Coltan is being dealt fast and furious in Kigali. The Swiss embassy is rumored to be buying. 
Susan Page said the American embassy had nothing to do with it except to make sure the
American dealers' papers were in order. The biggest one, she told me, was Cabot High-
Performance Materials, headquartered in Boyertown, PA. Her ears pricked up when I told her
that I had heard that Madame Gulamare, a Pakistani woman who owns the Supermatch cigarette
factory in Bukavu, was buying 5 tons a day. Every two days she sends 15 drums by truck 
to Dar es Salaam. But Page was not forthcoming about the coltan trade and the American
involvement in it. Nor was her colleague, the economic officer, who told me that coltan is a very
sensitive issue and that if I wanted to talk to her, the UN would have to make a formal request to
the State Department. 

        My source on Mme. Gulamare was my driver, Alfred Rwigamba. His roomate was a Kenyan
whom Alfred met a yearo ago at the Hotel Mille Collines in Kigale with a woman from Arkansas
who was letting it be known that she wanted to buy a million dollars' worth of coltan and had a
$50,000 machine for assaying the ore. The woman rented Alfred's car for a year and ended up
skipping town without paying him or the Kenyan, but not before she sold her machine to Mme.
Gulamare. "She seemed so trustworthy," Alfred told me. 

        Jean Karimbizi, partner in a company that buys coltan, told me : "Some comes from
Rwanda, some from Congo. We don't ask questions. Most of the Congolese coltan comes from
Punia, Shabunda, Masisi, and Walikale. A little from from the island of Idgwi. In Rwanda the
main mines are in Taba, Rutobwe, and Kayenzi.  People  bring to the coltan to us in Kigali and we
buy it in Bukavu and Goma. The best quality, 40% pure, 35%-plus, comes from the  region
controlled by the Ugandans. We don't get to see it. It comes Mangirajipe  (which is where ?) and
Bafwasende and all the way to Kisangani and it goes to Kampala. We get between 15 and 30%
pure. We have an xray spectrometer which we back up with chemical analysis so there are no
unpleasant surprises. The going price in Kigali is $10-12 a kilo for 15%, $22 k for 30%, 27% for.
40%.  We move between 2.5 and 5 tons a month. Mme. Gulamare couldn't be buying 5 tons a
day. That would  means she had practically cornered the world market. The entire production
from Congo is maybe 60 tons a month. The RPA officers are  not doing 100 tons a month. They
are  collection of free wheeling and dealing officers. They use the profits to finance not the war
but posh cars and mansions in Kigali and property outside, in South Africa and Uganda. . We sell
$30-70,000 a month of the mineral, depending on the quality and have a profit margin of 8-15%.
Sometimes we take a loss. We sell to partners in South Africa. The European dealers want to pay
with letters of credit,  which doesn't work well  in Rwanda because you have to get money out of
the bank and so many documents are required by the time you see your money it takes a month
and you haven't covered your fixed expenses. . Belgians, Germans, Russians, Americans, and
Chinese agents are all here buying. I just heard there are some interested parties in Hong Kong.
All these are middlemen. Much of the stuff that goes to Germany and China is only refined there
and ends up in the U.S.. The U.S. is the main consumer of coltan in the world, and Cabot is the
main company in the U.S.. It's a very strategic mineral. It goes into 
 capacitors for cellphones and  alloys for aircraft, satellites, missiles,  medical instruments,
prosthetics, hip joints, etc.,  the metal being very stable and inert.  The companies here that deal
directly with Cabot and don't go through a middleman reap the highest profit. The U.S. has
strategic reserves that it sometimes dumps on the market and the price  goes through the floor.
Last year the U.S. agency for strategic reserves sold 80,000 lb of pure coltan and the price was
down for 6 months. A month ago it started buying again. We don't discriminate who we buy
from. We had a private contract with the military but after two or three sales they found a better
payer, then they set up a bidding system. They got smart and started to go through higher-up
middlemen. These are just officer pooling, they have nothing to do with the Rwandese
government. [It seemed Karimbizi, whom I was put on to by Mazimhaka, doth protest too much].
But it's ironical that the U.S., which is supporting these parks, are also the ones who are
destroying them." 

       Back in the USA I called  Paul Rutter, who does a lot of the buying for Cabot High
Performance Materials,  which is a small subsidiary of Cabot Corporation in Boston. It was
founded by brahman scion Geoffrey Cabot, who had oil wells in Western Pennsylvania. An
ancient Cabot is still on the board. Rutter explained that "coltan is a combination of columbite and
tantalite. Columbite is same as niobium. Almost anywhere you find tantalum oxide you find at
least some niobium.  The coltan from Bukavu is 30% tantalite, 30% niobium, and the rest is
impurities like iron, titanium, and silicon. It sells in Kigali for $25 a kilo. It is often associated in
that part of the world with caciterite, from which it can be separated.  Niobium is  useful for high-
temperature alloys. 50% of the worldwide use for high purity tantalum powder is for capacitors
for cellphones, computer control systems in cars, etc.

