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One of the M23 leaders, Gen. Bosco Ntaganda used to run an illegal mineral trade network when he was in the Congolese army, making millions of dollars each year from mines including Rubaya, according to the report. Working conditions in the mines are dreadful as a result of the violence surrounding the trade and the complete absence of regulation. The miners, 40 percent of whom are children according to the advocacy group, work in extreme conditions, with crude equipment such as pick-axes and shovels. In Nyabibwe, a cassiterirte mine where conditions are similar to those in gold mines, miners go down tunnels without any safety net. "With time, we actually forget about the dangers, even though they are real," says Bisima, a 33-year-old miner working at the Nyabibwe pit. "Mine collapse remains the greatest danger." In August, 60 people died in a gold mine which collapsed in Pangoyi, Ituri Province. The gold from eastern Congo is smuggled across the border to Uganda, Burundi or Tanzania where it is absorbed in the local trade and then sent to major world markets, states the report. Uganda produced only $167 million worth of gold in the past three years, but exported an estimated $212 million, according to statistics cited by Enough. "They (the government) like the chaos. It's what allows the officers to get a cut from the trade," said a former Ugandan mining official quoted by Enough. Uganda was accused in a recent United Nations report of supporting the M23 rebellion in eastern DRC. The Ugandan government strongly denies the allegations.
[Associated
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