Australia's opposition leader, Kim Beazley, made a thought-provoking remark last week after two miners were rescued in spectacular fashion from a partially collapsed gold mine in the southern Australian state of Tasmania. "No amount of gold is worth an Australian life," Mr. Beazley was reported as saying. Then he repeated it for emphasis: "No amount of gold."

The Labor Party leader was calling for an independent inquiry into the rockfall that led to the men being entombed for two weeks in a cramped cage almost 1 km below the surface, implying that the mine's owners and managers may have cut corners on safety. But even allowing for the politically charged context, the comment stops you in your tracks. Many countries suffer mining disasters -- including cave-ins, floods and explosions -- but in how many of them would such a sentiment be expressed so unequivocally?

Eleven days before the Australian rescue, 30 Chinese coal miners were killed in a gas explosion in a mine in Shaanxi province, just the latest in a string of similar disasters in China. In January, 12 Americans, seven Romanians and one Afghan were killed in coal-mine blasts in their respective countries.