UN report on DRC diamond etc.

pdf file at link from global security

25. The elite network in the Government-held area
comprises three circles of power, namely, Congolese
and Zimbabwean government officials and private
businessmen. Chief figures in the Congolese branch of
the network are the National Security Minister,
Mwenze Kongolo, a shareholder and deal-broker for
both diamond and cobalt ventures; the Minister of
Presidency and Portfolio, Augustin Katumba Mwanke,
a former employee of Bateman’s mining company in
South Africa and a key power broker in mining and
diplomatic deals; the President of the State diamond
company, Société minière de Bakwanga (MIBA), Jean-
Charles Okoto; the Planning Minister and former
Deputy Defence Minister, General Denis Kalume
Numbi, a stakeholder in the lucrative Sengamines
diamond deal and in COSLEG; and the Director
General of Gécamines, Yumba Monga, pivotal in
facilitating several asset-stripping joint ventures
between the State mining company and private
companies,....

COSLEG, a Congo-Zimbabwe joint stock
company, remains a key vehicle for military-backedUnited Nations
II. Change in tactics by elite networks
12. The regional conflict that drew the armies of
seven African States into the Democratic Republic of
the Congo has diminished in intensity, but the
overlapping microconflicts that it provoked continue.
These conflicts are fought over minerals, farm produce,
land and even tax revenues.

Criminal groups linked to
the armies of Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe and the
Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
have benefited from the microconflicts. Those groups
will not disband voluntarily even as the foreign
military forces continue their withdrawals. They have
built up a self-financing war economy centred on
mineral exploitation.

13. Facilitated by South Africa and Angola, the
Pretoria and Luanda Agreements have prompted the
recent troop withdrawals from the eastern Democratic
Republic of the Congo. Welcome as they may be, these
withdrawals are unlikely to alter the determination of
Rwanda and Zimbabwe, and Ugandan individuals, to
exercise economic control over portions of the
Democratic Republic of the Congo. The departure of
their forces will do little to reduce economic control, or
the means of achieving it, since the use of national
armies is only one among many means for exercising
it. All three countries have anticipated the day when
pressure from the international community would make
it impossible to maintain large forces in the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. The Governments of Rwanda
and Zimbabwe, as well as powerful individuals in
Uganda, have adopted other strategies for maintaining
the mechanisms for revenue generation, many of which
involve criminal activities, once their troops have
departed.....

17. Although troops of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces
have been a major guarantor of the security of the
Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
against regional rivals, its senior officers have enriched
themselves from the country’s mineral assets under the
pretext of arrangements set up to repay Zimbabwe for
military services. Now ZDF is establishing new
companies and contractual arrangements to defend its
economic interests in the longer term should there be a
complete withdrawal of ZDF troops. New trade and
service agreements were signed between the
Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zimbabwe just
prior to the announced withdrawal of ZDF troops from
the diamond centre of Mbuji Mayi late in August 2002.
18. Towards the end of its mandate, the Panel
received a copy of a memorandum dated August 2002
from the Defence Minister, Sidney Sekeramayi, to
President Robert Mugabe, proposing that a joint
Zimbabwe-Democratic Republic of
the Congo
company be set up in Mauritius to disguise the
continuing economic interests of ZDF in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo. The memorandum
states: “Your Excellency would be aware of the wave
of negative publicity and criticism that the DRC-
Zimbabwe joint ventures have attracted, which tends to
inform the current United Nations Panel investigations
into our commercial activities.” It also refers to plans
to set up a private Zimbabwean military company to
guard Zimbabwe’s economic investments in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo after the planned
withdrawal of ZDF troops. It states that this company
was formed to operate alongside a new military
company owned by the Democratic Republic of the
Congo.
19. At the same time, local militias and local
politicians have supplemented the role that State
armies previously played in ensuring access to and
control of valuable resources and diverting State
revenue. The looting that was previously conducted by
the armies themselves has been replaced with
organized systems of embezzlement, tax fraud,
extortion, the use of stock options as kickbacks and
diversion of State funds conducted by groups that
closely resemble criminal organizations....

...
22. The elite network of Congolese and Zimbabwean
political, military and commercial interests seeks to
maintain its grip on the main mineral resources —
diamonds, cobalt, copper, germanium — of the
Government-controlled area. This network has
transferred ownership of at least US$ 5 billion of assets
from the State mining sector to private companies
under its control in the past three years with no
compensation or benefit for the State treasury of the
Democratic Republic of the Congo.
23. This network benefits from instability in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo. Its representatives
in the Kinshasa Government and the Zimbabwe
Defence Forces have fuelled instability by supporting
armed groups opposing Rwanda and Burundi.
24. Even if present moves towards peace lead to a
complete withdrawal of Zimbabwean forces, the
network’s grip on the richest mineral assets of the
Democratic Republic of the Congo and related
businesses will remain. Zimbabwe’s political-military
elite signed six major trade and service agreements in
August 2002 with the Government of the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. Reliable sources have told the
Panel about plans to set up new holding companies to
disguise the continuing ZDF commercial operations in
the Democratic Republic of the Congo and a ZDF-
controlled private military company to be deployed in
the country to guard those assets.
The elite network
25. The elite network in the Government-held area
comprises three circles of power, namely, Congolese
and Zimbabwean government officials and private
businessmen....


27. The key strategist for the Zimbabwean branch of
the elite network is the Speaker of the Parliament and
former National
Security
Minister, Emmerson
Dambudzo Mnangagwa. Mr. Mnangagwa has won
strong support from senior military and intelligence
officers for an aggressive policy in the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. His key ally is a Commander of
ZDF and Executive Chairman of COSLEG, General
Vitalis Musunga Gava Zvinavashe. The General and
his family have been involved in diamond trading and
supply contracts in the Democratic Republic of the
Congo. A long-time ally of President Mugabe, Air
Marshal Perence Shiri, has been involved in military
procurement and organizing air support for the pro-
Kinshasa armed groups fighting in the eastern
Democratic Republic of the Congo. He is also part of
the inner circle of ZDF diamond traders who have
turned Harare into a significant illicit diamond-trading
centre.
28. Other prominent Zimbabwean members of the
network include Brigadier General Sibusiso Busi
Moyo, who is Director General of COSLEG. Brigadier
Moyo advised both Tremalt and Oryx Natural
Resources, which represented covert Zimbabwean
military financial interests in negotiations with State
mining companies of the Democratic Republic of the
Congo. Air Commodore Mike Tichafa Karakadzai is
Deputy Secretary of COSLEG, directing policy and
procurement. He played a key role in arranging the
Tremalt cobalt and copper deal. Colonel Simpson
Sikhulile Nyathi is Director of defence policy for
COSLEG. The Minister of Defence and former
Security Minister, Sidney Sekeramayi, coordinates with
the military leadership and is a shareholder in
COSLEG. The Panel has a copy of a letter from Mr.
Sekeramayi thanking the Chief Executive of Oryx
Natural Resources, Thamer Bin Said Ahmed Al-
Shanfari, for his material and moral support during the
parliamentary elections of 2000. Such contributions
violate Zimbabwean law.