How We Fuelled the Deadliest War in the World -- and It's Starting Again

The deadliest war since Adolf Hitler marched across Europe is starting again -- and you are almost certainly carrying a blood-soaked chunk of the slaughter in your pocket. When we glance at the holocaust in the Congo, with 5.4 million dead, the clichés of Africa reporting tumble out: this is a "tribal conflict" in "the Heart of Darkness." It isn't. The United Nations investigation found it was a war led by "armies of business" to seize the metals that make our twenty-first century society zing and bling. The war in Congo is a war about you.

Every day I think about the people I met in the warzones of Eastern Congo when I reported from there. The wards filled with women who had been gang-raped by the militias and shot in the vagina. The battalions of child soldiers -- drugged, dazed thirteen year olds who had been made to kill members of their own families so they couldn't try to escape and go home. But oddly, as I watch the war starting again on CNN, I find myself thinking about a woman I met who had, by Congolese standards, not suffered in extremis.

I was driving back to Goma from a diamond mine one day when my car got a puncture. As I waited for it to be fixed, I stood by the roadside and watched the great trails of women who stagger along every road in Eastern Congo, carrying all their belongings on their backs in mighty crippling heaps. I stopped a 27 year-old woman called Marie-Jean Bisimwa who had four little children toddling along beside her. She told me she was lucky. Yes, her village had been burned out. Yes, she had lost her husband somewhere in the chaos. Yes, her sister had been raped and gone insane. But she and her kids were alive.

I gave her a lift, and it was only after a few hours of chat along on cratered roads that I noticed there was something strange about Marie-Jean's children. They were slumped forward, their gazes fixed in front of them. They didn't look around, or speak, or smile. "I haven't ever been able to feed them," she said. "Because of the war." Their brains hadn't developed; they never would now. "Will they get better?" she asked. I left her in a village on the outskirts of Goma, and her kids stumbled after her, expressionless.

There are two stories about how this war began -- the official story, and the true story. The official story is that after the Rwandan genocide, the Hutu mass murderers fled across the border into Congo. The Rwandan government chased after them. But it's a lie. How do we know? The Rwandan government didn't go to where the Hutu genocidaires were; not at first. They went to where Congo's natural resources were -- and began to pillage them. They even told their troops to work with any Hutus they came across. Congo is the richest country in the world for gold, diamonds, coltan, cassiterite, and more. Everybody wanted a slice - so six other countries invaded.

These resources were not being stolen to be used in Africa. They were being seized so they could be sold on to us. The more we bought, the more the invaders stole -- and slaughtered. The rise of mobile phones caused a surge in deaths, because the coltan they contain is found primarily in Congo. The UN named the international corporations it believed were involved: Anglo-America, Standard Chartered Bank, De Beers and more than 100 others (they all deny the charges). But instead of stopping these corporations, our governments demanded the UN stop criticising them.

There were times when the fighting flagged. In 2003, a peace deal was finally brokered by the UN, and the international armies withdrew. Many continued to work via proxy militias -- but the carnage waned somewhat. Until now. As with the first war, there is a cover-story, and the truth. A Congolese militia leader called Laurent Nkunda -- backed by Rwanda -- claims he needs to protect the local Tutsi population from the same Hutu genocidaires who have been hiding out in the jungles of Eastern Congo since 1994. That's why he is seizing Congolese military bases and is poised to march on Goma.

It is a lie. Francois Grignon, Africa Director of the International Crisis Group, tells me the truth: "Nkunda is being funded by Rwandan businessmen so they can retain control of the mines in North Kivu. This is the absolute core of the conflict. What we are seeing now is the beneficiaries of the illegal war economy fighting to maintain their right to exploit." At the moment, Rwandan business interests make a fortune from the mines they illegally seized during the war. The global coltan price has collapsed, so now they focus hungrily on cassiterite, which is used to make tin cans and other consumer disposables. As the war began to wane, they faced slowly losing their control to the elected Congolese government -- so they have given it another bloody kick-start.

Yet the debate about Congo in the West -- when it exists at all -- focuses on our inability to provide a decent bandage, without mentioning that we are causing the wound. It's true the 17,000 UN forces in the country are abysmally failing to protect the civilian population, and urgently need to be super-charged. But it is even more important to stop fuelling the war in the first place by buying blood-soaked natural resources. Nkunda only has enough guns and grenades to take on the Congolese army and the UN because we buy his loot. We need to prosecute the corporations buying them for abetting Crimes Against Humanity, and introduce of a global coltan-tax to pay for a substantial peace-keeping force. To get there, we need to build an international system that values the lives of black people more than it values profit.

