Image is from this Washington Post article, which shows the Shabara artisanal mine, where cobalt and copper are dug out by hand.

This preamble got much of its information from this article in ROAPE, and this article in People's World.

Countries in the imperial core have increasingly advocated for Green New Deals, whose primary goal is to re-attract manufacturing capability to somewhat counter deindustrialization, and then export some of this renewable energy generation to other countries to gain profit. Just as the initial wave of industrialization was built on massive resource exploitation of coal and iron and then oil, this wave is being built on exploiting metals like lithium, cobalt, and rare earth elements. The DRC is one of the best case studies on the planet for understanding the new dynamic.

The DRC is, to your average Western country, a resource bonanza. It is the 11th largest country by land area, and contains lithium, copper, and cobalt in massive quantities, famously containing two thirds of the world's known cobalt supplies. The Western world and their institutions swarmed the DRC like piranhas, dismantling the Congo's sovereignty over its natural resources. China was not terribly involved in the privatisation process, but has stepped in to benefit from the West's work - Chinese corporations account for 40% of the production of major Congo cobalt projects (and 15 out of 19 cobalt mines), with Switzerland at 30% via Glencore, and Kazakhstan at 22%. The US, for whatever reason, withdrew from majority ownership of some projects in the mid-2010s, but is now anxious about China's position in the cobalt markets. Western countries in general have spent their time lately drawing up critical minerals strategies both to keep capitalism chugging along in their own countries, and attempt to weaken China, which invariably involves the Congo.

The Congo has attempted to resist imperialist encroachment. In 2018, the Kaliba administration asserted a new Mining Code which raised tax and royalty rates and increased state ownership in mining firms from 5% to 10%, and these changes were bitterly resisted by the West right to the end. Since 2019, under the Tshisekedi administration, the government established the state-owned EGC, which sought to take control over the processing and export of artisanal and small-scale cobalt production, which comprises 5-15% of cobalt production in the Congo. More recently, Tshisekedi is planning to move up the manufacturing chain - instead of merely mining cobalt, they want to refine it there and then make electric vehicle batteries and other such products with it, which would be an industry worth trillions of dollars. But so far, there hasn't been much movement away from having mining exports as the backbone of the economy, and it's doubtful that plans to just keep doing this until they get rich enough to build refineries and factories will work. The profits mostly go to Western countries and have failed to produce significant benefits for Congolese workers, nor resulted in the emergence of domestic industries so far. Reforms will help a little, but only a little, and they remain fundamentally constrained by the markets and the whims of the West.

Meanwhile, war and mass displacements have put immense stress on the country. There are 7.1 million displaced people in the DRC due to various conflicts and mass displacements - most recently, the war between the Congolese army and M23. Hundreds of thousands of people continue to be displaced every few months, and across the whole country, over 26 million require humanitarian aid. 6 million people have died in the eastern DRC in the last three decades, with hundreds of armed groups, both domestic and foreign, battling for resources and territory.

The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is the Democratic Republic of the Congo! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

Please check out the HexAtlas!

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

Israel-Palestine Conflict

If you have evidence of Israeli crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.

Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:

UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.

English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.

English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.

Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.

Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Sources:

Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful. Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.

Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.

Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.

Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:

Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.

  • catonkatonk [none/use name]
    ·
    2 months ago

    This is it probably?

    TEL AVIV—As tensions with Iran ease , Israel's military is gearing up to complete what it says is unfinished business: Uprooting Hamas from its last stronghold in the Gazan city of Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians are taking shelter.

    Israeli leaders say they intend to go ahead despite vocal opposition from the country's most important ally, the U.S., which has warned that a full-scale move on the enclave could cause widespread civilian casualties and disrupt humanitarian-aid efforts aimed at preventing famine.

    "In the coming days, we will increase the military and diplomatic pressure on Hamas because it's the only way to release our hostages and achieve our victory," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday in a message to mark Judaism's Passover holiday, which begins Monday evening.

