At least 78 people have died after authorities imposed a blockade on an illegal gold mine here, part of a monthslong standoff between prospectors and a government determined to force them to surface—often by cutting off their food and water.

A total of 78 bodies and 166 survivors - some of them emaciated and disorientated - have been hauled out so far in a court-ordered rescue operation, with hundreds more men still stuck 2 km (1.5 miles) below the surface in a gold mine at Stilfontein,