Somewhere out there -- lost in the great global heist of Congo's resources - are Marie-Jean and her children, limping along the road once more, carrying everything they own on their backs. They will probably never use a coltan-filled mobile phone, a cassiterite-smelted can of beans, or a gold necklace -- but they may yet die for one.

Johann Hari is a writer for the Independent. To read more of his articles, click here.

To save the lives of the victims of Congo's sexual violence, you can donate money here.

To read more of Johann's reporting on Congo, click here.

Comments

[northstar11]

reasons we go to war

religion
resources
race
real estate
revenge
retaliation

[JohnShank]

really?

[CrackerJacker]

Actually you missed out "business" and "misdirection" for the last two.

[Ssebo]

The businessmen responsible for igniting the violence are Rwandese. Clearly many Africans see the lives of others as less important than the size of their personal bank account. The indifferent attitude of the elite on this earth towards the poor is historic. “Why don’t they eat cake when there’s not bread?” Indeed.

History has taught us that the only way to protect the poor from wars and the greed of the elite is economic development. Not sending troops, UN-sanctions, boycotts, mindless talk at the WTO, import-quota, military hardware or “aid”.

Economic development starts by allowing African countries to develop themselves. So the filthily rich of that continent will have an economic incentive to invest in Africa.

So allow them to export their agricultural produce. Lift the import restrictions here at home and stop the distortions we bring to world markets with the subsidies to some of our own farmers. Allow them unrestricted export of manufacturing goods and processed agricultural produce. Assist them to meet our standards and attract investments. Stop pretending that the tiny economies of that continent could in any way threaten the largest economy on earth. Acknowledge that economic development in Africa will bring export opportunities for our own economy.

In short – don’t feel guilty about a war you can’t stop but use your influence. Write to your members in congress and have them change the selfish and shortsighted trade and economic policies that are still in place in this country.

[cam]

Your argument misses the theme of Johann's aricle. The problem is not "allowing African nations to develop themselves". The problem, as Johannn states, is that the world's commercial interest in Africa is largely on exploiting its mineral wealth. Until that interest is regualted and controlled a few venal people will work actively to brutalise and destabilise the region to their own ends. The import restrictions on agricultural produce, such as they are, are not the primary problem -- the lack of ethical restraint on people bent on encouraging and exploiting a damaged social infrastructure to their own ends is.

An analogy might help: Abused women lose thier sense of self-worth to the point they seek it in the abuser. A pimp's interest is not in a woman but in exploiting her. Someone else might want to build a healthy relationship her, but the pimp is not going to allow anyone to undermine his interests, and he will break her rather than relinquish her to a happier fate. Your focus is on the woman - Johann's is on the pimp. I agree with Johann - the pimp will defeat all our attempts to help the woman - we need to take him out first.

[MSB]

Exactly correct.

Well said.

[CrackerJacker]

From the Coltan entry on Wikipedia:

"Toward Freedom states that the 2000 launch of the Sony PS2 required a large increase in production of electric capacitors, which are primarily made with tantalum, which greatly increased the world price of the powder from $49/pound to a $275/pound, resulting in accelerated mining of the Congolese hills containing coltan. Sales in computers, mobile phones, and DVD players spiked around this same time. Sony claims it has discontinued its use of tantalum acquired from the Congo, and sourced it from a variety of mines in several different countries. Researcher David Barouski states “The coltan ore trades hands so many times from when it is mined to when SONY gets a processed product, that a company often has no idea where the original coltan ore came from, and frankly don't care to know. But statistical analysis shows it to be nearly inconceivable that SONY made all its PlayStations without using Congolese coltan." "

At the very least, better recycling of electronic goods looks to be imperative.

[breezyholler]

The human race is not civilized.­..never has been ...and greed is indeed the root of all evil. I am sickened by what reckless consumption is doing to the world...ev­en here in the Southern Appalachians ..the mountains are being blown away to get at coal the easy way..while people are being driven from the only homes they've known for all their lives ..and folks here live like kings compared to the Congolese.­.

[citizenquill]

Like hell. I own no diamonds, no cell phone and my beans come from the garden or in plastic bags. You may wax self-righteous when you give up the perks you so deplore.

[CrackerJacker]

The problem is not use of Coltan in products, or any other material being purloined from DR Congo. The problem is of companies/­individual­s taking advantage of a war-stricken nation in an amoral effort to maximise profit at the expense of lives. The materials themselves are available in other nations that are much more stable(Coltan can be obtained from deposits in Australia, for example), but the vileness referred to here is of the despicable, and quite possibly racist actions of those making profit from war and suffering.

