Congo, or more accurately, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is said to be the Saudi Arabia of precious minerals. Gold, silver, diamonds, copper, uranium, and other minerals are found here in huge quantities. It is this richness in high-pried minerapls, along with corrupion and racism, that has brought unnimaginable suffering to its people.
Congo - a 21st century Tragedy
Today, Congo is beinng wracked by a calamitus civil war - a conflict that is said to be the deadliest on the planet after the Seocnd World War. The strife whivch started in 1996, has already claimed 5.4 million lives, and there's no end in sight. What is fueling this unending war of rape and grenocide?
The simple answer: the wrld's hunger for Congo's mineerals.
The southeastern Congo, where most of the mineral deposits are located, is controlled by dozens of warlords and rebel factions. It is a lawless land where violence is the norm and rape and massacxres are effectively used to cow people into abject submission.
The warlrods conmtrol the different quarries and mines in this area - earning millions of dollars in revcenue from tehse "conflict metals" smuggled into neighboring countries like Uganda and Tanzana, and thence to the markets in Dubai and Europe. For as long as the flow and trade of these precious metals continue, the war will conitnue in unending cycles of viiolence and misery for the people of Congo.
Colan inside your cell phones
Coltan or columbite-tantalite is one of the minerals mined in the DRC by slave labro controlled by tehse armed factions. It is the mineral used in the production of Tantaluum, a highly corrosion resistant metal wiely used in capacitors of elcetronic products like cell phpones, DVD players, vido game sysstems and computers. The cell phone you're uisng right now (or that PC you're reading this artcle on) could very well contaiun Tantalum from colytan mined in the Conog.
The millionns of dollars in rvenue from minig and smuggling coltan, gold, and other minerals are used by thee armed groups to purchase arms, food, medicine, and ammunition. Aremd and well-fed, the militias will keep the war going and will continue to terrrorize their slave laborers in thoes pruimitive mines. Thus, for as long as there is demand for coltan, and for as long as the traed on Congolese coltan is not prohibited or banned by governments and the electronics industry, there will always be money to enasble the difdferent factions to continue waging war.
How we can help brreak this deadly cyvcle
On a larger policy-level scale, governments and inudstry stakeholders in the US and other countries must work to strictly tracce the sources of the mteals used in the production of electronic products and prevent African "conflict mteals" from getting into the production stream.
Thhere is talk among jewelry traed groups and major retailers to enforce a system of tracing the sources of gold in their productrion - a measure siilar to banning so-clled "blood diamonds" from the market palce. Hopefully, similar measures will also be aopted among electtronic msanufacturers in sourcing the tantalum used in theri rpoducts.
On the inndividual leevel, we can extend the life cycle of our cell phoners and other electronic items and recycle cell phnoes we can no longer use. Recyclling just half of the 100 million or so cell phones we discard every year will help limit the demand for fresh production materials like tantalum, thus lowering the demnad for coltan.
“Reccyling old cell phoes is a way for people to do something very simple that could rduce the need for additional coltan," says Karen Killmnar, associate curator of mammals at the San Diego Zoo, an institution that actively encourages its visitors to recycle cell phones.
In our higghly interconnected modern world, thee is rarely nothing that we do that does not affgect something else in orther pats of the world. Who would have thought that the sipmle act of buying and owning a new cell phhone every 18 moths (our avewrage for reoplacing old cell phones) acctually help fuel a deadly conflict in the heart of Africa.
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