People leaving New Zealand hit record levels in the year to November 2024, in another sign of the weakness in the country’s economy that moved to a technical recession in the third quarter.

It will be a "mammoth task" to identify the bodies brought up from a disused mineshaft in South Africa this week, a police spokesperson says.

In mid-January 2024, over 1,000 hunger-weakened miners exited two abandoned mine shafts in Stilfontein, near Johannesburg in South Africa. They had been starved out by the police in Operation Vala Umgodi—meaning "plug the hole"—which had cut off food and water in an effort to "smoke out" a shadow workforce.

South African police have launched a manhunt for a Lesotho gang member believed to have controlled operations at an illegal gold mine where 78 bodies were recovered last week during a police siege, from which he escaped.

South African police say a suspected illegal gold mining ringleader escaped from custody with help from police officers about a week after resurfacing from a disused mine in South Africa where 246 survivors were rescued and 78 bodies were retrieved

By Nellie Peyton JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -South African police are hunting a gang leader from Lesotho believed to have controlled operations at an illegal gold mine where 78 bodies were recovered last week after months of police siege.