[breezyholler]

The two greatest deficits of modern times ...TRUTH AND FAIRNESS..­.for as long as some folks take more than what they need at the expense of others...t­he results will always be the same..

[fnygy]

Your lifestyle is to be commended. Your own self-righteousness - not so much.

[gifu]

You are so vain, citizenquill. Damn!

[sowhatdemos]

Great article, sad but great. We can all do something.
The holidays are approaching and we don't have to buy jewelry. We will be bombarded with the sickening DeBeers & He went to Jared commercials. Blood Diamond should be required viewing to counter this mindless drival. And that story of the woman with the starved zombie children should be shared repeatedly, I know it is burned into my head.

We are observing a Buy Nothing Christmas again this year. We live in the country and we practice organic gardening and canning. So our kids get care packages of food and I buy the grandkids books throught the year when I find them on sale. And yeah, I know books are a buying loophole but I don't buy toys or junk, never have. Every kid gets one gift. We get together for a meal and that's it. The great thing about a Buy Nothing Christmas is its simplistic nature. It is very freeing and good for the soul not to get caught up in the shopping rat race of frenzy and greed.
Everyone can do something to help the world besides NOT going to Jared.

[AynRand123]

Pious much?

[IHIRB]

Jeez! Settle down! It's just a suggestion, not a mandate.

[valkyrie607]

That's rich, coming from Ayn Rand.

[Young Grandma Ben]

I'll take economic piety over religious piety any day. The results are more tangible and the rhetoric less twisted.

[kycatfan]

I don't think it's about being pious. It's about looking realistically at how much crap the majority of Americans have, and reducing our drive to buy -->MORE CRAP!

[boophus]

WE don't do Christmas gifting either. But an Ayn Rand fan calling such behavior "pious" smacks of someone whos world view can only be fed by conspicuous consumption and a "use others & toss em to side of the road when done with them" ideal. The American lifestyle is unsustainable because we consume so much of the world's resources per capita that much of the world suffers for every excess.

[looking4thelight]

Its burned into my head too. I like your attitude about the holidays. If you look at the past, gifts used to be tokens in victorian times, not big splurges. Just a little something to say I am thinking of you. Why did it have to get so out of hand? Do we need all this imported stuff? I knit sweaters and blankets from recycled yarn. There are beautiful wool /cashmere,etc. sweaters out there- cast away because of one stain or tiny hole. I unravel them to make my gifts. Peace to you and everyone this winter.

[sowhatdemos]

You are blessed and have EXCELLENT karma!

[Academic]

What I find truly repulsive is that while there are many governments and significant numbers of their citizens in Europe that want to construct a Fortress Europe - the same mindset that some right wing Americans subscribe to in respect of the United States of America (Fortress USA) - and thus keep the alleged hordes of non-whites out of "their" country who they assume want to enter their self-prescribed white preserve, as if immigration and migration are new phenomena: ludicrous when particularly in the case of the USA it's a country founded on stolen people (African men, women and children involuntarily turned into slaves and who were then literally worked to death to build the undoubted prosperity of the United States) and stolen land, liberally accompanied by the systematic genocide of those people - the indigenous Americans - from whom this land was forcibly taken, is a concept that beggars belief. Yet at the same time the governments of the aforementioned countries and their corporate institutions that avidly support them have no compunction whatsoever in plundering at will, as they've always done, the massive natural resources and consummate wealth of these African countries, even to the extent of fomenting war and genocide on the African continent by any means possible to achieve this aim and gratuitously improve the living standards of the very people who hate Blacks and other non-whites.

Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore.

[mergina]

Greed is indeed mankind's hardest hurdle to overcome if we hope to survive as a species on this planet. It has its grip in every facet of our lives, like a virus that eventually destroys even its own host.

[TR12]

I often intimate the truth of that analogy

[ZenJu]

And yet the nutballs and dictatorships in the United Nations obsess about tiny democracy Israel, while virtually ignoring the horrific murders and violations of human rights in Africa, among other places. One can see massive protests from time to time in major cities in the West (such as London) against little Israel, while support for the millions upon millions of lives being destroyed in Congo and Sudan is paltry at best. One wonders why so many obsess against the only Jewish State on the planet--a democratic republic where Arab women can vote and hold public office, where Jews, Muslims, Christians, agnostics, atheists all live together, where homosexuals are not persecuted-- while seemingly turning a blind eye to actual genocide, rape, greed and hatred running rampant on a terrible scale in the rest of the world. One wonders indeed.

