Because thou hast had a perpetual hatred, and hast shed the blood of the children of Israel by the force of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time that their iniquity had an end: Therefore, as I live, saith the Lord God, I will prepare thee unto blood, and blood shall pursue thee: sith thou hast not hated blood, even blood shall pursue thee(Ezekiel 35:5-6).
The destruction of the Congo
says much more about the West than it does about the Central African country.
It reveals most clearly that the West is largely a criminal enterprise, the
prosperity of which is based on the genocide of Third
World people and the theft of their resources. The Congo is perhaps the worst example of this but
the West has followed the same policy in Asia, Africa and Latin
America for centuries. In this sense, Western countries can be
seen as a murderous mafia led by their godfather the United States government for which
no amount of blood and wealth is enough.
Must watch
Obama, the US and 5 Million Deaths in The Congo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHduddO7ZaU
Congo: Chaos By Design
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiJ0JC3LzEo
Inside the western heart of darkness : The so called Western Pan African African Multi-national Companies looting mineral resources from D.R.Congo
http://watchmanafrica.blogspot.com/2013/11/inside-western-heart-of-darkness-so.html
When Mercenaries of Babylon US reduce the poor to mere biological substances: Congolese refugees influx worries leaders in Kisoro
https://watchmanafrica.blogspot.com/2018/02/when-mercenaries-of-babylon-us-reduce.html
Helping US corporations and Neo-liberal slave states to primitively accumulate mineral resources in DR Congo: Uganda to build 223km road network inside DRC: Feeding your neighbour’s kids as your own kids starve to death is a very bogus idea
https://watchmanafrica.blogspot.com/2020/10/helping-us-corporations-and-neo-liberal.html
As M23 rebel group advances in Congo, a new leader signals a shift in its identity
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — After Rwanda-backed M23 rebels took control of the biggest city in eastern Congo this week, the man who emerged from the shadows to assert his leadership was not the group’s long-time military leader.
Sultani Makenga, an ethnic Tutsi rebel leader sanctioned by both the U.S. and the U.N., was nowhere to be seen in Goma’s Serena Hotel as the bearded Corneille Nangaa, in military fatigues, was ushered into the hall. Nangaa, who is not a Tutsi and who analysts say brings a more diverse, Congolese face to the group, told reporters of his plan to fight all the way to Kinshasa, the national capital a thousand miles away.
The spectacle was significant because it captures the evolution of M23 from an ethnic Tutsi-dominated outfit more than a decade ago to one that’s now actively seeking to be seen as a Congolese nationalist group. That’s the case despite the military support it gets from neighboring Rwanda, according to observers and analysts in Africa’s Great Lakes region.
From election chief to rebel leader
Nangaa is the former head of Congo’s electoral body who oversaw the 2018 presidential election won by President Félix Tshisekedi. He has been a controversial figure in Congolese politics for years. As the election commission chair, he oversaw the heavily criticized vote that elected Tshisekedi and led the U.S. to sanction him in 2019 for undermining Congo’s democracy.
A falling-out with Congolese authorities, including a dispute over a mining concession, sent Nangaa into exile in Kenya. In 2023, he joined the Congo River Alliance, a political-military coalition including 17 parties and rebel groups opposed to the government of Tshisekedi and became a top political figure.
Besides the mining, his grievance is also believed to be due to the president’s alleged refusal to advocate for the U.S. dropping Nangaa from its sanctions list, according to Christian Moleka, a political scientist at the Congolese think tank Dypol. “His perception that he had been mistreated by the authorities is what pushed him towards radicalization,” Moleka said.
An unholy matrimony
Last year, Makenga’s M23 joined Nangaa’s Congo River Alliance and with Nangaa at the helm of the revamped outfit, the M23 looked even more menacing to Congolese authorities, analysts say.
M23 is more of a threat now because the group is trying to “decouple the question of self-determination in eastern Congo” from evidence of Rwandan support, said Angelo Izama, an analyst with the Uganda-based Fanaka Kwawote think tank.
The rebels want to provoke a national discussion on widespread feelings of neglect in eastern Congo while gaining “as much territory as possible such that they can force the Congolese state to deal with questions of genuine autonomy and to force some kind of negotiation,” he said.
Forcing political negotiations is “a smart move” for the rebels, “the only path out of this crisis,” he added.
Getty ImagesThere is a good chance that inside your mobile phone is a miniscule amount of a metal that started its journey buried in the earth of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where a war is currently raging.
It may even be directly connected to the M23 rebel group that made global headlines this week.
The tantalum within your device weighs less than half of the average garden pea but is essential for the efficient functioning of a smartphone, and almost all other sophisticated electronic devices.
The unique properties of this rare, blue-grey, lustrous metal – including being able to hold a high charge compared to its size, while operating in a range of temperatures - make it an ideal material for tiny capacitors, which temporarily store energy.
It is also mined in Rwanda, Brazil and Nigeria but at least 40% - and maybe more – of the element's global supply comes from DR Congo and some of the key mining areas are now under the control of the M23.
