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The Congo - a letter you can use A forgotten emergency A treaty was signed in 2002, but fighting continues daily, largely ignored by the rest of the world. Since war began in 1998, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) estimates 3.9 million deaths - 6 percent of the nation’s population. Additionally, 2.2 million people are displaced. 340,000 more fled the DRC as refugees. All this adds up to the worst conflict since World War II. Numbers do not fully show the suffering. Whole villages are destroyed. Men and women are beaten, raped and killed. A woman is raped every twenty minutes. Yet less than 2 percent of conflict-related deaths come directly from violence. Fighting destroys agriculture and livestock. Supply lines are broken. Health care is disrupted. Every month, 40,000 die of hunger and preventable diseases. Almost half of these are children under five. All this is caused by the DRC Government, local militias, and rebel groups, some supported by nearby countries. They continue to operate because the foreign community lacks the will to get involved. Brutal capitalism 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. These middlemen buy directly from the smugglers and sell to major corporations. Thus, few profits benefit the DRC. In fact, the Congolese suffer greatly from the illegal digging. Unregulated mining damages the environment. Mine operators push people from resource rich areas. There are also reports of slave labor. In reaction, there is a "No blood on my cell phone!" campaign. Cell phone companies allegedly facilitate the exploitation, so people are urged not to buy cell phones made with coltan. The campaign has not stopped the mining yet, but it has increased global awareness of the issue. Now, the DRC government and foreign governments need to intervene. Hope for the future:
elections
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