Congolese authorities are hoping to achieve an agreement with the Trump administration on the country’s mining sources in a command to stable US toughen in their fight against the M23 rebels and Rwandan forces leading an offensive in eastern DR Congo. While preliminary discussions have begun, details of the settlement remain very vague.
The US and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo or DRC) may soon initiate formal negotiations on a critical minerals deal. Discussions are below way, the Congolese presidency confirmed to FRANCE 24, on US access to the mineral sources of the vast central African country, which has a few of the arena’s largest reserves of cobalt, coltan, copper and lithium that are vital for decreasing-edge applied sciences in defence, energy transition and other sectors.
The US State Department last week said it was inaugurate to a mining partnership in DR Congo and has confirmed that preliminary discussions had begun.
Congolese authorities hope to block neighbouring Rwanda, which helps the M23 rebels and is accused of plundering their country’s mineral sources. Since January, the armed community has been leading a major offensive in eastern DR Congo, which has put the Congolese army below considerable strain.
A Congolese provide to the US secretary of state
The possibility of a minerals deal was first outlined by Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi in a February 22 interview with the Unusual York Times. In his first interview because the launch of the 2025 M23 offensive, Tshisekedi “offered the United States and Europe a stake in his country’s vast mineral wealth, a sector at the 2nd dominated by China”, the US daily reported.
The Congolese president had “pinned his hopes on Western strain against Rwanda”, calculating that a deal may perhaps carry his country safety and stability, said the anecdote. Tshisekedi also told The Unusual York Times that the Trump administration had “already shown passion in a deal that may perhaps guarantee a stream of strategic minerals immediately from Congo”.
The interview was revealed a day after a US consultancy, commissioned by Congolese senator and Tshisekedi supporter Pierre Kanda Kalambayi, sent a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, providing a “strategic partnership” between the 2 nations. The letter proposed access to Congolese minerals, operational regulate of a deep-water port to encourage as an export hub, and the establishment of a joint strategic mineral stockpile.
In return, the US would train and equip Congolese armed forces to “defend mineral present routes from overseas-backed militant teams”. The strengthened military cooperation may perhaps even replace MONUSCO, which the letter described as the “ineffective UN peacekeeping operations” within the central African nation.
“Till we have proof to the contrary, here’s no longer an official plan,” explained Jason Okay. Sterns, a leading US knowledgeable on the DR Congo. “Some parts appear unrealistic, such as the deployment of American forces on the bottom, which runs counter to [President] Donald Trump’s promise to carry dwelling the troopers. However what is certain is that the Congolese army is in a weak place within the east and that the authorities are counting heavily on international strain, particularly from the United States, to increase the strain on Rwanda.”
Calls for transparency
The opportunity of a US-DR Congo agreement raises several questions. “Here is symptomatic of the governance considerations in our country,” said Jean Pierre Okenda, executive director of the Congolese NGO, La sentinelle des ressources naturelles. Okenda, a mining sector knowledgeable, expressed considerations that the negotiations, dictated by the DR Congo’s safety emergency, may no longer advantage the Congolese economy. “Every other folks here assume that the authorities are searching for above all to defend their power. Such an agreement mustn’t be negotiated in backhanded deals, it is going to be submitted to parliament since it may perhaps have a major impact on the population,” he notorious.
Congolese govt spokesman Patrick Muyaya Katembwe claimed last week that the DR Congo was merely searching for to diversify its partners. Meanwhile a Congolese presidency spokesperson refuted the idea that the DR Congo was ready to trade its minerals for safety toughen. “Atmosphere the anecdote straight: President Tshisekedi invitations the USA, whose companies provide strategic raw materials from Rwanda, materials that are looted from the DRC and smuggled to Rwanda while our populations are massacred, to purchase them immediately from us the rightful house owners,” said Tina Salama on X.
When contacted by FRANCE 24, Salama asserted that Congolese Senator Kalambayi’s transfer was a “personal initiative”. “We are searching for to stop the Rwandan predation of our sources,” she explained, preserving out the hope that a strategic agreement with the US may perhaps assist “stop the war”.
Western hardening towards Rwanda
Salama also made it clear that the initiative was specifically directed at the US “because what has been hidden and fostered for 30 years has moral been revealed by Donald Trump’s administration”. It was a reference to the US sanctions, announced on February 20, on James Kabarebe, Rwanda’s minister of state for regional integration, and Lawrence Kanyuka, spokesman for the M23 revolt.