[jjoshaugh]

Probably because the agenda is being forced by the Arab countries on the issue.

Think is the Palestinians are hated by everyone. If the Jews left tomorrow the other Arab countries would immediately invade and start doing massive genocide. The literal first thing they did after the 1948 wars is pass laws that any Palestinian refugees or their children could not become citizens of their countries. The "Israeli army" that people talk about doing bad things are generally composed of Bedouin Arabs that the Israeli goverment hires.

In fact the Israelis have been bloody restrained in their actions.

Anyway I agree with you. the effort spent on the whole middle east nonsense only cluds the issue n stuff that's really serious

[ceti]

You got it opposite my friend. For most major newspapers, goings on in Israel is their international news. No other coverage even comes close, no other life is more valuable. You can kill hundreds of Palestinians, thousands of Arabs, and hundreds of thousands of Africans, but a dozen Israelis outweighs all of that in terms of coverage and sympathy. Now why is that? Perhaps we can all agree that if all the affairs in Israel weren't so trumped up, then there would be enough media oxygen for the rest of the planet.

[mouselion]

Here is another must-read by this writer:

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-the-republicans-dirty-secret-torture-975452.html

[digdeeper]

Thank you for this blog. We all need to look inside ourselves and ask what part did we play in allowing corporations to so injure and hurt the African people.
Most of us have computers therefore most of us indirectly are receiving valuable resources from the DRCongo. I hope and pray that the next President of the USA will have more compassion and respect for these countries. Additionally we need to open our eyes to what is going on beyond our own very small world.

[Infokronea]

Well said. Most of the world treats war in the Congo as if it were that endless storm on Jupiter, an act of Nature that is curious to look at now and then, but far away and easy to ignore. That corporate interests take advantage of this situation, there is no doubt. Resource wars are not a new thing. The story of Pandora (All Gifts, another name for the Earth) is proof of that. The Earth gives the gift of herself (resources) to her beloved children, only to find that her gift triggers endless suffering. Since she cannot take back her original gift, she counters it with another: Hope. In the 21st century, that hope can be found in tools like the Internet. Communication is the reproductive system of this species, after all, and ideas our true offspring. And it is through ideas made public, through communication and greater awareness, through dedication, outrage, and courage that hope springs eternal. Thank you.

[laurajo]

incredible article. this country has become so insular, and unaware of the larger world. we're spending ourselves and the world to death. anyone has seen the film blood diamonds, i'm not sure why they would ever want to buy diamonds, those overly expensive, war prooducing , blood soaked (sometimes literally) stones.

[tomas0808]

I've known this for a long time. Thanks to the generosity of relatives, I am able to live on 6,000 dollars a year. I have never, and will never purchase a diamond. I sold my gas guzzling Chevy Chevelle and bought a Toyota Tercel seven years ago. Not because gas prices were hitting my pocketbook, but because after the last two elections were stolen I realized the only control I had to effect change was where I spent my money. As the global community becomes more of a community I would urge others to do the same. The American Dream is so much more than conspicuous consumption. If we all lived more frugally the world would be better off, and probably us too

[helix711]

I really think that the first world sees the cost of a human life as being less in Africa. That's an old tradition, anyway. It might not be because the people are black though. Bear with me here: I think it's because people in modernized societies implicitly assume that people in less modernized societies are somehow less important, less valuable. Maybe it's because they don't live the same type of lives we do (they live much worse lives), so we can't identify with them in the same way.

People in big cities are surrounded by buildings and the signs of progress, the ever-increasing upward expansion (myth). They are on their way to bigger and better things, they are busy, they are doing something in the world. Then we see shots of people living in Africa, and they're in huts and surrounded by vegetation. They're almost just another part of nature (which is just untapped resources as far as we're concerned). They aren't going upward, or making a business proposal or taking the kids to soccer practice in an SUV. (Think of some white-collar yelling "Get a job" at them.)

I don't know how, but this perception seriously needs to be changed. Not only do we need to stop seeing the natural world as a free bounty of resources for our exploitation, but we need to understand the value of lives lived within or closer to that natural world--they are human beings just as we are.

[citizentm]

Most of us really have no idea what kind of suffering we are causing with our 'way of life' and our 'ignorance'. So much of what we thoughtlessly but innocently do is actually blood soaked, because we blindly follow business and political leaders who have nothing but exploitation and enriching themselves on their mind.

[RnR]

and because the media, with the exception of Link TV and its documentaries, do not report it in deference to their corporate masters.

[ObamaSheeple]

Thanks