Major Rwandan coltan exporter bought smuggled Congolese minerals, UN report says

Straits Times

6 hours ago

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, REUTERS -Rwandan company Boss Mining Solution bought minerals smuggled from rebel-held areas of neighboring Congo, helping fund an insurgency in that vast African country, according to a confidential report by a group of United Nations experts that was reviewed by Reuters.
The U.N. report marks the first time the world body has named a company that's purportedly complicit in trafficking minerals looted from Congo since M23 insurgents seized a key mining area there last year. Boss Mining was named in the U.N. report, which documents how recent territorial gains in Congo by M23 have further destabilized a region beset by decades of conflict. The heavily armed rebels, whose stated aim is to overthrow the government in Kinshasa and ensure the safety of the Congolese Tutsi minority, have been accused by the U.N. of plundering Congo's natural resources and committing atrocities against civilians, backed by the government of neighboring Rwanda.
Illegal mining in M23-controlled areas and the smuggling of these minerals to Rwanda have 'reached unprecedented levels,' the report said.
The report was submitted to the U.N. Security Council sanctions committee for Congo in early May and is due to be published soon, diplomats told Reuters.
M23 did not respond to requests for comment.
Boss Mining's operations are run by Eddy Habimana, a Rwandan businessman, corporate records reviewed by Reuters show. U.N. investigators identified Habimana a decade ago as a minerals smuggler connected to rebels waging war in eastern Congo. Habimana declined to comment on the allegations in the unpublished U.N. Report.
Two Russia-born mining executives are also owners in Boss Mining, according to the Rwandan corporate records.
Yolande Makolo, Rwanda government spokesperson, told Reuters on Wednesday the U.N. report "misrepresents Rwanda's longstanding security concerns" about Hutu rebel groups that have attacked ethnic Tutsis in both Rwanda and Congo, a threat that "necessitates the defense posture in our border areas."
A Congolese government spokesman did not immediately respond to questions from Reuters, but Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) officials have repeatedly accused Rwanda of fomenting the conflict to plunder Congo's mineral wealth.
Sales from the mineral trade have been critical to funding M23's rebellion. The insurgents this year swept across large swathes of eastern DRC that are home to the country's largest coltan mine as well as mines producing gold, copper, tin and gemstones.
A Reuters analysis of customs records from 2024 found that Boss Mining is one of a number of Rwandan companies that export significant volumes of coltan despite the fact that Rwanda produces little of the metallic ore. Rubaya, the Congolese mining area now controlled by M23, produces 15% of the world's coltan. The ore is processed into a heat-resistant metal called tantalum that's in high demand from makers of mobile phones, computers and other applications in the electronics, aerospace and medical industries.
Early this year, M23 insurgents seized the Congolese border cities of Bukavu and Congo, giving them control of two key crossings into Rwanda. It is through these cities that smuggled Congolese minerals are trucked to Rwanda, often at night 'to avoid detection,' according to the forthcoming U.N. report. The report said 195 tons came across in the last week of March alone. Some of the smuggled minerals were purchased by Boss Mining, the report said.
In previous text messages to Reuters in June responding to questions about Boss Mining's operations, Habimana said his company has 'never been involved in purchasing coltan from Rubaya.'
'All materials we buy are in compliance" with international guidelines meant to ensure that mining isn't used to fund armed groups or contribute to human rights abuses, he said.
M23's lightning advance in eastern Congo has re-ignited a decades-old conflict that has its origins in Rwanda's 1994 genocide and has displaced millions of people. The rebels have vowed to overthrow the Congolese government.
Rwanda's government has long denied that it traffics in coltan looted from its neighbor or that it backs M23. But Rwanda's ruling party, mainly headed by Tutsis, shares the same concerns as the Tutsi-dominated M23 insurgents over the purported threat posed by rival Hutu groups operating in eastern Congo. As of April, Rwanda had at least 1,000 troops in Congo, according to the confidential U.N. report.
On Friday, Rwanda and Congo signed a U.S.-brokered peace agreement that aims to arrange for the withdrawal of Rwandan troops from Congo's territory. The accord does not include M23. The rebel group is part of a separate, parallel mediation led by Qatar that seeks to end hostilities. The success of those talks is key to any lasting peace.
MURKY SUPPLY CHAIN
A Reuters analysis of customs records found Boss Mining in 2024 exported at least 150 metric tons of coltan worth $6.6 million. The figure accounted for 6.5% of total Rwandan exports of coltan in 2024, making Boss Mining the country's sixth-largest exporter of the ore last year.
Boss Mining does not mine any of its own coltan but purchases it from another Rwandan company, Speck Minerals, as well as from other sellers, according to a Boss Mining employee who asked not to be identified, saying he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Boss Mining has a mining concession in Rwanda's Burera district where it mines wolframite, another mineral, according to the employee and an online database from the Rwanda Mining Board. That area does not have major coltan mining sites, according to maps of mineral deposits in Rwanda and mining industry press.
