BLOOD MINERALS AND RESOURCE CURSE: THE CASE OF SUDAN AND THE DRC

Sun 28 September 2025:

Minerals fuel modern civilization, ensuring comfort and amenities. From electronic devices to machines of all types, various minerals are required to operate them. Should we call the civil wars in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) a manifestation of the resource curse? A closer look at the political scenario can unravel the mystery. Sudan’s blood gold is smuggled to the United Arab Emirates to pander to power ambition. Despite not having a single gold mine, the UAE is the hub of the gold market. The USA and other European countries can procure cheap blood gold from the UAE markets to finance the war in Palestine and other places.

Coltan, cobalt, copper, diamond, uranium, tin, and gold mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo have become a scapegoat due to the ethnic strife between the Hutu and the Tutsi. In the wake of the Rwandan genocide, the Hutu extremists took shelter in Zaire, which later became the DRC, and planned to regain power in Rwanda, which was under the control of the Tutsi. The Tutsis, with the help of the Ugandan and Rwandan army, formed a coalition to disarm the Hutu militias. The coalition forces killed starving Hutu refugees. Once Laurent Kabila deposed Mobutu from power, he ordered the Coalition army to go back to Rwanda. The army went back but came back to massacre people and loot mineral resources. Rwanda was complicit in this plundering war. DRC president Laurent Kabila was killed, and his son became the new president. Gold from the DRC is being sent to the UAE, the hub of the global gold trade economy.

Being militarily sponsored by the Rwandan government to create tension and political unrest, the M23 rebels took control of some parts of the DRC so that precious minerals could be easily taken out of the country. The government of Congo bombed the area taken over by the rebels to drive them away, but they did not back off, and now they are trying to prove that they have a good relationship with the civilians. M23 rebels claim that they are occupying those areas where Tutsis are living to give them protection against the Congolese government. The Alliance of Patriots for a Free and Sovereign Congo, which previously fought against the government, now collaborates with the Congolese army against the M23 rebels. The Rwandan government is allegedly said to have the political ambition to incorporate those areas inhabited by the Tutsi into Rwanda.

Artisanal miners in the DRC forage for cobalt from temporary mining embankments and avoid being caught by security guards. Sometimes they are buried alive by the collapse of the embankments. Cobalt, an important component of batteries, is highly sought after in today’s green economy, and nearly 70 per cent of it comes from the DRC. Artisanal miners also risk their lives by digging for cobalt through tunnel mining. If the tunnels collapse, they have no way to come out, and they will be buried alive. Chinese and Swiss companies buy cobalt from the DRC and sell it to big companies to make batteries for phones, laptops, and electric cars. Child miners are sent to school to avoid the back-breaking work of cobalt foraging and get entangled in a hunt for employment in the future. Miners of the DRC are paying the price for the green economy. Houses adjacent to the mine experience cracks due to blasts in the mine. Huge and intimidating open pit now dominates the landscape of the mine area. But some have managed to improve their financial condition due to the cobalt mines in Kolwezi.

The civil war in Sudan is fought between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. People are suffering from cholera due to a lack of safe drinking water, as water pipes were destroyed because of the war. In this power game, civilians are the pawns and easy victims. They have to pay the price with their lives. They suffer from malnutrition and become victims of famine caused by civil war in Sudan. People are forced to eat rats, insects, grasshoppers, baobab tree leaves, and grass due to a lack of regular food items. People even chase dogs to catch and turn them into food. Power-grabbing schemes endanger the lives of civilians. People who used to have a peaceful life before the war now live in an environment where killing is normalized by the warring factions. Stumps of limbs proclaim the severity of the conflict. The Nuba Mountains now shelter them temporarily from the atrocities of war. Food scarcity is becoming acute due to the meaningless war.

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UN peacekeepers are sometimes found to have sexual relationships with native women in the DRC against the code of conduct. They disappear once they have physical relationships, and the children are born with a lighter skin complexion. Women desperately try to contact the men, but without any luck. Women remain vulnerable to sexual assault even during times of comparative peace, and war brings havoc for them. When women and children fled the DRC to escape the sexual assault and took refuge in Uganda, they again became victims of sexual violence by army officers. Orphans are the inevitable outcome of the devastating war.

Civilians in DRC became the victims of rape, killing, and torture by the warring factions. They have nothing to do with war. They just want to lead a peaceful life. But war has devastated their lives. They are the helpless victims of these severe fights, where their control is almost zero. Women are raped while looking for food to feed their children. Sometimes classrooms are used to shelter the displaced people after class hours. Farming in the new area is very challenging due to a lack of seeds and other agricultural inputs. After three decades of war, people feel exhausted and cannot take the burden anymore. Whether they want it or not, they have to endure the ordeal of protracted war. Displaced people’s dream of going back home remains an illusion in the face of escalated conflict and war. People say that because of the war, the place has become hell on earth. Life expectancy is said to be twenty-four hours. The law-and-order situation in Goma has deteriorated after M23 seized the city. Meanwhile, some Tutsis were displaced from the DRC because they were told that they had no right to live there, and they ended up in Rwanda. While the war is going on, the state mechanism is oscillating like a pendulum and leaving its deadly impact on hapless civilians. And minerals, instead of bringing prosperity to the community, have become a glaring example of the resource curse due to selfish war.

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