The official Xinhua news agency said the men were killed when a blast ripped through the state-owned Liangjiahe coal mine in a mountainous area outside Shanxi province’s Linfen city.
It said efforts to investigate the cause of the blast were being hampered by the mine’s location in remote, difficult terrain.
Earlier today, Xinhua said 15 people had been trapped by flooding at a coal mine at Wuhai city, in north China’s Inner Mongolia region.
Many of China’s mines are poorly managed and have abysmal safety records, although the country is one of the world’s top coal producers.
The latest official figures show almost 7200 miners died in accidents in the first 10 months of last year.