    Israel's air force has been hitting targets in Rafah in recent days. A series of strikes on Sunday killed at least 16 Palestinians, the majority of them women and children, according to Wafa, the official news and information agency of the Palestinian Authority. Israel's military said in mid-April that it had called up two reserve brigades "for operational activities on the Gazan front."

    Netanyahu has said that Israel plans to evacuate civilians ahead of operations. The military has said it plans to move Gazans to humanitarian enclaves to be constructed within the Gaza Strip, which would include food, water, shelter and medical services.

    "One, it's going to happen. Two, we're going to have a very tight operational plan because it's very complex there. Three, there's a humanitarian response that's happening at the same time," said an Israeli security official.

    Israel is preparing to move civilians from Rafah to nearby Khan Younis and other areas, where it plans to set up shelters with tents, food-distribution centers and medical facilities such as field hospitals, according to Egyptian officials briefed on the Israeli plans.

    That evacuation operation would last two to three weeks and be done in coordination with the U.S., Egypt and other Arab countries such as the United Arab Emirates, the Egyptian officials said. They said Israel plans to move troops into Rafah gradually, targeting areas where Israel believes Hamas leaders and fighters are hiding. The fighting is expected to last at least six weeks, they said.

    Israel has faced mounting international pressure to wind down its six-month military campaign in Gaza sparked by Hamas's Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel, which killed around 1,200 people in the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. More than 34,000 people have died in Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities. The figures don't distinguish between combatants and civilians.

    The U.S. has pressed Israel to reconsider a large-scale push into Rafah, citing concerns for civilians as nearly two-thirds of Gazans are estimated to be temporarily sheltering in the city. Many fled their homes as the Israeli army moved south in recent months through the enclave, which is roughly the size of Washington, D.C.

    "President Biden has been very clear about this: We cannot support a major military operation in Rafah," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday. Such a move "would have terrible consequences" for any civilians who remained in the city. Israel's war goals, he said, could be achieved by other means.

    The overwhelming majority of aid enters the Gaza Strip through two crossings near Rafah. That is also where U.N. agencies and other aid groups are currently based, along with most remaining working hospitals and clinics. Any disruption to aid, especially food, could have devastating repercussions. The U.N. and other international aid agencies have warned Gaza is at risk of famine .

    Israel says it must move on Rafah—which sits along Gaza's border with Egypt—to neutralize the military threat posed by Hamas, a U.S.-designated terror organization. Israel's military says it has dismantled 20 of Hamas's 24 military battalions, and must uproot its remaining fighting formations now in Rafah.

    Any military action would also be aimed at flushing out top Hamas military leaders and finding the remaining 129 hostages held by the group from its Oct. 7 attacks, many of whom are believed to be held in Rafah. Israel has also said it must cut smuggling routes from Egypt into Gaza that provide war materiel for militants, from fuel to ammunition.

    But any major military incursion is also a strategic gamble, especially if a high civilian death toll erodes Israel's international standing and weakens ties with the U.S. Trying to reduce the civilian toll could also make the battlefield more risky for Israeli troops, leading to higher casualty rates.

    If Israel fails to get civilians out of harm's way, "I really think this could be a grand strategic disaster for Israel and create one of the leading stressors on the bilateral relationship that we've seen for years," said Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

    The timing of any operation remains uncertain. Israel's military will need to deploy more forces into the strip before acting. Earlier this month, Israel reached its lowest troops levels of the war , dropping to a few thousand soldiers to conduct targeted raids and patrol key thoroughfares within Gaza, down from a peak of over 60,000 soldiers last fall.

    Uncertainty about the operation's timing hangs over Gazans sheltering in Rafah, who are struggling with whether to leave the city, and where they could go in a devastated strip lacking shelter and services.

    Hazer Ghanem, 22, who has been in Rafah since leaving her partially-destroyed Gaza City home in December, said she has packed clothes, documents and some food in case she needs to quickly flee.

    However, she isn't certain where she would go if Israel invades Rafah since there has been no clear indication from the Israeli military whether Palestinian civilians will be permitted to return to what is left of their homes in northern Gaza.

