Chapter 1.6

Chapter 7

They had again arrived in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province. The city, located in the Virunga National Park, belongs to the geographical structure known as the Great Rift Valley, on the border with Rwanda. This location was one of the reasons for the tragic fate of the city and the surrounding area during the two Congo wars, which caused hundreds of thousands of deaths and decimated the country's population, in confusing national and ethnic conflicts between various groups that included one million Hutu refugees fleeing Rwanda after committing the appalling Tutsi massacre in 1994 and wishing to escape their revenge; clashes between Hutus and Tutsis continued in the territory of the Congo and were joined by the troops of the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda.

Yusuf's planned visits included several general business that supplied the rebel groups with food and other supplies for the mines and received in payment bags of refined coltan ore, which they then had to market to make money.

In 2003, the United Nations imposed a ban on the sale of arms in the Congo in order to curb the butchery, and in light of the evidence that the illegal trade in minerals, especially tin, gold and coltan, was financing the Militias made up of thousands of soldiers, also prohibited the purchase of these metals from conflict areas, restricting it to products from areas controlled by the Congolese government.

The first of the shops they visited was a large warehouse belonging to a former military man who had abandoned his rank to devote himself to the profitable coltan trade. In the back of his warehouse, pallets with stacked sacks of ore could be seen, ready for shipment abroad. The owner was out of the country so they managed to speak to one of his lieutenants, also a former Congolese army officer who, given his friendship with Yusuf, answered Romain's questions unequivocally.

"Does all this mineral come from areas controlled by the government or by the militia?" Mercier asked.

We really have no way of knowing. It is brought here by many different means and by providers, some regular and others not. As long as the product complies with the technical requirements and we reach an agreement on the price, we do not ask any more questions because if we do not close the deal we will do business with one of our colleagues, who have similar warehouses.

“To whom do you sell coltan? Are your clients African?

“No. They are European, Belgian or French, who buy through their local agents. Lately they are approaching to buy some Chinese, who have businesses in Uganda. In any case, they are intermediaries since the product is ultimately shipped normally to China at the port of Mombasa, in Kenya.

The other interviews in Goma yielded a similar result so that the next day they set out for Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu Province, where Yusuf had higher”level contacts.

Bukavu turned out to be a bigger and more important city and Mercier was able to settle into a comfortable hotel, while the others got adequate accommodation at the home of a friend of Yusuf's.

In Bukavu they only carried out one interview but in fact of a higher level. The owner of the warehouse received them in suits and ties in an elegant office and spoke with caution but with relative sincerity.

"Where do you buy the coltan?" Asked Romain.

“We have a multitude of small suppliers with very varied volumes of product, ranging from forty kilograms to two hundred. We control the merchandise and then add it to our inventory.

“ They do not know if they come from permitted or prohibited areas?

“There is really no way of knowing.

“And who are your buyers?

In this case, the response was more specific than that obtained in Goma, since in this case the customers of coltan were Belgian firms that were among the leaders in the international mineral trade. In tone

…

The store owner confided to them the names of a dozen companies that bought the product, all of them from Belgium and France. Romain carried a hidden recorder so that he recorded all the data provided.

Upon returning to the hotel, the Canadian connected his laptop to the wifi and sent a couple of email messages. Then he went into the bathroom and took a shower staying half an hour under the stream of water to soften his body. He then went to bed naked and fell asleep immediately.

The beep from the laptop woke him up almost immediately indicating that he had messages. With pleasure, she noted that Alisha had answered her email, indicating that she was ready for the Skype conference call. Romain connected to the system and his screen quickly lit up with the familiar face.

Alisha Shankar Chand was a woman of beauty who did not go unnoticed by anyone, male or female. Born in Bombay, today Mumbai thirty years ago, her parents belonged to the high castes of India. Indeed his father Vijai Anand Chand was nominally Raja de Bilaspur, in the Punjab, although this noble title was already only honorary, since the princely power associated with it had been extinguished in 1948, with the eighteenth Raja, Vijai's uncle .

Separated from his wife, whose family still had possessions in North India, Vijai had returned years ago to Bombay with his little daughter, taking his personal assets with him. In that city, which in 1955 had been renamed Mumbai, the man had engaged in financial activities, increasingly lucrative as well as murky, which had caused twenty years earlier to leave the city, the most populous in India and its most important economic center, while Alisha completed her secondary and higher education in Switzerland and then briefly in the United States.