“It be clear that the latest US sanctions are viewed as an important step,” explained Okenda. “Here is the primary time a Rwandan minister has been immediately targeted. What’s more, here’s moral one stage within the sanctions that Washington may perhaps impose against Rwanda,” she notorious.
In its statement, the US Treasury Department described Kabarebe as “a Rwandan govt liaison to M23” who has “coordinated the export of extracted minerals from mining sites within the DRC for eventual export from Rwanda”.
According to UN consultants, the M23 levies substantial taxes on mining activities, generating around $800,000 a month from coltan taxation alone, within the Rubaya area of North Kivu, which it has managed since May 2024.
On February 21, the UN Security Council unanimously approved a determination “strongly condemning” the M23 offensive within the DR Congo and the advances it is making in North and South Kivu provinces with the toughen of the Rwandan Defence Forces (RDF).
Read moreUN Security Council demands Rwanda withdraw troops from eastern DR Congo
A snub to China
Congolese appeals for Western mining investments are viewed as a snub to China, which alone controls between 75 and 80% of mining operations in DR Congo, particularly within the copper and cobalt sectors.
However this does no longer necessarily mean the Congolese president has made a diplomatic U-flip, according to Sterns. “Félix Tshisekedi has always had a tendency to sight to the West, he has spent much of his life in Belgium and was supported by the United States at some stage in his disputed election in 2018,” he notorious.
Since coming to power, the Congolese president has made two bilateral visits to China, aimed at constructing, however also rebalancing, the partnership with Beijing. In January 2024, he concluded the renegotiation of a major mining agreement between the DRC and a Chinese consortium dubbed “the contract of the century”.
Originally signed in 2008 below then-president Joseph Kabila, the renegotiation was meant to yield additional benefits for the DRC. However it failed to appease many Congolese and was slammed by NGOs and civil society teams. “China has no longer revered its part of the 2008 agreement bearing on its infrastructure investments. On the bottom, there’s no longer any real engagement with local communities, and Chinese companies have no regard for staff’ rights or appreciate for the environment,” said Okenda. “Today, many of these staff assume, rightly or wrongly, that it’d be better to deal with the US.”
An American mirage?
Inspired by the much-mentioned, however but to be signed Ukraine-US mining deal, the Congolese counterpart has several attractions for Washington DC. It items a nod to Trump’s “America first” agenda, while countering the pursuits of his rival, China.
However operationally, such a mission items stout challenges, warns Okenda. “A lot of the mining concessions have already been handed over to private companies within the southeast of the country, the part richest in copper, cobalt and lithium ores. This appears to leave shrimp room for a large-scale agreement with the US. Obviously, many exploration tasks are below way. However they portray vast investments, with no guarantees on arrival, which are no longer factored into the balance when it comes to obtaining emergency safety aid,” he notorious.
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Negotiations with Washington DC appear much more hazardous given that no US mining company at the 2nd operates within the DRC. The last American mission on Congolese soil left a sour taste and bad recollections within the central African country. Freeport-McMoRan’s departure caused a poke in 2016, when the company was accused of promoting its assets to a Chinese company with out consulting Congolese authorities.
However, the US retains an passion in DR Congo’s mining sources. This was demonstrated by dilapidated president Joe Biden’s active toughen for the Lobito Hall, a rail mission designed to hyperlink the mines of northern Zambia and southeastern DRC to the Angolan port of Lobito, in uncover to give a enhance to US presents and counteract Chinese affect.
“US mining companies may perhaps return to DR Congo as a consequence of the recent discussions. However the idea that the United States may perhaps significantly compete with or even replace China is a fallacy, as it now no longer possesses the industrial capacities for metal processing and refining that Beijing does,” explained Sterns.
At the back of the scenes, however, Congolese and US officials are busy attempting to glean normal ground. On Tuesday, Congolese presidential spokeswoman Salama welcomed the fact that “discussions are going well”, while explaining that she wanted to “wait till they are concluded ahead of revealing their inform”.
Salama also confirmed reports that André Wameso, Tshisekedi’s deputy chief of staff, had visited Washington in early March, accompanied by a delegation. Congolese govt spokesman Katembwe explained last week that “daily exchanges” were taking place with the US.
For his part, Trump is reportedly preparing to appoint a special envoy to the Great Lakes place, tasked with a precedence mission to look Congolese mineral deals. US reports say Massad Boulos, whose son Michael is married to Trump’s daughter Tiffany, has been picked for the job.
This article has been translated from the original in French.
