food and water from the surface for a time. Hundreds are thought to remain underground.