The Open Veins of the Democratic Republic of Congo

KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of Congo — If it weren’t for the DRC, most people’s cellphones would burn their hands. They don’t though, due to the mineral coltan, of which more than 70% of the global supply is located in the DRC. However, only 54% of people in the country own a cellphone, with the majority living on less than the equivalent of $2 a day. The situation is especially dire in the mineral-rich and conflict-wracked east of the country, where 3 million people are facing critical hunger — a number that has doubled in the past year. Although a ceasefire was scheduled to be signed in the U.S. this week, President Donald Trump seems to have prioritized the U.S.’ economic interests over Congolese people’s needs.

Mining of the Congo’s natural resources is enriching neighboring countries, foreign powers and multinationals. Apart from coltan reserves, the DRC’s eastern provinces, particularly North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri, contain strategic minerals that include the “three Ts” — tungsten, tantalum and tin— as well as copper and gold. Big Tech companies like Apple, Tesla and Samsung depend on these minerals to build smartphones, computers, drones and electric cars. The average smartphone, for example, contains 40 milligrams of tantalum, used for anodes in capacitors to store electric charge — and around 70% of the mineral comes from the DRC and Rwanda.

Armed groups have been fighting for over three decades for control over mining regions. In 2021, the Rwanda-backed M23 — one of more than 100 armed groups in the country — resumed an offensive in the east, causing the mass displacement of more than 1.6 million people. Early this year, the M23 seized Goma and Bukavu, also in the east, leading to more mass displacements, violence, rape and looting. Some 787 people were killed in the initial siege of Goma. The M23 is accused of massacring 319 civilians in at least 14 villages in July 2025 in eastern DRC.

Fighting for control of mines and profits

Eric Kajemba, coordinator of the Observatoire Gouvernance et Paix (OGP), a civil society nongovernmental organization based in Bukavu, told Truthdig that the M23 has also recently seized several sites that mine 3T minerals, including the Rubaya site in Masisi, which provides 50% of the DRC’s coltan and 15% of the world’s tantalum.

“Mining continues in these areas, but it is now under the control of the M23, with smuggling routes passing through Rwanda and Uganda,” Kajemba said. The main minerals exported to Uganda are cassiterite and coltan, he adds.

The OGP has reported the presence of the M23 in South Kivu, a gold-rich region. There, the M23 has driven local miners out of the Luhihi mining site, Kajemba said. They are also trying to extend their control over the Twangiza industrial mine in Luwindja, a major gold mine in the region that government forces bombed several times in October in an effort to disrupt M23 operations. 

With the M23’s takeover of the Kivu region, initiatives to trace minerals for conflict-free and child labor-free certification have been abandoned. Now, the resources leave Rubaya for Rwanda and disappear.

The strategic value of minerals in eastern DRC have transformed the country into a sphere of influence for competing world powers, including China, the United States and the European Union. Geopolitical rivalries in turn exacerbate local conflicts that further destabilize the region.

“Economics are the primary motivator of the war” in the east of the country, said Emmanuel Umpula, director of Afrewatch, an NGO that advocates for fair and equitable management of natural resources. Congolese and foreign armed groups, mainly from Rwanda and Uganda, have been linked to smuggling networks that operate in neighboring countries, where factories and refineries process raw minerals that these countries lack.

Coltan: essential for phones and laptops

This year, the United Nations documented how coltan from the Rubaya mines was regularly smuggled into Rwanda and laundered through supply chains. Between May and October 2024, at least 150 tons of coltan were smuggled out of the DRC to Rwanda each month, resulting in the “greatest contamination of mineral supply chains” in the African Great Lakes region recorded in the last decade.

Official Rwandan figures show that their coltan exports doubled from around 1,000 tons in 2021 to 2,000 tons in 2023. Exports reached a record in the first quarter of 2025, with more than 600 tons reported. Most of this coltan is from the DRC. A 2025 Global Witness report detailed how commodities trader Traxys smuggles coltan mined in conflict zones from the Democratic Republic of Congo into Rwanda.

