China will take tough measures to rectify coal mine industry this winter, vowing to improve the country's coal mine safety, said State Councilor Hua Jianmin at a meeting on coal mine safety held in Beijing on November 11.

Hua said to ensure work safety in coal mine industry is significant to the country's macro-economic development.

The industry should take safety and human-life in prior agenda, he stressed.

The accident prevention work should be concentrated on gas explosion prevention, and relevant departments should carefully investigate production beyond the ventilation capability in mines and list out those high-risk coal mines for tighter supervision, Hua said.

In the first eight months this year, the death toll of coal mine accidents hit 3,457, according to the State Administration of Work Safety.

Last month, a deadly gas explosion at the Daping Coal Mine in central China's Henan Province took 141 miner' lives.

Source: Xinhua