Bolivians bury 16 killed in miners' clashes

HUANUNI, Bolivia, Oct 7 (Reuters) Grieving Bolivian families today held funerals for 16 people killed when rival groups of miners attacked each other with dynamite in an impoverished town in the Andean highlands.

A truce restored a tense calm to the town of Huanuni, where the violence erupted between independent and state-employed miners fighting to work in the government-owned mine, which is one of the world's biggest tin deposits, local media reported.

Weeping relatives gathered at the two funeral parlors in the town as streets were blocked off to make way for the mourners. Shops started to reopen and white flags hung from miners' houses, some scarred by the dynamite attacks.

''We're neighbours and relatives but some worked for the state and some worked for the (independent mining) cooperatives,'' said Walter Condori, whose uncle was among the dead. ''I just hope peace returns but the government must find a way to solve this or we'll keep killing each other.'' Local media said talks over the mine's future involving the government of President Evo Morales and the rival miners would begin on Monday. Morales yesterday fired his mining minister, who was criticised for not foreseeing the violence.

GOVERNMENT BLAMED But in Huanuni, a bleak town of about 40,000 people, angry miners continued to blame the government.

''I don't think anyone from the government will come (today) because they're to blame for not having found a peaceful solution,'' said Prudencio Pacheco, leader of the mining cooperative that fought for more control of the mine.

Some 1,200 state-employed miners and 4,000 independent miners work at Huanuni, which produces 10,000 tonnes of tin a year, slightly more than half Bolivia's total production.

The violence began when hundreds of independent miners threw lit sticks of dynamite at their rivals and packed dynamite into tires, which they rolled down to explode near state-employed miners guarding mine entrances.

There were deaths on both sides and about 60 people were hurt before a truce was reached yesterday.

Both state-employed miners and independent miners work parts of the vast tin mine -- the South American country's biggest -- and the independent cooperatives have long been demanding larger concessions to work the site.

State-employed workers complain that while they earn a monthly wage, workers from the independent cooperatives are paid according to the amount of ore they extract, frequently earning more than mine staff.

Leftist Morales, who has strong support among miners, was elected on pledges to fight poverty and restore state control to natural resources in South America's poorest country.

He nationalised the energy sector earlier this year but his government has so far ruled out a similar approach to the cash-strapped mining sector.

In a televised address late yesterday, Morales said ''the entire Bolivian nation is in mourning'' and urged the miners involved in the conflict to ''think of the country,'' state news agency ABI said.

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