The current wave of fighting has been going on for months, but the rebels grabbed attention with Sunday's assault on the vital trading and transport hub of Goma. The city, bordering Rwanda, is a regional centre for the mining business
Over the past year, the M23 has made rapid advances across the mineral-rich east of DR Congo, taking areas where coltan – the ore from which tantalum is extracted – is mined.
Like scores of other armed groups operating in the area, the M23 began as an outfit defending the rights of an ethnic group perceived to be under threat. But as its territory has expanded, mining has become a crucial source of income, paying for fighters and weapons.
Last April, it seized Rubaya, the town at the heart of the country's coltan industry.
Mineral extraction in this region is not in the hands of multinational conglomerates - instead thousands of individuals toil in open pits that honeycomb the landscape, or underground, in extremely unsafe and unhealthy conditions.
MonuscoThey are part of a complex, and yet informal, network that sees the rocks removed from the ground using shovels, brought to the surface, crushed, washed, taxed, sold and then exported to be further purified and eventually smelted.
Once the M23 moved into Rubaya, the rebels established what a UN group of experts described as a "state-like administration", issuing permits to the diggers and traders and demanding an annual fee of $25 (£20) and $250 respectively. The M23 doubled the diggers' wages to ensure they would carry on working.
It runs the area as a monopoly making sure – through the threat of arrest and detention – that only its authorised traders are able to do business.
The M23 also charges a levy of $7 on each kilogramme of coltan. The UN group of experts estimated that as a result the M23 earns about $800,000 a month from coltan taxation in Rubaya. That money is almost certainly then used to fund the rebellion.
There is a question mark hanging over how the ore extracted from M23-controlled areas gets into the global supply chain.
Neighbouring Rwanda, which is seen as backing the M23, is at the centre of the answer, the UN experts say.
Theoretically, a certification scheme - known as the Innovative Tin Supply Chain Initiative (Itsci) - should mean that what goes into a phone handset and other electronics does not come from areas of conflict where it could be used to fund armed groups responsible for carrying out atrocities.
EPAThe US' Dodd-Frank Act passed in 2010, and a similar piece of EU legislation, is aimed at ensuring that companies purchasing tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold – so-called "conflict minerals" – are not inadvertently funding violence.
But Itsci has come under some criticism.
Ken Matthysen, a security and resource management expert with independent research group Ipis, highlights that the dispersed nature of a lot of small-scale mines make it difficult for the local authorities to monitor exactly what is going on everywhere.
Itsci tags should be put on bags at the mine itself, to prove the origin of the minerals inside, but often they get transported to a collection point where it becomes harder to trace where the ore actually came from, Mr Matthysen said.
He added that there is also a possible issue with corruption.
"There is even an accusation of the state agents selling tags to traders, because they don't make a good living. So the traders then go around eastern DR Congo and they tag the bags themselves."
Itsci did not respond to a BBC request for comment, but has in the past defended its record saying that the scheme has been subjected to a rigorous independent audit. It has also been praised for bringing "prosperity for hundreds of thousands of small-scale miners".
In the case of Rubaya, Itsci suspended its operations there soon after the M23 entered the town.
Nevertheless, the group has managed to continue exporting coltan.
The UN experts map a circuitous route showing how it is transported to close to the Rwandan border. It is then transferred to "heavy-duty trucks" that needed the road to be widened in order to accommodate them.
Rwanda has its own coltan mines but the experts say that the uncertified coltan is mixed with Rwandan production leading to a "significant contamination of supply chains".
The M23 was already involved in the coltan business before the capture of Rubaya - setting up roadblocks and charging fees to cross them, according to Mr Matthysen.
"A lot of the trade of these minerals went through M23-controlled area towards Rwanda. So even then, Rwanda was profiting from the instability in eastern DR Congo and we saw the export volumes to Rwanda were already increasing," he told the BBC.
AFPFigures from the US Geological Survey show that Rwanda's coltan exports rose by 50% between 2022 and 2023. Mr Matthysen said this could not have all come from Rwanda.
In a robust defence of Rwanda's position, government spokesperson Yolande Makolo reiterated to the BBC that there were minerals and refining capacity in her own country.
"It's very cynical to take an issue like what's happening in eastern DRC, where a persecuted community is fighting for its rights... and turning [it] into an issue of material benefit," she added.
Rwandan President Paul Kagame has also dismissed the UN experts' reports, pouring scorn on their "expertise".
Much of the east of DR Congo has been blighted by conflict for many years, raising questions about who has been benefitting and whether armed groups are profiting from what is dug out of the ground there.
In order to highlight the issue and its connection to the smartphone industry, the Congolese government filed criminal complaints in France and Belgium at the end of last year against subsidiaries of the tech giant Apple, accusing it of using "conflict minerals".
Apple has disputed the allegation and pointed out that since early 2024, because of the escalating conflict and the difficulties of certification, it stopped sourcing tantalum, among other metals, from both DR Congo and Rwanda.
Other companies have not been so clear, which means that as the M23 seizes more territory those small bits of tantalum from the mines that they control could still make their way into the devices that we have come to rely on.
