An explosion shook a coal mine in the remote Svalbard Islands Thursday morning, killing at least 26 people.
Officials said the victims were Russians or Ukrainians working in a mine in Barentsburg, about 30 miles west of Longyearbyen, the district capital of the Svalbards.The cause of the explosion was not immediately known. Local authorities said the blast was not reported to them until about three hours later.
At least 33 people survived the blast, Elisabeth Aarsaether, a spokeswoman for the district governor's office, told the Norwegian news agency NTB.
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The Svalbards, 400 miles north of the mainland, are Norwegian territory but the islands have several Russian coal-mining settlements allowed under a 1920 treaty.