Few people have any idea that an obscure mineral used to coat electronic parts in cell phones is a critical factor in the Congo's civil war. But I wouldn't want to use my cell phone to convey the happy news to my family and friends, because the murderous mineral might be coating some of the electronic parts inside its guts.
Coltan is also the fuel that keeps the Congo's endless civil war burning.
Thousands of elephants have been killed for food by coltan miners, the report said, and now that they have just about vanished from the mining areas, gorillas have become the hunters' latest quarry. The broadcast led me to a United Nations report transmitted to the body's Security Council by Secretary-General Kofi A. Annan on April 3rd in which the mineral figures prominently. Nearly 4,000 out of 12,000 elephants were killed in the Garamba Park in northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1995 and 1999. The UN panel that prepared the report said the animals have been the victims of a well-organized system of poaching that violates international law. As wireless and computer technologies have developed, the price of coltan has spiked, and it would seem that the presence of large deposits of the valuable mineral could offer hope of peace and prosperity for the Congo.