An unidentified woman protests against the police near a shooting scene at the Lonmin mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Friday, Aug. 17, 2012. Police chief Mangwashi Victoria Phiyega says 34 miners died and another 78 were wounded when police opened fire on strikers in one of the worst police shootings in South Africa since apartheid. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
An unidentified woman protests against the police near a shooting scene at the Lonmin mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Friday, Aug. 17, 2012. Police chief Mangwashi Victoria Phiyega says 34 miners died and another 78 were wounded when police opened fire on strikers in one of the worst police shootings in South Africa since apartheid. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
Striking mineworkers are caught in teargas as police open fire on striking miners at the Lonmin Platinum Mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012. An unknown number of people have been killed and injured. Police moved in on workers who gathered on a rocky outcropping near the Lonmin late afternoon, firing unknown ammunition and teargas. (AP Photo) SOUTH AFRICA OUT
Police surround the bodies of striking miners after opening fire on a crowd at the Lonmin Platinum Mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012. An unknown number of people have been killed and injured. Police moved in on workers who gathered on a rocky outcropping near the Lonmin late afternoon, firing unknown ammunition. (AP Photo) SOUTH AFRICA OUT
RETRANSMISSION FOR ALTERNATIVE CROP Police surround the bodies of striking miners after opening fire on a crowd at the Lonmin Platinum Mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012. South African police opened fire Thursday on a crowd of striking workers at a platinum mine, leaving an unknown number of people injured and possibly dead. Motionless bodies lay on the ground in pools of blood. (AP Photo)
Police surround the bodies of striking miners after opening fire on a crowd at the Lonmin Platinum Mine near Rustenburg, South Africa, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012. South African police opened fire Thursday on a crowd of striking workers at a platinum mine, leaving an unknown number of people injured and possibly dead. Motionless bodies lay on the ground in pools of blood. (AP Photo)
MARIKANA, South Africa (AP) ? Frantic wives searched for missing loved ones, President Jacob Zuma rushed home from a regional summit and some miners vowed a fight to the death Friday as police announced a shocking casualty toll from the previous day's shooting by officers of striking platinum miners: 34 dead and 78 wounded.
Wives of miners at the Lonmin platinum mine northwest of Johannesburg took the place of dead and wounded husbands on Friday in staging a protest. But this time instead of asking for higher wages as the miners had done, the women demanded to know why police had opened fire Thursday with automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns on the strikers, many of whom had been armed with spears, machetes and clubs. Police said at a news conference that it was in self-defense, noting that strikers even possessed a pistol taken from a police officer they had beaten to death on Monday.
"Police stop shooting our husbands and sons," read a banner carried by the women. They kneeled before shotgun-toting police and sang a protest song, saying "What have we done?" in the Xhosa language.
National police Chief Mangwashi Victoria Phiyega told a packed news conference Thursday was a dark day for South Africa and no time for pointing fingers, even as people compared the shootings to apartheid-era state violence and political parties and labor unions demanded an investigation.
At least 10 other people were killed during the week-old strike, including two police officers battered to death by strikers and two mine security guards burned alive when strikers set their vehicle ablaze.
Makhosi Mbongane, a 32-year-old winch operator, said mine managers should have come to the striking workers rather than send police. Strikers were demanding monthly salary raises from $625 to $1,563. Mbongane vowed that he was not going back to work and would not allow anyone else to do so either.
"They can beat us, kill us and kick and trample on us with their feet, do whatever they want to do, we aren't going to go back to work," he told The Associated Press. "If they employ other people they won't be able to work either. We will stay here and kill them."
Myriad problems are facing South Africa 18 years after white racist rule ended, including growing inequality between a white minority joined by a small black elite while most blacks endure high unemployment and inadequate housing, health care and education.
The shootings "awaken us to the reality of the time bomb that has stopped ticking ? it has exploded," The Sowetan newspaper said in a front-page editorial Friday. "Africans area pitted against each other... They are fighting for a bigger slice of the mineral wealth of the country."
The youth wing of the ruling African National Congress party argues that nationalization of the nation's mines and farms is the only way to redress the evils of the apartheid past. Zuma's government has played down those demands. Zuma's office confirmed that he had left a regional summit in Mozambique and was on his way to the mine, 70 kilometers (40 miles) northwest of Johannesburg.
Zuma said Thursday that he was "shocked and dismayed at this senseless violence." Lonmin PLC chairman Roger Phillimore issued a statement Friday saying the deaths were deeply regretted.
At hospitals in the area, people gathered, hoping to find missing family members among the wounded. At the scrubland scene of the killings, a woman carrying a baby on her back said she was looking for a missing miner.
"My husband left yesterday morning at 7 a.m. to come to the protest and he never came back," said Nobantu Mkhuze.
Shares in platinum miner Lonmin PLC fell as much as 8 percent Friday. Since violence broke out last weekend at the Marikana mine, shares have fallen by as much as 20 percent, wiping some 390 million pounds ($610 million) off the company's market value. The company, the world's third-largest platinum miner, has also been hit by Thursday's announcement that Chief Executive Ian Farmer is hospitalized with a serious illness.
Meanwhile Friday, police investigators and forensic experts watched by about 100 people combed the scene of the shooting, planting multicolored cones and numbered placards to mark evidence amid the dirt and bushes where the shooting took place. Police also searched the rocky outcropping where thousands of miners had gathered daily to strike.
The South Africa Police Service defended officers' actions, saying in a statement that they were "viciously attacked by the (strikers), using a variety of weapons, including firearms. The police, in order to protect their own lives and in self-defense, were forced to engage the group with force."
Shocked South Africans watched replay after replay of video of the shooting that erupted after police used water cannon, and then stun grenades and tear gas in an effort to disperse the strikers and get them to hand over their weapons. Some miners did leave, though others carrying weapons began war chants and marched toward the township near the mine.
Suddenly, a group of miners rushed through the underbrush and haze of tear gas at a line of police officers. Officers immediately opened fire, with miners falling to the ground. Dozens of shots were fired by police armed with automatic rifles and pistols.
By the time officers shouted "Cease fire!" dozens of miners were motionless on the ground, dead or dying.
Poor South Africans protest daily across the country for basic services like running water, housing and better health and education. Protests often turn violent, with people charging that ANC leaders have joined the white minority that continues to enrich itself while life becomes ever harder for the black majority.
While the initial walkout and protest focused on wages, violence has been fueled by the struggles between the dominant National Union of Mineworkers and the upstart and more radical Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union.
NUM secretary-general Frans Baleni has said that some of his union members were on a hit list, including a shop steward killed Tuesday by strikers.
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Faul reported from Johannesburg. Associated Press journalist Jon Gambrell contributed to this report.
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Jon Gambrell can be reached at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP .
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