At least 200 people have been killed in a landslide at a coltan mine in the Rubaya region of North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the country’s mines ministry said in a statement. The accident occurred after heavy rains.
Government sources claim that about 70 children are among the dead. The injured are being treated in various hospitals in the nearby city of Goma. However, the rebel group March 23 Movement (M23) that controls the mine has questioned the government’s information.
Fanny Kaz, a senior official in the group, claimed that the incident was not a landslide; rather, it was the result of a bomb attack. According to her, only five people were killed. “What is being propagated is not true,” she said. “There was no landslide, there was an explosion.”
Ibrahim Taluseke, a mine worker , told the Associated Press that he personally helped recover more than 200 bodies from the site, but he alleged that the mine owners were preventing the actual number of casualties from being released.
The Rubaya mine supplies about 15 percent of global coltan production. The tantalum metal obtained from this mineral is used in high-tech products such as mobile phones, computers, aerospace technology and gas turbines. In the same area, more than 200 people were killed in a mine collapse in January this year after heavy rains.