Further Reading
- By Amy Joi O’Donoghue
“Our children are Suffering and Dying.” That is the sad statement of one Congolese mother whose son and cousin died while working the cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) . She and other parents like her are involved in a lawsuit filed in U.S. federal court in Washington, D.C., in 2019. This lawsuit aims to make a group of widely recognized technology and electronics companies responsible for reportedly benefiting from child labor while pursuing cobalt.
“Cobalt is a key component of every rechargeable lithium-ion battery in all the devices made by these companies, and all other tech and electric car companies in the world that have brought on the latest wave of cruel exploitation fueled by greed, corruption, and indifference to a population of powerless, starving Congolese people,” the lawsuit reads. However, the companies have argued the case should be dismissed, claiming that they have no control over the mining practices in a foreign country and that the Congolese families cannot legally bring the lawsuit onto U.S. soil. Furthermore, they stressed that they have no direct connection to mining on foreign soil.
A well-known smartphone manufacturing company has taken measures to address its global supply chain of cobalt and at one point stated its intention to stop purchasing cobalt mined by hand in the Congo. The company released this statement in 2019: “Our company is committed to treating everyone in our business and supply chain with dignity and respect, to maintaining human rights across our global network of suppliers, and to protecting the planet we all share. We set high standards to respect and empower those who build our products, while conserving the planet’s resources,” it said, adding, “We are dedicated to protecting children wherever our products are made or used.” But the lawsuit insists companies are simply turning a blind eye to the terrible abuses that include children killed in tunnel collapses or losing limbs or suffering from other tragic injuries caused by mining accidents.
“There is no question that the companies have specific knowledge that the cobalt mined in DRC they use in their various products includes cobalt that was produced by children working under extremely hazardous conditions, that serious mining accidents are common due to the primitive conditions and complete lack of safety measures in the mines, and that hundreds, if not thousands, of children have been injured or killed to produce the cobalt needed for the world’s modern tech devices produced by these companies and those like them,” the lawsuit says. It goes on to emphasize that every single smartphone, tablet, laptop, electric vehicle, or other device containing a lithium-ion rechargeable battery requires cobalt in order to recharge. “Put simply, the hundreds of billions of dollars generated by the companies each year would not be possible without the cobalt mined in the DRC.”
Child labor practices in the Congo have been widely reported in media sources throughout the world and documented by human rights experts. In 2016, Amnesty International published a major report on the conditions for child laborers mining cobalt in the DRC. The report, called “This Is What We Die For─Human Rights Abuses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Power the Global Trade in Cobalt,” said it is widely recognized on an international scale that the involvement of children in mining constitutes one of the worst forms of child labor, which governments are required to prohibit and eliminate. Although companies, including the smartphone manufacturing company mentioned, have promoted voluntary programs in which human rights abuses in the supply chain for cobalt can be reported, the lawsuit contends these programs are mere lip service. “The DRC is one of the most oppressive countries in the world, but, until they are forced to do better, a group of well-known technology and electronics companies are relying on mainly uneducated, desperately poor, and exceedingly vulnerable people to figure out the problems and report supply chain violations,” the lawsuit said, emphasizing the Congolese people “certainly cannot afford personal computers or smartphones and they do not have Internet access to connect to the outside world within the context of a violent government.”