About 600 black miners are killed each year in accidents.

They had joined the strike by black miners on Wednesday.

At least 240 black miners have been hurt in clashes with mine security personnel and the police.

The union, which represents 260,000 black miners, said in a statement that it had accepted pay increases of 13 to 21.5 percent.

Discontent runs deep among the black miners, who had to leave their families in rural areas for lack of housing at the mines.

So the recent strike by black miners against the gold and diamond industries is reported almost as a routine labor story.

He traveled the country recruiting black miners into the union, which now claims more than 273,000 members.

The average black miner earns $250 a month, a third of what white miners make for the same work.

The strike of black miners against the nation's gold and coal producers is the main event.

The black miners take home up to $250 a month.