Coltan is essential for the manufacture of tantalum capacitors, the components that store and release energy in phones and laptops. Without coltan, cellphones would overheat, making them too hot to hold. Computers and game consoles would likewise reach excessive temperatures and even cause fires. 

A supply chain that benefits everyone except the Congolese 

“The DRC should get its share of the mining profits,” Yvette Mwanza told Truthdig. She is president of the Chamber of Mines for the Council of the Federation of Enterprises of Congo in North Kivu.

Attempts to remedy the imbalance, including a 2018 reform of the DRC mining code, have faced corruption and various conflicts of interests, with companies acting with impunity. The International Tin Supply Chain Initiative’s mineral traceability system to ensure a supply chain free from the influence of armed groups and the use of child labor is being undermined by the fighting.

Mwanza also stressed that tracing systems are governed by national and international auspices that can’t function while there is war in the east. Congolese authorities are also involved in and earn money from the artisanal mining sector. None of the involved entities stand to benefit from efforts to ensure more transparency in the supply chain.

“If mining companies were really operating locally, communities would be rich, young people would have jobs and there would be income-generating activities capable of reviving local economies,” said Eric Mikalano, a member of the Bukavu-based civil society organization Good Governance Initiative for Natural Resources in Kivu.

Mikalano gives the example of Walikale, in North Kivu, where Alphamin Bisie Mining operates. A Canadian company, its contract and infrastructure in no way benefit the local population, he said. The company’s tin output from Walikale increased this year, with that tin being sold for profits abroad.

“The community doesn’t receive any of the wealth from the mining these companies do, and the funds collected are often misappropriated,” Mikalano told Truthdig. And so the population grows increasingly impoverished.

Ineffective and unequal truce

President Trump negotiated a peace deal in June that the DRC and Rwanda were to sign in Washington on Thursday. The deal does not address any measures for justice and restitution, but does talk about disarmament and “respect for territorial integrity and a prohibition of all hostilities,” but with no reference to Rwandan involvement in that. 

It also outlines economic cooperation among the U.S., the DRC and Rwanda, and provides provisions for the U.S. to gain access to Congolese minerals in exchange for Washington’s “security assistance.” It appears the U.S. and its allied firms are even eyeing the Rubaya mine, seeing it as a strategic lever that can counter China’s growing influence in the region.

There is also the Doha Framework signed by the M23 and the DRC in November in Qatar. It covers other aspects of the conflict such as humanitarian aid, the return of people who were forcibly displaced and ceasefire monitoring. So far, however, several ceasefires have failed to end the clashes between the DRC Armed Forces and the Rwandan-backed M23, including those made in April 2023 and July 2024.

Umpula, the director of Afrewatch, urged caution. “These agreements are repetitive in different forms, with the same actors and the same broken promises,” he said. “It’s becoming a vicious cycle.” 

The smaller and impoverished countries neighboring the DRC, meanwhile, are feeling growing pressure to yield to the major powers. 

“Every country sees the DRC as a land of opportunity, a territory where they can come and take advantage of the prevailing disorder,” Umpula said.

“So far, Kinshasa has given more than it has received. The other countries appear to be the main beneficiaries … the partnerships are guided by the interests of the nations involved,” he said, arguing that peace cannot be built on an unequal foundation, and that the DRC must remain vigilant.

He stressed that the stability of the DRC depends above all on its ability to defend its interests and sovereignty and make the most of its own resources. “If Kinshasa wants lasting peace, it must build a strong, deterrent army capable of protecting its borders,” he said.

Rather than outside economic interests, Umpula called for Congolese leaders to have a clear vision that supports young people, strengthens institutions and establishes national policies that ensure minerals primarily benefit the country. 

“As long as there are minerals here, there will be mafia partners who will come to control them,” he said. “Congo needs to know what each partner really brings to these relationships.”