Police Slaughter Workers on Strike. South Africa is home to 80 percent of the world's known reserves of platinum, a precious metal used in vehicle catalytic converters and for other engineering purposes. Rising power and labor costs and a steep decline this year in the price have left many mines struggling to stay afloat. From [HERE] and [HERE]  Thirty-four people were killed in clashes between police and striking miners at a South African mine on Thursday, police said. Police opened fire after failing to disperse strikers armed with clubs and machetes at the Marikana mine.

The Lonmin-owned platinum mine has been at the centre of a violent pay dispute, exacerbated by tensions between two rival trade unions.

The incident is one of the bloodiest police operations since apartheid. Violence had already killed 10 people, including two police officers, since the strike began a week ago.

The images, along with Reuters television footage of a phalanx of officers opening up with automatic weapons on a small group of men in blankets and t-shirts, rekindled uncomfortable memories of South Africa's racist past. After over 12 hours of official silence, police minister Nathi Mthethwa confirmed that at least 30 men had died when police moved in against 3,000 striking drill operators armed with machetes and sticks and massed on a rocky outcrop at the mine, 100 km (60 miles) northwest of Johannesburg. Some of the carnage was captured in the raw video [HERE] 

In a front page editorial, the Sowetan questioned what had changed since 1994, when Nelson Mandela overturned three centuries of white domination to become South Africa's first black president. "It has happened in this country before where the apartheid regime treated black people like objects," the paper, named after South Africa's biggest black township, said. "It is continuing in a different guise now."