Miners are believed to be suffering from a lack of food, water and other basic necessities after police closed off the entrances used to transport supplies.

An estimated 4,000 illegal gold miners are hiding underground in South Africa after the government cut off food and water in an effort to "smoke them out" and arrest them. The miners have been in a mineshaft in Stilfontein, in the North West province, for about a month.

South Africa's government says it will let thousands of illegal miners starve until they accept their fate and emerge from an abandoned shaft to face arrest.

A body was brought out of an abandoned South African gold mine as police tried to evict hundreds of illegal miners hiding out in the workings.