PRAGUE - The Czech Republic will stop mining black coal at the end of January, closing its last mine in a switch to greener energy sources, state mining company OKD said Thursday. Black coal mining has a tradition spanning more than two centuries in the eastern Czech region of Ostrava, once known as the country's "steel heart". The last power station using black coal closed last year, and coal prices are too low to even cover the costs of mining, she told AFP. - Mining job cuts -Brown and black coal mining employed about 100,000 people in the 1980s, when the former Czechoslovakia was ruled by Moscow-steered communists promoting heavy industry. Black coal output has slumped as well, from 35 million tonnes in 1989 to less than 1.2 million tonnes last year.