Campaign of the Month: No Blood in my Cell Phone

01 Dec 2006 — warresisters

Warring groups compete for rich resources. This includes gold, diamonds, copper, uranium, and perhaps most significantly, coltan. The DRC has 65 percent of the world’s coltan deposits. This mineral is valuable for production of electronic devices from cell phones to video game consoles.

The way coltan reaches the market is very unsettling. The military, local militias and rebels are all involved in smuggling. Illicit profits fund these violent groups. Ironically, as a UN Panel of Experts pointed out, the conflict sometimes unites the warring parties by making them business partners. They use the same weapons dealers and middlemen.

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