How ‘conflict-free’ minerals are used in the waging of modern wars

Minerals such as cobalt, copper, lithium, tantalum, tin and tungsten, which are all abundant in central Africa, are essential to the comforts of everyday life. Our phones, laptops and electric vehicles would not function without them.These minerals are also tied intimately with conflict. For decades, military and paramilitary violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and on its borders – particularly with Rwanda – has been shaped and financed by control over some of these sought-after commodities.Many of these minerals, including those that have supposedly been sourced responsibly, are linked to violence at the other end of the supply chain too. As we found in our recently published research, minerals sourced in central Africa play a crucial role in the waging of modern wars.Extensive campaigning and lobbying over the past two decades has focused on the idea of “conflict-free minerals” as a way to address links between extraction and armed conflict in mining regions.This has resulted in a suite of legislation in the EU and US obliging tech manufacturers that use minerals from the DRC and surrounding countries to submit so-called “conflict minerals reports” to national authorities.Tech companies worldwide – big and small – now comply with conflict minerals policies. The fact that these firms can be held under a critical spotlight, and that attention is falling on how bloody wars are connected to consumer products, is a positive development. But there are many flaws to this system of accountability.One issue is the difficulty in proving that mineral supply is truly conflict free. Many of the “conflict-free” minerals sold through Rwanda, for instance, are very likely to have at least some connection to war.Another issue is that, under conflict-free mineral legislation, “conflict” is associated with minerals only at source. There is no oversight on how minerals are connected to conflict at the other end of supply chains in modern weapons of war.Conflict mineralsWeapons are no longer fashioned only with lead, iron and brass. They now depend on a range of advanced technologies: lithium batteries, cobalt cathodes, tantalum resistors, nickel capacitors, tin semiconductors, tungsten electrodes and so forth.In fact, everything advanced militaries do nowadays – whether it involves a fighter jet, drone, guided bomb, smart bullet, night vision or remote sensing – utilises these components.As we outline in our study, conflict-free minerals are essential to the waging of modern wars. We traced the movement of ores from the DRC into Rwanda, from where they are then sold to some of the world’s largest weapons makers as “conflict-free” minerals.A coterie of defence contractors source minerals via this route. Researchers have long suspected that minerals can never be conflict free at source. But our findings now turn attention to the other end of the supply chain. If it is to have any purchase at all, the idea of “conflict-free” minerals must be entirely refigured.As our research shows, some companies are sourcing minerals from one war zone and then making profit from another. There needs to be more scrutiny on the use of minerals “downstream” to stem the flow of the raw materials that propel wars in Gaza and beyond.- Published in The Conversation

How ‘conflict-free’ minerals are used in the waging of modern wars

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Namibian Sun 2026-03-19

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How ‘conflict-free’ minerals are used in the waging of modern wars

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Namibian Sun 2026-03-19

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