China detains 10 on Beijing subway tunnel cave-in

Beijing, Apr 1: Chinese police have detained 10 people in connection with the collapse of a Beijing subway tunnel being built for the 2008 Olympics that killed six workers, Xinhua news agency said in a report seen today.

The accident happened on Wednesday, but the construction firm failed to report it for nearly eight hours and instead tried to rescue the trapped workers on its own.

Project managers also ordered workers not to talk to media or police and confiscated their mobile phones, the report said, adding the project supervisor and tunnel designers were among those detained.

The bodies of three of the workers had been brought to the surface, but rescuers were still struggling to recover the remaining three, trapped under layers of earth and concrete, the People's Daily reported.

The 25-km line has reported several accidents in the past.

Last June, two people were killed in a collapse and in January 2006 a section of highway running past Beijing's central business district caved in, rupturing a sewerage pipe and flooding a subway construction site.

Beijing, seeking to improve transport in the notoriously traffic-snarled city, plans to add 84 km of new subway lines in time for the Games in August next year.

Reuters