National Human Trafficking Prevention Month
This January, the Migrant Rights Coalition wants to emphasize the impact of human trafficking in our country, but also its impact on other countries around the world. As it is National Human Trafficking Prevention Month, we at MRC have a duty to inform our student body in the hopes that this crime can be prevented everywhere, and eventually be brought to an end. So, during the duration of the month-our newsletter, The Monarch will be dedicated to this cause.
Since today is the last day of National Human Trafficking Prevention Month, we at MRC thought it would only be right to release a newsletter discussing the importance of human rights- a key element of freedom frequently lost to those with experiences and currently experience human trafficking.
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Congo Cobalt Mines- Human Rights Activist Exposes Abuse
Siddharth Kara, is an American activist, an expert on modern-day slavery and human trafficking, and author who is making known to the world the growing human rights issues in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DCR)- more specifically in the Katanga region. He is sounding the alarm after witnessing workers- including children- laboring in cobalt mines for less than two dollars daily. If you’re unfamiliar with cobalt, it is a key element that is often found in lithium-ion batteries, and commonly used in everyday household items such as phones, laptops, and tablets (even electric cars)- furthermore, the DCR is responsible for around 90% of the world's cobalt supply. According to Kara, the conditions of the mines in the DCR have become increasingly appalling, and human rights risks are particularly high in these artisanal mines.
'There are hundreds of thousands of the poorest people on the planet [mining for cobalt].
'The moral clock has been dialed back to colonial times.
'They’re doing it for $2-a-day and for them, it’s the difference between whether or not they eat that day so they don’t have the option of saying no.'
The DCR as a whole is weakened by aggressive ethnic conflict, corruption, and other disease- where child labor, ftal accidents, and violent attakcs between workers and security are recurrent. As much as these mines have become increasingly dangerous and unregulated, they also serve as a lifeline for nearly millions of Congolese people that live in poverty.
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It isn’t abnormal to see teenage boys working perilous shifts at the mines, operating and navigating rickety shafts. In larger mines, women and young girls are subject to prostitution, while other women regularly wash raw mining material. This mining material is often full of toxic metals, and in some cases, might be mildly radioactive. For example, if a pregnant woman works with a metal such as cobalt, it increases her chances of having a stillbirth, or a child born with birth defects.
According to a study done through The Lancet, most women in the southern part of the Congo “had metal concentrations that are among the highest ever reported for pregnant women”- the study also found that fathers working at the mine were also at risk for the development of birth defects in their unborn children. “Paternal occupational mining exposure was the factor most strongly associated with birth defects.”
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A family searches for cobalt in the ruins of a cobalt mine.
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Dozens of miners hunt for cobalt in the discarded Earth
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Overall, this metal has become essential in the Congolese people's way of living, so much so many families, since learning of its existence in their communities, have started to dig through their property's floor in search of the material- nearly creating tunnels in between neighbor's properties.
Although this has become an incredibly tumultuous way of life, the technological advance towards green living and decarbonization has made Cobalt a necessary component in fueling electric cars such as Tesla. Fortunately enough, Tesla claims that they will switch in favor of a lithium-ion phosphate battery. While these are significantly cheaper, cars that will be made with this battery will typically have a shorter range.
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A general view of the artisanal miners working at the Shabara mine this past October 2022- some 20,000 people work at this Shabara mine, often in shifts of 5,000 at a time.
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Camila Rodriguez- Education Coordinator
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