    "Everyone in Rafah is worried and all people talk about is the ground invasion," said Ghanem.

    The incursion risks further upsetting ties with Washington after Israel's recent round of tensions with Iran helped draw the U.S. and other allies back onside. The U.S. led an international coalition to rally to Israel's defense earlier this month when Iran launched its first-ever direct strike into Israeli territory, largely thwarting an onslaught that threatened to escalate fighting in the region .

    The U.S. and Israel have been meeting periodically to discuss Israel's plans to evacuate civilians ahead of a military incursion into Rafah, as well as operational plans, said an Israeli security official. Last week, national security adviser Jake Sullivan met virtually with his Israeli counterpart and Israel's Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer, a Netanyahu confidant.

    "The two sides agreed on the shared objective to see Hamas defeated in Rafah," the White House said after the meeting. "U.S. participants expressed concerns with various courses of action in Rafah, and Israeli participants agreed to take these concerns into account and to have further follow up discussions between experts," it said.

    The U.S. has urged Israel to accomplish its objectives in Rafah through precision strikes and targeted raids, hoping to avoid both the high civilian toll and widespread destruction in the rest of the Gaza Strip. The Israeli Prime Minister's Office and Defense Ministry declined to comment on the bilateral talks.

    Experts say Israel won't be able to destroy Hamas's four remaining battalions without invading Rafah, but that a more important long-term strategic goal might be to take control of the Philadelphi Corridor, the narrow, eight-mile strip of land spanning the border between Gaza and Egypt.

    Israel has long said that smuggling tunnels below the border were critical in supplying weapons and other prohibited materiel to armed groups in Gaza including Hamas. Israel relinquished control over the corridor during its 2005 pullout from Gaza, and Israeli action in the border region is a sensitive issue which requires coordination with Egypt. Egypt has pushed back against Israeli overtures to establish a presence on the Rafah border line.

    "What is important is establishing a real border that would cut off Hamas supply lines from Sinai into Gaza," said Ofer Shelah, a military analyst at Tel Aviv's Institute for National Security Studies.

    Shelah said that a large military maneuver in Rafah would be problematic, for both its tunnel-laden battlefield and its humanitarian consequences.

    As the last major city in Gaza that Israel hasn't invaded, Rafah has more than tripled in size as internally displaced people sought shelter there. Adjacent to border terminals from Egypt and Israel, it also rapidly developed into a hub for international organizations coordinating humanitarian response efforts.

    Noha Saadawi, a 33-year-old mother of three children, said there is no infrastructure elsewhere in Gaza to support the more than one million displaced Palestinians. When she visited her home in Khan Younis to examine the damage earlier this month, she found it destroyed.

    She said she expects the Israeli operation to last months and hopes to stay close to Rafah—in Al-Mawasi, along the Mediterranean coast. "We will stay in a tent because we don't have a home to return to," she said.

    Abeer Ayyoub, Omar Abdel-Baqui and Summer Said contributed to this article.

    Credit: By Carrie Keller-Lynn

    • SaniFlush [any, any]
      ·
      2 months ago

      I like how there's no mention that North Gaza is already slowly rebuilding even while it's still being hit by airstrikes. Wouldn't want to look ineffective, would they?

    • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
      ·
      2 months ago

      Israeli leaders say they intend to go ahead despite vocal opposition from the country’s most important ally, the U.S., which has warned that a full-scale move on the enclave could cause widespread civilian casualties and disrupt humanitarian-aid efforts aimed at preventing famine.

      Yes. THAT IS WHY THEY ARE DOING IT! THEY WANT TO KILL CIVILIANS!

      I'm so sick of the US state doing this "oh, we had no idea the genocide fascists we armed and train were actually planning on doing a genocide! We gave them a stern talking to, alongside our latest weapons shipment. We told them that if they don't stop their crimes against humanity, future shipments of weapons to conduct their genocide will also come with stern lectures asking them to possibly consider stopping."