Kachin State’s recently appointed natural resources and environment minister Dashi La Seng said that it is the responsibility of jade miners to look out for their own safety.

The comments come after nine jade pickers were killed in Hpakant Township within a week due to a security crackdown and multiple landslides.

“People just take care of themselves on their worksite,” Dashi La Seng, a former parliamentarian representing Hpakant, told KNG on Monday.

The minister added that the government plans to issue new rules and regulations to protect workers and to launch a safety awareness campaign for the jade industry. Action will be taken against both jade companies and individual pickers who break the law, he said.

Police shot dead a jade picker at a jade block near Sang Hka village on February 4, when a group of pickers tried to enter the mine during an undesignated time. Two more men were killed in a landslide near Maw Sizar village on the same day. Six were killed in another landslide on February 10 in Shabaw village, Seikmu (Seng Tawng) village tract.

The government issued a new law in December of last year declaring that jade companies are permitted to work in mine blocks of less than five acres. The government also stopped issuing extension licenses to jade mining companies in April of 2016.