BEIJING, March 5 (Reuters) - A fire at a coal mine in Jilin Province in northeast China killed 17 people, state media reported on Wednesday.

"The fire broke out at 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday at the Jin An colliery in Dongliao County in Jilin," Yin Yuke, a local official, was quoted by Xinhua News Agency as saying.

"They all suffocated to death," said Yin.

Thirty people were working in the mine, 85 metres (280 feet) underground, at the time of the accident and 13 were rescued.

The mine was operating legally, about 130 kilometres (81 metres) from Changchun, the provincial capital of Jilin Province.

Last month, a blast in an illegal iron mine in northern China killed 24 people and injured five others.

China's coal mining industry is the world's deadliest, claiming close to 4,000 miners' lives last year.

Despite government campaigns to clean up the sector, mine owners still often push production past safe limits to maximise profits. (Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Edmund Klamann)

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