"The people living in the region should be benefiting from the growth in mining. Instead, many are being forced out of their homes and farmland," an extract from the report reads.
The paper examined the effects of four mining projects in the region using 133 interviews, documentary data, and satellite images. The research discovered that whole towns had been forced removed, becoming "collateral damage of energy transition mining".
In the vicinity of Kolwezi, on a mining concession owned by the DRC-registered company Chemical of Africa SA, was the town of Mukumbi. According to former inhabitants questioned by researchers, Congolese troops reportedly set fire to the village in November 2016.
We weren’t able to retrieve anything,” said ex-resident Kanini Maska, 57, as seen in a report by the East African, an East African news publication. “We had nothing to survive on, and spent nights in the forest,” he added.
A similar account was given by another ex-resident named Papy Mpanga, 37. "The eviction destroyed my dreams," he remarked.
Agnes Callamard, secretary general of Amnesty International, said the rights group acknowledged the urgent need to switch to renewable energy sources but urged a stop to abuses. “The people of the DRC experienced significant exploitation and abuse during the colonial and post-colonial era, and their rights are still being sacrificed as the wealth around them is stripped away,” she said.
