The EU's Rwanda raw materials deal — profits before Congolese lives

Few Europeans realize how much the EU and Donald Trump actually have in common: a hunger for minerals from Congo and Rwanda. 

In February 2024, the European Commission signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), agreeing with Rwanda to develop “sustainable value chains” for critical raw minerals.

According to the United Nations and other international organisations, some of the minerals processed and shipped from Rwanda such as coltan, a rare mineral used to manufacture electric car batteries, mobile phones and other electronic devices, come illicitly from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

While this agreement is not yet up and running, as EUobserver reported previously, a commodities trader in at least one EU member state has already benefited from minerals likely smuggled into Rwanda from the DRC.  

In eastern DRC, the Rwandan-backed M23 armed group has committed serious abuses and brutalised Congolese civilians.

The EU’s attempt to thread the diplomatic needle by denouncing Rwanda’s support for M23 while refusing to suspend the critical raw materials agreement without adequate safeguards to ensure that this agreement does not contribute to human rights abuses is revealing.

In taking this approach, the EU is putting profits before Congolese lives – a slap in the face to people in DRC who are desperate for international actors to exert sustained public pressure on all parties to the conflict. 

Gang-rape and torture

Amnesty International research found that M23 fighters have gang-raped women and tortured detainees. M23 has also threatened, detained and tortured human rights defenders and civil society members.

Between February and May of this year, M23 fighters entered hospitals in Goma five times, searching for members of the Congolese army or abducting patients, and later beating many of them with wooden rods and sticks.

Detainees at some M23 detention sites have been so badly beaten that they had open wounds and required hospitalization after their release. Families are often prevented from visiting detainees, who are also denied access to lawyers and healthcare.

Conditions at these sites violate international law, they are so appalling that they may amount to war crimes of torture or cruel treatment.  

Early in the conflict, the EU recognised abuses committed by M23, calling on Rwanda to remove its troops from DRC and working to establish a fact-finding mission at the UN Human Rights Council.

In February 2025, the EU and its member states agreed to suspend defence consultations with Rwanda and to review the MoU with the country.

In March, the Council imposed sanctions on nine individuals and one entity responsible for acts that constitute serious human rights violations and abuses in the DRC, including the head of the Rwanda Mines, Petroleum and Gas Board — a nod to EU and member state concerns about the country’s involvement in processing illicit minerals.

In the same spirit, the European Parliament called for the suspension of the minerals agreement, highlighting how, along with the EU’s defence cooperation with Rwanda, it had “contributed to sending an inconsistent message to the Rwandan authorities”.

And now silence

However, since March, despite rampant M23 abuses, the EU has fallen entirely silent on the DRC, and commission officials continue to defend the agreement to MEPs.

The reasons for the EU’s defensiveness about the minerals deal aren’t clear. 

If EU officials believe the agreement gives them leverage over Rwanda to ensure human rights are protected, war-weary Congolese are still waiting for them to use it.

To date, there has been no visible EU effort to engage with Rwanda to ensure that minerals in its supply aren’t contributing to or financing human rights abuses in the DRC. At the same time, the EU appears content to sit on the sidelines while abuses continue and the US and Qatar attempt to facilitate a peace deal between Rwanda and the DRC.

The EU’s failure to hold Rwanda accountable for M23 abuses makes its human rights commitments ring hollow to many Congolese who fear losing their lives simply for speaking out.

Taking timely action will be crucial. EU and AU ministers missed the mark on Wednesday (21 May) by sending blatantly mixed messages giving a nod to “shared values” of human rights and “deep concerns” on the consequences of conflict on civilians, including in the DRC — while simultaneously trumpeting the “positive results and transformational impact” of EU-AU cooperation, including on raw minerals.

EU High Representative Kaja Kallas spoke not a word on human rights publicly, instead declaring that key priorities for the EU-AU partnership will include greater collaboration on critical raw materials.

With Washington negotiating minerals deals with the DRC and Rwanda, which will likely intensify mining in eastern Congo, the EU’s review of the Rwanda minerals deal is now even more crucial.

If the EU doesn’t press Rwanda on its responsibility to uphold human rights, it’s a signal that it favours minerals over the rights of Congolese. That’s a transactional message that shouldn’t sit well with anyone, in Brussels and beyond. 

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