Alisha and Romain had met in dramatic circumstances on an atoll in the Seychelles, when the girl was sailing on her sailboat and found a castaway passed out on a beach. Both lived since then a romance crossed from time to time by situations of danger due to the man's activity. They shared a palazzo bought by Vijai Chand in Venice, a suitable setting for their idyll (1).

(1) See the Legacy of the Cathars, by the same author.

(2)

Obviously the woman had prepared for the conference call and was dressed in a richly colored, flowing Indian silk gown that created a framework for her perfectly cut face and huge black eyes. Romain was speechless for a few moments, staring at her in silence until the girl broke the silence speaking in English with her peculiar accent and her velvety voice.

“All right. Are you going to be speechless or do you have something to tell me?

“Excuse me ... I haven't seen you in a month ... you are beautiful ... let me contemplate you for a few moments. Please stand up and stand in front of the computer camera so I can fill my eyes with you.

Obviously pleased, the woman rose from her seat and took a few steps and a couple of turns around her to show off her slender silhouette with a grace that was natural to her. In turn he said.

“Does the computer screen distort your face or are you thinner?

“Can be. Tell me what you are doing these days in Venice.

Alisha began to give an account of her activities in the separation period, generally related to cultural and fashion related events that took place in the city of canals; few would guess in that elegant and sophisticated woman the adventure companion of Romain Mercier. Once her accomplishments were exposed, she asked her boyfriend to narrate what had been done in the meantime, which the man did in short.

"... so you think that the United Nations ban on not acquiring minerals from war zones is not being respected?" Asked the young woman.

“In fact, wholesalers who monopolize the mineral to resell it buy indiscriminately from

…

anyone who is going to offer it to them. Of the 5,000 estimated mines in Congo, fewer than 200 are legal, so there is no doubt that most of the coltan that reaches them is prohibited.

“And to whom do you sell that product?

“In general the buyers are European, Belgian and French. But I think they are only intermediaries, because ultimately the vast majority of cell phones are produced in China, even those of European or American brands. So the mineral travels directly to China from Africa.

"So there is a very long commercial chain from the mines to China, with many hand passes." Alisha deduced.

“ Yes, and all this makes the product more expensive. What I intend to do is look for a more direct line of negotiation with the Chinese. But for this I must find new sources of coltan, not yet explored and, if possible, in non”belligerent areas.

“And the Chinese will be willing to deal with you.

“ They already have. Do you remember the meeting at the Victoria hotel?

Remembering the event, a chill ran down the girl's spine. (2)

(2) See op. cit.

"I remember it with fear," he replied.

“But everything ended well.

“And tell me. What do you want me to do from Europe?

“ That you go to interview the firms in Belgium that buy from the merchants of Goma and Bukavu. They are a half dozen. Some of them may have been listed in the 2003 United Nations as violators of the banned coltan embargo. However, I suppose they have changed their names since then to avoid sanctions. I send you the list by email including some addresses, you can find out the rest on the Internet.

“ Then I will go to Belgium. What do you want me to find out?

“Where they buy and where they sell, and if they ask their suppliers for certificates of origin of the mineral to ensure that it does not come from conflict zones. If they get these certificates, they are false since nobody knows from which mine each kilo of coltan comes.

"And what will you do in the meantime?" Asked the woman.

“Find the alternative sources I need.

“You will take risks.

“You know how to avoid the dangers.

The two lovers said goodbye at a distance and when Alisha closed the video conference she felt a knot form in her stomach.

Before closing his laptop Romain searched for the name of a Chinese company from which he only partially remembered the name. It was a company nominally dedicated to the commercialization of tropical woods, but Mercier knew that it was only a screen behind which was the Division of Africa and West Asia of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Trade and in turn behind it a Chinese People's Army area. He found a directory and within it the email of the person he was looking for.

"Zhang Wei” Director of Foreign Affairs"

After meditating for a moment he opened his own email and prepared to send a message. In the recipient, he copied the found address of Zhang, left the "Subject" blank and went directly to write the text.

"Dear Mr. Zhang,

I am again in Africa to continue with my usual businesses. I hope you remember me.

Romain Mercier. ”

Underneath, he placed his cell phone number and sent the message.

The next day, Mercier and his companions proceeded to buy the supplies they would need to undertake the long journeys ahead, loading them into the van.

Upon returning to his hotel the Canadian packed his things, and before putting away the laptop he opened his email. A message appeared in the mailbox.

"Mr. Mercier. I will be in Mombasa from the beginning of next month. It is always a pleasure to do business with you. Zhang Wei ”