AFP, MUMBAI, INDIA Women buy gold jewelry at a shop in New Delhi, India, on Dhanteras, the first day of the five-day Diwali Festival, on Oct. 15, 2009. Photo: AFP High prices are likely to deter Indians from heavy gold buying this week during the Hindu...

Gunmen shot and killed three miners in the latest attack near the world’s largest gold mine in eastern Indonesia, officials said yesterday.

South Wales Chief Constable Peter Vaughan called the unfortunate outcome of the search-and-rescue operation on Friday “the one that none of us wanted,” because police had held out hope of finding some of the miners alive. It is Britain’s worst fatal mining accident in years. Officials do not know what caused the accident at the Gleision Colliery near Swansea, in south Wales, an area once synonymous with coal mining, but where the industry all but disappeared since Britain’s labor strife of the 1980s.

A buildup of volatile gas hampered rescue efforts in one Chinese coal mine and water continued to pour into another as emergency crews raced to reach 42 people trapped yesterday for a second day, officials and state media reports said. The accidents — a cave-in at one mine and a flood at the other — occurred on Saturday in two southern provinces after days of heavy rains.