I saw the unbearable grief inflicted on families by cobalt mining. I pray for changehttps://www.theguardian.com/global-development/commentisfree/2019/dec/16/i-saw-the-unbearable-grief-inflicted-on-families-by-cobalt-mining-i-pray-for-change by Siddharth Kara First part of text:
Bisette sits before me, her face drawn with woe. Even though this is my second research trip to the cobalt provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, I am ill-prepared for the torment I will witness. We thank Bisette for her courage, for we know she is fearful that even a rumour that she is speaking to us could result in brutal reprisals against her and her family. She inhales sharply and recounts a tale of unimaginable grief.
Raphael was born to Bisette’s sister, but after both his parents died when he was a baby, Bisette raised Raphael as her own son. She says he was a bright and cheerful child. Raphael loved to learn but, when he was 12 years old, the family could no longer afford the $6 (£4) a month required to send him to school. Instead, Bisette says Raphael did what most children in his village had to do: he went to work as a surface digger at a nearby industrial cobalt mine near Kolwezi.
When Raphael turned 15, he was strong enough to dig tunnels at the site. Bisette says that on 16 April 2018, Raphael was deep underground with a group of 30 diggers when the tunnel above him collapsed. She heard the news and rushed to the site. “I prayed to God: ‘Please, let my son be alive,’” she says.
When she arrived at the mine, she says, she was informed that no one had survived.
I try to imagine the moment – when Raphael was crushed in the earth, screaming for his mother, suffocating in darkness, dying alone.
Every lithium-ion rechargeable battery in smartphones, tablets, laptops, and electric vehicles requires cobalt to recharge. Approximately two-thirds of the global cobalt supply is mined in DRC. A considerable portion of this supply is mined by an informal workforce of artisanal miners, called “creuseurs”.
Children and creuseurs are not formally allowed at large, industrial cobalt mines. But Bisette and scores of other families we interviewed said their children had been working at sites operated by foreign mining companies for years.On Monday, Bisette and 13 other families have launched a landmark legal case in DC Federal Court in the United States against Apple, Microsoft, Dell, Google and
Tesla for what they consider to be the companies’ complicity in the injuries and deaths of their children.
