By Nellie Peyton and Xolani Nhlapo STILFONTEIN, South Africa (Reuters) -South African rescuers ended their attempts on Thursday to find anyone left in an illegal gold mine where at least 78 people died during a police siege,

The miners are suspected to have died of starvation and dehydration, although no causes of death have been released.

It will be a "mammoth task" to identify the bodies brought up from a disused mineshaft in South Africa this week, a police spokesperson says. Seventy-eight corpses, along with more than 240 illegal miners,