Conflict-Free Cell Phones?
Peter Svensson reports for the Associated Press that a new U.S. law requires companies to certify whether the products contain minerals — namely tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold — from rebel-controlled mines in Congo and surrounding countries.
Similar to the Kimberley Process that certifies diamond as conflict-free, this legislation attempts to deprive the rebels of funds and to encourage them to lay down their arms, but unfortunately, like the Kimberley Process, the new law has been met with a great deal of cynicism and ridicule because enforcement of such a law will be plagued by a lack of Congolese government control in certain regions, and corruption where government control exists.
Critics of the new legislation say that it will deprive hundreds of thousands of desperately poor Congolese of their incomes and disrupt the economy that's already suffering from more than a decade of war.
Advocacy groups, the United Nations, and academic researchers agree that the mines fund rebel groups, homegrown militias, and rogue elements of the Congolese army, but even the academics admit that advocacy groups have placed too much emphasis on the link between the mines and violence.
Laura Seay is an assistant professor of political science at Morehouse College who studies and visits Congo. She says that the conflict in Congo is partially funded by the mining of the minerals, but to her, the chief cause of conflict is land rights and the status of the refugees and militias from neighboring Rwanda who entered eastern Congo after the Rwandan genocide in 1994.
The new legislation is also limited in its application because it doesn't stop the mineral trade with Congo; it simply requires companies to report annually whether their product contains any of the four "conflict minerals." The 9 surrounding countries are included too, since the minerals can be smuggled out of Congo to hide its place of origin.
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