Mineral Rights Disguised in Peace Deal

The Western empire of corporate extrativism, now led by the US, has normalized hopping around the world to fuel wars of Plunder for resources, using a tired justification that somebody else was about to do something worse. A BBC article published on July 28, 2025, exemplifies this grabber mentality in the headline “How Trump wants the US to cash in on mineral-rich DR Congo’s peace deal”, revealing that the US is primarily driven by the quest for minerals rather than peace.

By America posing like it can achieve peace now, it shows that it previously allowed the war to continue for its interests, which are revealed in the aforementioned BBC article in the view “its [Trump administration’s] “efforts come as no surprise as DR Congo is endowed with the mineral wealth that the US requires to power the IT, and now AI, revolutions, much of which is currently going to China”. 

Many things can be debunked from the quote, including the fact that Copper and Cobalt, the leading exports from the DRC and mainly to China, done through infrastructure-for-mineral contracts, are widely used in electric and electronic devices and are not uniquely pivotal for IT or AI development. The article tries to obfuscate that the US administration seeks Coltan, which is pivotal for making Microprocessors and hence advanced chips for IT and AI.

The DRC holds 60% of the global reserves of this resource in its Kivu province, while the US prefers obtaining it through chaos and wars, rather than exchanging it for infrastructure, as China does. DRC’s Coltan from regions captured by Rwanda-backed M23 rebels is illegally exported through Rwanda and Uganda. From the preceding information, claims that resources needed for IT and AI revolutions are taken by China are disingenuous and are meant to hide and present the West’s attempt to plunder African’s resources by floating a morally bankrupt justification that someone else is already doing it.

Getting Uranium was required for the Nuclear revolution in 1940

A large percentage of the Uranium used to develop atomic bombs dropped on Japan in August 1945 was stolen from the DRC through abuse and violence, reflecting stealing from Africa since the 1940s. African miners involved were never issued with protective equipment or adequately compensated, and had to live with the adverse effects of irradiation for the Western capitalist system. Even today, the US administration does not care about Africans’ lives or humanitarian wellbeing in its pursuit of Africans’ resources, while its lazy apologists think that justifications that the US requires the DRC’s minerals for IT or AI revolutions suffice.

Trump’s announcement of the DRC-Rwanda peace deal on June 27, 2025, was a transition in means of plundering the DRC from violence to contracts, as Marjorie Namara Rugunda notes in an article published on July 12, 2025. The announcement suggests that parties, including Rwanda and M-23, which have recently captured Coltan-producing areas, will cease fighting, just because the US will gain mineral rights, which is a clear indication that they have been doing Washington’s bidding.

While the peace deal is posted as a diplomatic victory, it was born through violence. This deal with sketchy terms gives secondary importance to DRC’s sovereignty, and civilians’ wellbeing, and places primary importance on Americans’ access to African minerals, as indicated by Trump’s announcement. Trump seemed disturbingly comfortable announcing that his country had received mineral rights from a region that has experienced 6 million deaths due to incessant conflicts since the 1990s, according to Amnesty International.

Meanwhile, the latest round of violence driven by M23 rebels since January 2025 has led to the deaths of 7000 people, destruction of homes, and social infrastructure, while violence and uncertainty prevent resettlement and reconstruction. The recent escalation has targeted regions such as North Kivu, which are notable for Coltan deposits and artisanal mining. Thus, minerals have continued to be smuggled from the country throughout these conflicts, and the plunder will now be underpinned by contracts, likely awarded to privileged companies in Trump’s circle. The US administration is unconcerned about enabling citizens to restore their lives or allowing the DRC government to have adequate control to restore social and economic infrastructure.

The curated nature of the DRC’s decades-spanning conflict can be noted in how it is now supposed to end after the US gains mineral rights. The thought that M23 rebels and up to 12000 Rwandese troops embedded in M-23 rebels by March 2025 will lay down their weapons after the US gains mineral rights shows that their claims that they were engaged in an existential war were false all along. Remarkably, the countries involved have had no weapon manufacturing abilities and only started making light arms, meaning weapons used to drive war were brought from abroad, and most probably purchased from proceeds of mineral smuggling, meaning that the illicit outflows of resources have been sustained through inflow of weapons.

The ongoing war, combined with illicit mineral extraction and smuggling, has led to the destruction of thousands of homes and hundreds of thousands of families, worsening the humanitarian crisis. Simultaneously, families and communities are torn apart, with the displaced being forced to start life elsewhere under precarious social and economic conditions. The war has not only caused death and destruction but also weakened the government and societal institutions, causing other long-term effects. For instance, the weakened government has limited the government’s ability to formulate and enforce laws to protect workers, the environment, and communities. As a result, in the country, mining has exploited child labour, left the land derelict, and ruined communities through inter-ethnic violence.

Getting Coltan is requires for the IT and AI revolutions in 2025

One crucial link between the War in DRC and Western corporate monopolists is that the war-ravaged region produces Coltan, used to make Tantalum used in advanced microprocessors for IT and AI industries, led by, among others, data oligarchs, who flanked Donald Trump when he was announcing the Stargate Project. A UN expert’s report revealed that Rwandan figures for Coltan exports expanded inexplicably from 1000 in 2021 to 2000 tonnes in 2023. Also, the increase for the first quarter of 2024 rose to a record 630 tonnes, which did not correspond with mining capacity. It also noted that over 120 tonnes of this mineral had been smuggled from Rubaya in the eastern DRC to Rwanda, a trend that explains Rwanda’s increase in Coltan export that ended up in global markets.

Reports from the 2000s also show that Rwanda’s Coltan exports by far exceeded its known mining capacity, showing its involvement in smuggling the DRC’s resources. Previous reports had also indicted Uganda for leading the plunder of the DRC’s mineral wealth, making it unfortunate that African regimes are participating in plundering and ravaging their neighbours, also noting that both Rwanda and Uganda have militarily meddled in the DRC over the decades.

Trump’s deal is unlikely to bring sustainable peace to the DRC. Instead, Washington will likely maintain the capacity of its vassals and rebels to cause controlled chaos to maintain leverage on future mineral ownership and trade. Trump’s vaunted peace deal will maintain this status quo, facilitating foreign capital to gain more control and eliminate smugglers and middlemen for enhanced profitability.

Simon Chege Ndiritu, is a political observer and research analyst from Africa. Courtesy

https://journal-neo.su/2025/08/13/plunder-from-the-barrel-of-a-pen-a-second-look-into-trumps-vaunted-drc-rwanda-peace-deal/