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.

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

Arguing that the miners had entered the mine without permission, authorities reportedly cracked down by cutting off their access to food and water.

The authorities had at one point limited the miners’ access to food, water and other supplies in a blockade that drew criticism from human rights groups.

A group representing informal miners in South Africa says at least 100 men who were mining illegally in an abandoned gold mine have died after being trapped deep underground for months while police tried to get them out.

South African rescuers have pulled out 36 dead bodies and 82 survivors from a gold mine deep underground in two days of operations, police said on Tuesday, adding that the survivors would all face illegal mining and immigration charges.