        "We are not the biggest buyer in Kigali. We buy some from traders there but our major
source is European traders who sell to anybody who comes up with the price they are asking.
They  get it from Kigali, Bukavu, or Goma and have their samples weighed and assayed by a third
party. If it is going to be separated that is usually already done in Africa. There are small
processing plants in Congo and Rwanda, but most of the coltan goes not significantly processed
to Europe. The price in Rotterdam or Antwerp for 30% pure varies from $80 to $90 a kilo. We
get most of our coltan from there, only a small percent directly in Kigali. Most of our stuff
actually comes from Australia, where we have long- term contacts with big miners. Nobody
knows what % of the coltan in Europe is from Congo. There are no clearly defined channels. The
material could be double and triple counted as it changes hands. We process the coltan ourselves
into high purity tantalum powder and niobium for a variety of products, the largest  of which is
the capacitor. How much of our coltan is from Congo ? I'd guess 10%.  Any figure for the entire
production from Congo would have to have a huge error bar, but I wouldn't faint if I had to
throw a dart at   $25 million a year.  We buy it unprocessed. Cabot is known as a refiner. A kilo
of high purity tantalum powder is worth several hundred dollars. There are three manufacturers of
tantalite powders for the world solid-state electronics industry : us, the Germany company H.C.
Stark, and the Red Chinese company Ningxia. How much we produce is proprietary, but I would
guess Cabot is a $100  million dollar business. 

       "Automobile control systems  ignitions, air bags  are big business. A small portion is for
ballistic applications. I don't know if we are involved. I just buy the raw material.  We also
process the niobium- into what, to be perfectly honest, I don't know. Niobium 1% zirconium
alloy and niobium titanium is used in superconductors and medical instruments. A kilo of high
purity niobium power is worth less than tantalite powder. 

      "In Kigali a number of dealers are running around and selling to big buyers and number of
small ones. It is very competitve in Kigali because the demand is very high at moment. We
process it as fast as we can get it. We buy from a local who has his own mining operation in
Rwanda. I didn't say we don't get any from Congo. A lot of the material in Kigali is from Goma
and Bukavu. I don't know how much goes to Kampala. I think there is the potential for some
serious business in Congo. So far it is just artesanal mines scratching the surface. Of the $25
million or so coming out of Congo we do a very small amount. People there demand cash and we
can't evaluate the ore. Portable x-ray analysis can lead you down the primrose path. Most of it is
going directly or indirectly  to  Stark and Ningxia."

     Jim Giershek told me that he the high-purity tantalum powder that Cabot makes "to capacitor
manufacturers all over the world.  Virtually every electronic device you can think of from
cellphones to digital cameras has a capacitor. Cellphones are a big driver of the market right now.
We produce about half a million pounds, $100 million worth, of the powder a year. 95% goes to
the capacitor industry. 50% of the coltan industry worldwide goes for tantilite wire, rods, sheets,
foil, and alloys. Less than 2% of our powder is used for ballistic applications, mainly for the actual
warhead part of shoulder-fired anti-tank weapons. The metal has exceptional penetrance." 

People contacted : 

Nairobi : the Honorable John Carson, American Ambassador to Kenya 
Eugene Rutagarama, Program Officer, IGCP 
Annette Lanjouw, Director, IGCP
Mbayma's co conservateur Mafuko, Congolese coordinator, Kes's counterpart.
 

Kigali :
 Patrick Mazimhaka, Councilor to the President on the Great Lakes
 Charles Murigande, Councilor to the President
T‚ogŠne Rudasingwa, Directeur du Cabinet (President's chief of staff
Liz Williamson, Karisoke Director, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund
Ian Muranura, Director, Project Conservation de la Forest de Nyungwe
 Vince Smith, Programme Manager, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Europe
Jean Bizimana, Chef de Service Parcs Nationaux et Tourisme, ORTPN
the Honorable George M. Staples, American Ambassador to Rwanda
 Susan Page, US political officer who monitors eastern DRC

Goma :
Honorable Dr. Vizima Karaha, Chief of Territorial Security and Intelligence for RCD-Goma
Anicet Mburanumwe Chiri, Coordonateur ICCN/RCD
Stanislas Bakinahe, Directeur Provincial Nord Kivu, ICCN
Yowa Winder, OCHA
Kate Farnsworth, US Aid Disaster Relief
Wathuaut Wabubundja Miy, Alexandre, conservateur en chef station Rwindi. 
Maitre Joseph Mudumbi Mulunda, RCD Chef de Departent de l'Interieur

Rumangabo : 
Laurent Muhindo, conservateur principal, Parc Nacional des Virunga

Beni :
Benoit Kambale Kisuki Mathe, Commisaire Adjoint des Infrastructures, RCD-ML 

Epulu :
Karl Ruf, Field Director for GIC at RFO
Robert Mwinyihali, Administrator Research and Training Center (CEFRECOF), WCS
Jean-Joseph Mapilanga
Mayimingi, Kenge
Terese and John Hart (in states before and after trip).
 

Bunia :
Professor Ernest Wamba dia Wamba, President RCD-Kisangani
Ernest Uringi-pa-Dolo, Governor of Ituri Province
Thomas K. Luhaka, Vice-Commisar of Defense, RCD-Kisangani
Faustin Lola Lapi,  commisaire d'agriculture, development rural, peches, et forets. 
President de la societe civile de l"ituri, Bha-Avira Mbiya Michel-Casimir. 
Alex Bonte, FAO

Garamba:
Dr. A.K. Kes Hillman Smith, Monitoring and Research Coordinator
Fraser Smith, Field Director of IRF for Garamba
Sangbalenze Ungua Moke, Commisaire de zone be Dungu
Jules Abiadra, Administrator of Territory of Faradje
Hassan, SPLA political counselor 
Mbayma Atalia, chef conservateur
Claude last name tk UNHCR

Bukavu : 
Carlos Schuler, Administrative and Financial Officer, GTZ
Christine Schuler, chef de bureau, GTZ.
Guy Debonnet, Chef de Mission, GTZ (by telephone from Montreal to Butare)
Mushenzi Lusenge, Directeur Provincial Sud-Kivu, ICCN
Norbert Basengezi Katintima, Governor of South Kivu Province
Commandant Kasereka, Military Commandant of Bukavu Region
Kasereka the conservateur principal
the Mwami of Idgwi, Ntambuka.
 
 

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