Mexican search teams recover 14 dead workers after mine blast

(CNN) — Search teams have recovered the last of 14 workers killed in an explosion at a mine in northern Mexico, the country’s labor secretary said Sunday morning.

“Objective accomplished,” Labor Secretary Javier Lozano said in a Twitter post.

But he later told reporters that the federal government would step up its inspections of mines in light of the blast.

“We want coal free of blood, clean coal,” Lozano said, speaking minutes after forensic investigators drove away with the last body, the state-run Notimex news agency reported.

Rescuers began searching for survivors in the mine outside Sabinas, Mexico, on Tuesday, after an explosion injured one worker and trapped 14 others inside.

But after they entered the mine’s shaft, officials painted an increasingly bleak picture of the incident. At one point, Lozano posted on his Twitter account that the prognosis was “not at all encouraging.”

He went on to criticize the owner of the small, makeshift mine, referring to the facility and others like it as “irregular, deadly traps.”

Sabinas is in the coal production center of Mexico and has a museum dedicated to the history of coal mining.

In 2006, in the nearby town of San Juan de Sabinas, 65 miners perished after an explosion in the mine where they were working.

An organization representing family members of the victims of that accident said Tuesday’s blast was a tragic reminder that the federal government must do more to regulate mines. One activist from the organization said there had been more than 40 people killed in local coal mines since the 2006 accident.

CNNMexico.com contributed to this report.