Article Author:
Associated Press
Dake Kang, Victoria Mirko and Lori Hinnant
Birds no longer sing. Fish no longer swim in rivers that have turned muddy and brown. Animals do not roam and sometimes cows are found dead.
The forest people of northern Myanmar have lost generations of their way of life. But if they complain, they too face the threat of death.
This forest is the source of several important metallic elements known as rare earths, often called vitamins in the modern world. Rare earths now permeate the lives of nearly everyone on the planet, being used in everything from hard drives and cell phones to elevators and trains. They are especially important in the rapidly growing field of green energy, which powers wind turbines and Tesla engines. And eventually enters his chain of supplies for some of the world's most famous companies, including General Motors, Volkswagen, Mercedes, Tesla and Apple.
However, AP research found that their ubiquitous use hides a dirty and open secret of the industry. Their cost is environmental destruction, land theft from villagers, and an influx of money into brutal organizations. Militia including at least one associated with Myanmar's covert military regime. And as demand for rare earths soars with green energy, abuse is likely to grow.
"This rapid push to build mining capacity is justified in the name of climate change," said the book Rare Earths, which heads a federal project to track illicit resources. said Julie Michelle Klinger, author of Frontier. energy minerals. "There is an ongoing effort to find suitable places to mine them, but they are invisible and unmindful."
AP's research draws on dozens of interviews, customs data, company records, and Chinese academic papers, as well as satellite imagery and geological analysis collected by the environmental nonprofit Global Witness, to identify Myanmar's rare earths. Supplied to the supply chain of 78 companies.
About a third of companies responded. About two-thirds of them did not or did not comment on procurement, including Volkswagen, which said it conducts due diligence on rare earths. Nearly all said they take environmental protection and human rights seriously.
Some companies say they have audited their rare earth supply chains. Other companies did not or only required supplier self-assessments. GM said it understands the "risks of heavy rare earth metals" and will soon source them from American suppliers.
Tesla did not respond to repeated requests for comment, and Mercedes said it responded to the story by contacting suppliers to find out more. Apple said a "large majority" of its rare earths were recycled and found no "evidence" from Myanmar, but experts say there's usually no way to confirm that.
Just as dirty rare earths flow down corporate supply chains, they slip through regulatory gaps.
In 2010, Congress required companies to disclose the origin of so-called conflict minerals such as tantalum, tin, gold and tungsten. However, the law does not cover rare earths. Auditing is left to individual companies and no single agency is responsible.
The State Department, which is leading the effort to secure US rare earth supplies, did not respond to repeated requests for comment. But experts say the government weighs regulation of rare earths against other environmental goals, such as the sale and use of electric vehicles. Rare earths are also excluded from the European Union's 2021 Regulation on Conflict Minerals.
The United States offshored rare earth mining to China in the 1980s due to environmental and cost concerns. China's leader at the time, Deng Xiaoping, declared rare earths to be China's answer to "Middle East oil."
The industry has thrived for decades. Then, stung by public criticism, Beijing officials declared war on the country's dirty industries, including rare-earth mining.
Ore prices rose as Chinese mines closed. Thousands of miners flowed across the border into neighboring Myanmar, home to some of the richest deposits of the world's richest deposits known as heavy rare earths.
"It harks back to Europe's colonial attitudes toward Africa," said an industry analyst, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid undermining relations with the Chinese government. “In a dictatorship like Myanmar, we cannot rely on Third World-style mining practices. Guo, an unwilling Chinese miner, spoke of primitive working conditions in Myanmar, including swarms of mosquitoes and nights of burning logs in crumbling huts. Miners dug hundreds of feet deep with shovels and octopus-filled bare hands.
"I am only responsible for digging and selling mountains," said Guo. "The rest is not my job….We just see if we can make money. It's very simple.
There's a name for what happened to Myanmar." A sacrificial zone, or a place where you destroy yourself for the sake of the world.
Sacrifice can be seen from above, with his blue pools of poisonous turquoise dotting the mountain jungle-clad landscape just a few years ago. Myanmar's rare earth clays are soft and close to the surface, making it easy to scoop into these pools of chemicals. Satellite imagery commissioned by Global Witness shows that there are over 2,700 of these pools in nearly 300 locations.
A villager living along the river, about 24 km from the center of the mining site, said his wife was catching and selling fish. Now the few they can catch make them sick.
"There are no fish along the river, not even small fish," said a villager who requested anonymity for safety. rice field. "Everything is extinct."
Militia are rampant in these northern forest frontier areas, including at least one he associated with military-backed border guards. After last year's coup, the Myanmar military or national army has been subject to international sanctions for human rights violations. Rare-earth funding from militias could fuel violent crackdowns on civilians. Myanmar military and militia leaders did not respond to requests for comment. The hundreds of dollars you hand us are the price you pay for doing business. He has no illusions about acid damage strong enough to corrode bulldozers and excavator shovels.
"This is unbelievable," he said. "It's definitely polluted."
Meanwhile, black cardamom and walnuts are still growing in an area of northern Myanmar where villagers are protesting.
"They are mining rare earths everywhere and the water is no longer safe to drink," said a villager. "There is nothing to support the children. There is nothing to eat."
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AP Researcher Si Chen and his AP Diplomacy Writer Matthew Lee contributed to this report.
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To contact the AP investigative team, send an email to investigativeâ†*ap.org.