Habimana is also the listed company representative of Speck Minerals, according to the Rwanda Mining Association and Rwandan mining industry press reports. The phone number provided is the same number that Habimana uses for Boss Mining, according to a 2024 Rwanda Mining Association publication. The Boss Mining employee told Reuters that Speck operates two mines in the Gakenke and Muhanga districts of Rwanda that produce a combined 18 tons of coltan monthly.
A 2018 audit of the Muhanga mine conducted by a Thai smelter lists the mine site name as Speck Minerals and Eddy Habimana as the site owner. The audit listed the monthly production at the time as 2.3 tons of coltan.
Responding last month to Reuters' questions about Boss Mining, Habimana in text messages described the two mining concessions in Muhanga and Gakenke as part of Boss Mining's operations.
Reuters was unable to verify the current production at either mine.
Habimana did not answer questions about Speck or the employee's assertions about production.
U.N. investigators, non-governmental organizations and mining industry sources have accused M23 rebels and their Rwandan backers of profiting from the illicit trade of minerals smuggled from Congo for over a decade.
The scale of the trade reached new levels after M23 captured Rubaya and established a parallel administration controlling mining activities, trade, transport and the taxation of the minerals produced there, according to a U.N. report published in December 2024. Reuters reporters visited Rubaya in March this year and were told by M23 officials that the rebels had imposed a tax on mineral traders of 15% on the value of coltan they purchase from informal miners who work the area.
The 2024 U.N. report said the rebels, by seizing Rubaya, had ensured that they could maintain exclusive control over the critical supply chain of minerals, while making Rwanda 'the sole transit market for these minerals.'
The smuggled Congolese coltan is mixed with Rwandan production before export, making it virtually impossible to trace its origin, then sold to smelters supplying global technology manufacturers, U.N. experts said.
The resulting mingling of Congolese and Rwandan coltan production was 'the most important contamination of supply chains' to date, the U.N. said. M23 was taking in $800,000 monthly from taxes collected from coltan mining in eastern Congo, according to the 2024 report.
Official statistics on Rwanda's coltan production are unreliable, mining experts say. The country's central bank suspended publication of export figures in May 2024, shortly after M23 seized Rubaya.
A Reuters analysis of customs records showed that Rwanda exported at least 2,300 tons of coltan ore last year.
Eleven mining experts and geologists who work in the region told Reuters that Rwanda exports far more coltan than the country actually produces. Many of them have visited mines in both countries and say the scale of mine sites and the number of miners in Rwanda are dwarfed by those in Congo.
'It's totally implausible that Rwanda can generate that level of output," UK-based mineral consultant Bill Millman said of Rwanda's 2024 coltan exports.
Rwanda's government did not comment on its coltan production.
The DRC severed diplomatic relations with Rwanda in January after M23 seized the Congolese city of Goma. Congo's military has struggled to contain repeated Rwanda-backed rebellions. But even in peacetime Kigali has long benefited from the corruption and weak regulation in the minerals trade that fuels smuggling from Congo.
RUSSIAN CONNECTION
Rwandan company records reviewed by Reuters show that Boss Mining was set up in 2013 and is one-third owned by Habimana, the managing director who denied purchasing Congolese coltan.
Those records show that Boss Mining has two other owners: Yuriy Tolmatchev and Alexander Konovalchik. Both men have dual British and Russian citizenship and have been in the mining industry for decades, according to UK and Russian corporate records and Russian mining industry press reports. They now live and work in the United Kingdom.
The two men also own other companies that buy up the coltan supplied by Boss Mining, according to the corporate records reviewed by Reuters.
In addition, they are directors of a Cyprus company, Metarex Ltd, Cyprus corporate records show. Metarex, in turn, is the 100% owner of Novacore FZE, a company based in the United Arab Emirates, according to UAE corporate records provided by the corporate intelligence firm Diligencia.
Novacore is managed by Tolmatchev and purchases all of Boss Mining's coltan, according to the corporate records and a Reuters analysis of customs records.
Tolmatchev did not comment on Novacore's purchases. He said Boss Mining is the smallest coltan exporter in Rwanda, but declined to provide more information.
'I have no idea how local traders do business in North Kivu,' he said, referring to the Congo province that is home to the Rubaya coltan mine.
Asked about the U.N. report that Boss Mining buys minerals smuggled from Congo, Tomaltchev said the company did not purchase material that originated in Congo.
His partner, Konovalchik, had no comment on the U.N. report. He told Reuters that all of Boss Mining's minerals are purchased 'from Rwandan sources.' He referred follow-up questions to Habimana. 'I'm not controlling day by day operations,' he said. REUTERS