At least 35 people were killed May 10 when armed men raided an artisanal gold mining camp in Ituri province, in the conflicted northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Local authorities at the rural commune of Mungwalu in Ituri's Djugu territory blamed the attack on the CODECO rebel militia. A four-month-old baby was among the dead. The militiamen also looted and torched homes at Camp Blanquette, and seized quantities of extracted gold. (AfricaNews) Informal mines in the eastern DRC provide much of the country's output of gold, cobalt and other minerals used in the global electronics industry.

Chinese-owned MMG Ltd on March 24 announced that it has secured approval from Peru's Ministry of Energy & Mines (MINEM) to expand its copper mine at Las Bambas,  despite ongoing outrage from local campesino communities. The country's fourth-largest copper mine and the world's ninth-largest, Las Bambas has been repeatedly shut down by peasant protests since it opened in 2016. The most recent blockades were launched in February by residents of Chumbivilcas, Paruro and Espinar provinces, Cuzco region, to oppose excavation of a second open pit at the facility, at a locale called Chalcobamba. Ahead of approval of the expansion, MINEM secured a pledge by some 20 communities to lift their blockades and refrain from further protest actions in exchange for agricultural aid, including two new tractors for pueblos in Coporaque district, Espinar province. However, the pueblo closest to the Chalcobamba pit rejected the deal. Huancuire pueblo, in the district of Cuyllurqui, Cotabambas province, Apurímac region, said the community had agreed to take all necessary "legal and social" measures to prevent excavation of the Chalcobamba pit. (Reuters, EFE, Gestión, El Comercio, Mining.com)

Under the slogan "Ato Pela Terra" (Stand for the Earth), thousands of protesters, including some 150 indigenous leaders from eight ethnic groups, gathered for the biggest environmentalist demonstration ever held in Brazil's capital on March 9, protesting a series of bills dubbed the "death package" by critics. The package being pushed by President Jair Bolsonaro would open indigenous reserves to a wide range of economic activities, including mineral exploitation. This measure, assailed as unconstitutional, is actually opposed by the Brazilian Mining Institute (IBRAM), which issued a statement calling it "inappropriate" and warning that it would give legal cover to informal "garimpo" mining in the Amazon rainforest. But Bolsonaro maintains the measure is mandated by the Ukraine war, which has threatened supplies of strategic minerals, including the key fertilizer ingredient potassium. Brazil, the world's top soy producer, imports 80% of its fertilizer—20% from Russia, its biggest supplier. (Mongabay, TRT World)

The government of Poland announced Feb. 4 that it has agreed to pay compensation in a dispute over the Turów open-pit lignite mine that lies close to the border with the Czech Republic. In return, Prague has withdrawn its complaint at the Court of Justice of the European Union. The dispute concerns the complaints of local farmers on the Czech side of the border that their water sources are going dry due to the mine's operations. The Turów Brown Coal Mine, owned by Poland's parastatal power company PGE, must pump water from the pit into the Lusatian Neisse River, draining the local aquifer. The mine has been expanding closer to the border, further enflaming the fears of the Czech farmers. The deal was protested by Greenpeace for failing to provide sufficient guarantees for protection of the watershed. (EuroNews, Jurist, Expats.cz, BBC News, EUReporter)

A rural community in Ghana's Western Region was virtually flattened Jan. 20 when a truck carrying explosives to a gold mine collided with a motorcycle, setting off a massive blast. Some 40 have been hospitalized, and the official death toll of 17 is expected to rise. The truck, owned by a local mining services company called Maxam, was en route to the Chirano gold mine, operated by Toronto-based Kinross Gold. The explosion left a huge crater and reduced dozens of buildings to dust-covered piles of wood and metal in the community of Apiate, near the city of Bogoso, some 300 kilometers west of the capital Accra. Isaac Dasmani, chief executive of Prestea Huni-Valley municipality, told local media "the whole community is gone" after the blast. (Mining.com, RFI, TRT World, Reuters)

In Episode 106 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues his rant against the ubiquitous propaganda that normalizes the oppressive and dystopian pre-pandemic normality—or, as it is now incorrectly rendered, "normalcy" (sic). The opportunity for a crash conversion from fossil fuels that was posed by 2020's pandemic-induced economic paralysis is now being squandered. As fossil-fuel prices soar, the Biden administration is continuing a Trump-era policy to aggressively open public lands to coal mining, refusing to return to an Obama-era moratorium on new leases. US greenhouse gas emissions dramatically bounced back in 2021, which was one of the five hottest years on record. A record was made for highest temperature ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere. (The Northern Hemisphere record was reached in 2020.) The global mean sea level is rapidly rising, and will keep rising for centuries even if the Paris Agreement goals are met, as seems less likely each day. And all this as hospitals remain overwhelmed coast to coast, and the National Guard is being mobilized to keep them functioning. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon.

The US administration on Jan. 5 imposed sanctions on several Bosnian officials and a TV station for alleged corruption and for trying to destabilize Bosnia & Herzegovina. Bosnian Serb political leader Milorad Dodik, his adviser and former president of Bosnia's High Judicial & Prosecutorial Council, Milan Tegeltija, as well as their affiliated station Alternativna Televizija, topped the list of latest US sanctions. The sanctions mean that they are all banned from travelling to the US, and any assets they have in the US are frozen. Dodik and Tegeltija have publicly rejected the US allegations. A Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) political leader, Mirsad Kukić, was also targeted in the new sanctions. He is accused of using his role as manager of the publicly owned Banovici mine and his seat in the B&H parliament to use "political influence and official power for his personal benefit."

Gabriel Boric, a young leftist lawmaker and former student protest leader from Punta Arenas, is celebrating his victory over far-right rival José Antonio Kast in Chile's Dec. 19 presidential run-off election. His declaration "La esperanza le ganó al miedo" (Hope triumphed over fear) has gone viral over social media in the South American country. He was the candidate of Apruebo Dignidad (Approve Dignity), a new coalition that came together to press for progressive reforms under Chile's new constitution. The constitutional redrafting process was set in motion by incumbent President Sebastian Piñera in response to a wave of popular protest two years ago.  (TeleSur, NYT, The Wire, Al Jazeera)