Democratic Republic of Congo\u2019s mines inspectorate said on Monday it had \u200ccreated a paramilitary mining guard to secure mining sites and mineral supply chains, as the world\u2019s top cobalt producer tries to curb smuggling and insecurity in the sector and boost investor confidence.<\/p>\n
The \u200bprogramme will be funded by a $100 million budget under strategic partnerships with \u200bthe United States and the United Arab Emirates, the General Inspectorate \u2060of Mines (IGM) said in a statement.<\/p>\n
Congo, the world\u2019s second\u2011largest copper supplier with major \u200breserves of lithium, coltan and gold, is battling a\u00a0Rwanda\u2011backed rebellion\u00a0in its mineral\u2011rich east \u200bthat has killed thousands and displaced hundreds of thousands. Kinshasa last year signed a\u00a0minerals partnership\u00a0with the U.S. to strengthen supply chains and security as Washington seeks to reduce China\u2019s dominance in \u200bcritical minerals.<\/p>\n
The IGM said the new unit will be gradually deployed across Congo\u2019s mining \u200bregions and is expected to reach more than 20,000 personnel by the end of 2028.<\/p>\n
A first \u200ccontingent \u2060of between 2,500 and 3,000 is due to be operational from December 2026, following recruitment and six months of training in collaboration with the military.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe will of the President of the Republic is to clean up the entire mining sector, by eliminating \u200bpractices that run \u200bcounter to good \u2060governance, transparency and the traceability of minerals,\u201d said Rafael Kabengele, the country\u2019s inspector general of mines.<\/p>\n
Under the Congo\u2011U.S. minerals partnership,\u00a0Virtus\u00a0took \u200bover copper-cobalt miner Chemaf while other Western firms have\u00a0expressed interest\u00a0in \u200bmining assets, \u2060including in\u00a0rebel\u2011held areas\u00a0where insecurity has previously disrupted operations.<\/p>\n
The mining guard will take over security duties currently carried out by defence forces. Its mandate will include securing mine \u2060sites, escorting \u200bmineral shipments from extraction areas to processing facilities \u200band border posts, and safeguarding investments, the statement said.<\/p>\n
The initiative is expected to strengthen investor confidence and improve \u200bstate oversight of mineral production, officials said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Democratic Republic of Congo\u2019s mines inspectorate said on Monday it had \u200ccreated a paramilitary mining guard to secure mining sites and mineral supply chains, as the world\u2019s top cobalt producer tries to curb smuggling and insecurity in the sector and boost investor confidence. The \u200bprogramme will be funded by a $100 million budget under strategic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11722,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":6,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,29,2362,3028,1129],"tags":[3016,1429,385],"class_list":["post-20626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-east-africa","category-featured","category-mining","category-security","tag-democratic-republic-of-congo-drc","tag-united-arab-emirates-uae","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20626"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20626\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20627,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20626\/revisions\/20627"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}