The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is a land blessed with unimaginable natural riches like cobalt, copper, diamonds, gold, lithium, and the so-called 3Ts: Tin, Tantalum, and Tungsten. These are the raw materials that fuel the global economy and the green energy transition. But for the people of the Congo, this blessing has become a curse.
Since 1998, Congo’s mineral wealth has turned the country into a battlefield. Armed militias, foreign-backed rebel groups, and complicit elites have fought to control mining territories, using the profits from conflict minerals to finance endless wars. The toll? Millions dead. Entire provinces destabilised. A country trapped in a cycle of violence, exploitation, and state failure.
How China is Stripping the Democratic Republic of Congo of Its Future 
By 2020, China was importing nearly $9 billion in goods from the DRC, up from just $1.45 million in 1995. In just five years, cobalt oxide imports surged 2,920 percent, copper ore by 1,670 percent, and cobalt itself by 191 percent. Over 70 percent of the world’s cobalt is mined in the DRC—80 percent of which is exported directly to China. These are not small numbers. They are the economic foundation of China’s dominance in clean energy and military tech.
The invasion is not metaphorical; it is literal.
As of 2025, over 450 Chinese-run mining companies operate in South Kivu Province alone. The majority are illegal, operating without permits, without oversight, without any social responsibility commitments. They poison rivers. They flatten rain forests. They fuel child labour and corruption. In these areas, malnutrition is rampant. Schools and clinics are nonexistent. Chinese miners are seen moving around with cash and gold bars, often under the protection of Congolese soldiers.
In December 2024, seventeen Chinese nationals were arrested for illegal mining in Walungu and Mwenga. Within days, they were released—no penalties, no fines—following direct orders from Kinshasa. In January 2025, another group was caught with $400,000 in cash and 10 gold bars. These revelations didn’t come from a judicial process or media investigation—they came from the governor himself, acting in desperation to expose a deeply entrenched system of impunity and collusion.
China’s grip on Congo is not just economic. It is military.
Chinese companies have demanded and received protection from the Congolese army. Beijing has trained Congolese military personnel. It has sent weapons, security advisers, and now, drones. In 2023, China announced the delivery of nine CH-4 attack drones to Kinshasa to help fight Rwanda-backed rebels—sparking fears of a regional war. But the truth is far darker: some of these drones could easily fall into the hands of warlords or rogue elements within the Congolese army itself, many of whom are already implicated in human rights abuses.
In 2024, two Chinese gold miners were killed by Congolese army officers. The culprits were sentenced to death, a rare gesture that underscores the fragility and volatility of China’s position. Even within the army supposedly protecting them, Chinese nationals are targets. Yet, Beijing’s response wasn’t to back down. It was to double down –More military aid. More political influence. More silence purchased with billions.
The true horror lies in how systematic the plunder is
Take Tenke Fungurume—the crown jewel of cobalt mining. Once a U.S.-backed venture, it was quietly sold to China Molybdenum in the twilight of the Trump administration, backed by Chinese state loans. When the DRC tried to intervene—citing under-reported reserves and unpaid royalties—the company simply continued operations, banking on diplomatic pressure and the DRC’s weak regulatory capacity.
In reality, these “infrastructure-for-minerals” contracts have brought little to no benefit to the Congolese people. Roads go unfinished. Hospitals promised never open. All while billions in minerals are shipped east.
This is not partnership. It is extraction at the barrel of a gun.
Critics warn that China’s behaviour in the DRC is a blueprint for modern-day resource imperialism the one that uses contracts instead of conquests, but leaves devastation just the same. In South Kivu and North Kivu, violence has intensified as rebel groups like M23 reportedly backed by Rwanda, seize control of tourmaline, coltan, and gold-rich areas. Rubaya, one of the country’s largest coltan hubs, is now under threat. And behind every armed advance is a silent market, hungry for minerals, blind to blood.
The West, too, bears blame. U.S. disinterest created the vacuum China filled. Major American companies have avoided DRC minerals over human rights concerns that China does not share. Washington’s failure to prioritise Africa, and especially Congo, has allowed Beijing to walk in unchallenged and unchecked.
Today, the DRC government faces an impossible choice: defy China and risk instability, or submit and watch the country’s wealth vanish. The people of the DRC know what’s at stake. In territories like Walungu, Shanje, and Numbi, they watch foreign trucks roll out with minerals while their children go hungry. They protest against MONUSCO, the U.N. peacekeeping mission, accusing it of standing guard over plunder. They demand change—but in a state captured by foreign interests, change is hard to come by.
There is still hope. In recent years, some provincial leaders have shown rare courage in calling out corruption. Activists continue to document abuses. Civil society has demanded transparency. But without international support, without real pressure on Beijing, and without enforcement of Congolese law, these efforts are a whisper in the storm.
This is not just a Congolese tragedy. It is a global disgrace.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo stands as a bleeding testament to what happens when diplomacy becomes a weapon of exploitation. Behind China’s polished rhetoric of “win-win cooperation” lies a devastating truth, a nation trapped in the jaws of a foreign superpower that sees people as collateral and the land as loot. Villages are displaced, rivers run toxic, and children work in the shadows of billion-dollar deals struck behind closed doors. This is not development it is a calculated erosion of sovereignty, dignity, and human rights. As the world watches in silence, the people of Congo pay the price for China’s insatiable appetite for power. And if unchecked, this model of neo-colonialism will not end in the Congo but it will spread like a blueprint for global control, built on the backs of the most vulnerable.
Until then, the mines of the Congo will keep fuelling the future—while burying a nation in its past.
