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Putin vows state support for families of Siberian mine blast dead

© RIA Novosti . Aleksei Kudenko / Go to the mediabankPutin vows state support for families of Siberian blast mine dead
Putin vows state support for families of Siberian blast mine dead - Sputnik International
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The authorities will offer every assistance to the families of the miners and rescue workers who died in two blasts in a mine in west Siberia at the weekend, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday.

The authorities will offer every assistance to the families of the miners and rescue workers who died in two blasts in a mine in west Siberia at the weekend, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday.

"The situation in which you have found yourselves...is so terrible and so tragic that no words of condolence are appropriate here, and I fully understand this," Putin told a group of bereaved relatives in the west Siberian city of Novokuznetsk.

He also said that the state would fulfill all its obligations to the relatives of the dead.

"Everything will be done," he said.

"I sincerely feel for you," the premier, who had earlier visited people injured in the blasts, went on, adding that, "You are not alone."

At least 43 people died and more than 70 were injured when two explosions hit the west Siberian Raspadskaya coal mine, near the town of Mezhdurechensk in the Kemerovo Region, at the weekend. Another 47 people are still missing underground.

Putin earlier said the state would pay one million rubles (just over $33,000) to the families of the deceased. He also said those people who suffered serious injuries would receive 400,000 rubles and people with less serious injuries 200,000 rubles.

The prime minister also said that there could be no question that the second blast was caused by negligence.

"Investigations into this kind of event always look into the problem from every angle, including the so-called human factor - the careless handling of naked flame," he said.

"But while this can be supposed with regard to the first blast, I believe that it can be ruled out for the second," he went on, adding that the follow-up explosion was the most powerful.

He also noted that rescuers had gone into the mine after the first blast.

"In this situation, there could have been no careless handling of flames or equipment," he said.

The 19 rescuers who went into the mine are now known to have all died in the second explosion.

Putin is currently heading to the Raspadskaya mine.

The cause of the two blasts has not yet been determined, although a Raspadskaya official said on Monday that methane levels were "normal" in the mine.

President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered the creation of a special commission to look into the disaster.

 

NOVOKUZNETSK, MAY 11 (RIA Novosti)

 

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