SILICON VALLEY TECH GIANTS IN INTERNATIONAL CHILD EXPLOITATION LAWSUIT
I have to warn you up front about this blog and its accompanying article: it's not light nor easy reading; it's heartbreaking in fact. And I'm blogging about it not only because of the inherent interest of the story, but because it confirms a suspicion that I and others have held(Catherine Austin Fitts for example). We'll get back to that suspicion after the article and a bit of context.
The bit of context is this: the Congo (oops, there's another one of those countries with a definite article as part of its proper name) has long been an example of the worst features of European colonialism, with few of the benefits or pluses. Belgian rule was notoriously corrupt and cruel. Supposedly, all that changed (or at least, was supposed to change) at the end of colonial rule. But the Congo remained a country rich in rare resources - and a very poor population - to be exploited. In the late 1980s, Mikhail Gorbachev, still General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, accused West Germany of maintaining a large and very secret preserve in the country where it was covertly developing all manner of weapons, from cruise missiles to bioweapons under the aegis of a German corporation called OTRAG (Orbital Transport Raketen Aktiensgesellschaft). For those who know the story, former Apollo flight director Dr. Kurt Debus retired from NASA, and quickly became a board member of OTRAG.
S.D. shared this article, and herewith a big thank you for doing so, because what the article states indicates that little has changed in the Congo; the exploitation continues, and one wonders if it signals the confirmation of that suspicion I and others have maintained:
Apple and Google named in US lawsuit over Congolese child cobalt mining deaths
The beginning of the article says it all:
A landmark legal case has been launched against the world’s largest tech companies by Congolese families who say their children were killed or maimed while mining for cobalt used to power smartphones, laptops and electric cars, the Guardian can reveal.
Apple, Google, Dell, Microsoft and Tesla have been named as defendants in a lawsuit filed in Washington DC by human rights firm International Rights Advocates on behalf of 14 parents and children from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The lawsuit accuses the companies of aiding and abetting in the death and serious injury of children who they claim were working in cobalt mines in their supply chain.
The families and injured children are seeking damages for forced labour and further compensation for unjust enrichment, negligent supervision and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
It is the first time that any of the tech companies have faced such a legal challenge.
Cobalt is essential to power the rechargeable lithium batteries used in millions of products sold by Apple, Google, Dell, Microsoft and Tesla every year. The insatiable demand for cobalt, driven by desire for cheap handheld technology, has tripled in the past five years and is expected to double again by the end of 2020. More than 60% of cobalt originates in DRC, one of the poorest and most unstable countries in the world.
The extraction of cobalt from DRC has been linked to human rights abuses, corruption, environmental destruction and child labour.
...
In the court documents, the Congolese families describe how their children were driven by extreme poverty to seek work in large mining sites, where they claim they were paid as little as $2 (£1.50) a day for backbreaking and dangerous work digging for cobalt rocks with primitive tools in dark, underground tunnels.
The families claim that some of the children were killed in tunnel collapses while others were paralysed or suffered life-changing injuries from accidents.
...
One of the central allegations in the lawsuit is that Apple, Google, Dell, Microsoft and Tesla were aware and had “specific knowledge” that the cobalt they use in their products is linked to child labour performed in hazardous conditions, and were complicit in the forced labour of the children.
There you have it: children are being exploited to mine cobalt. And given that country's history, one wonder just what else children might be being used to mine. And being paid a pittance to do so. That, pretty much, has been the history of much of the resource-rich areas of Africa, and particularly the Congo. Imagine, for a moment, being so poor that $2/ day to mine cobalt seems like a good thing.
So what's my suspicion? What's the high octane speculation? Well, for one thing, there's a pattern here and it's an old one: the exploitation of cheap labor by mega-corporations. But in this case, it's exploitation of a population of people that "no one will miss." One thus wonders just how extensive the practice is, and that's my suspicion, namely, that the size and extent of human trafficking and the variety of "purposes" it "serves" - from sex slavery to organ harvesting and so on - isn't also a source of outright slavery to use people to create hidden infrastructures funded by hidden finance for hidden purposes. In the case of the Congo, the technologies clearly exist to mine cobalt much more safely: boring machines can dig, shafts can be reinforced and air ducts can recycle air. But that would require a considerable outlay of capital, and reduce "the bottom line." But why do that, when there's a ready supply of what in effect is slave labor available? Better to have children breathe cobalt dust than to pay a real wage for real mining. If you detect that I'm both sad and angry about this story, you'd be right.
So, yes, if as alleged these corporations are doing it in the Congo, chances are they're doing it elsewhere as well, perhaps right here, perhaps right beneath our feet. It wouldn't surprise me, because if they're willing to do it there, they'll do it anywhere.
So, yes, I'm taking this article as a bit of confirmation of my suspicion...
See you on the flip side...
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A great report and shameful for big tech when you realize they are charging a thousand dollars for a bloody mobile phone, let us pray that they win a court case and get due damages yet that would be only the start as god knows what other evil tactics are being played out well-done sir.
At his site, Jim Stone is currently unmasking a major “Molech Temple”. Detailed photos and commentary. If this is an important ‘ceremonial’ center, we should be careful to watch out for a knee-jerk reaction from the perps…
http://82.221.129.208/.vv7.html
The creepiest part was how js seemed to be pitching the place. More so than when aj pitched bohemian grove like the super spy good guy we all know him to be.
I was more interested in js’ take on the likelihood of a recess session of congess to pull a coup on trump.
ZDB, you have to have read Jim Stone for a while to know the ‘context’. Various baddies have been messing with his site, including blocking his funding sources (quite blatantly). Apparently, it got so bad lately – probably their ‘revenge’ for him outing so many ‘ops’ – that he had to expose an Ace to get them to back down. That is why “js seemed to be pitching the place.” Also note that JS has had to publicly-proclaim a “dead man’s switch” as insurance. JS does not operate at Gizar-level speculation; his very life is at risk. Might as well make a big splash, if you have to do it…
Hey Gosh,
I tried to reply about 12 times.. System is not even acknowledging my entries.
wow but it got that. hm. will have to take apart my attempts and find what part is flipping the bot’s trigger.
Darn hit report instead of reply again.
Yep. Understood. And taken witb salt.
A jones is one of the most pro zio guys out there n protects n projects his cred by being so attacked n censored. Even as he takes walks thru parks with camera crews at bohemian grove that we all gotta know he didn’t get without approval (more like command) of someone with lots o leverage and power.
Saw an old Richard van D. ike detective show today on a cancerous relatives’ tv. Which is worse, cancer or the old mk programming? This episode had the old dr uncovering anti-Christian worshippers in tv production business. These contrary religious folk were behind a murder oh my. Same kinda marketing. Comes off as expository until one watches 20 years later. Then it’s clearly contrarian publicity. And as the monsters of our past and present (Bernays through to Rendon) say, there’s no such think as bad publicity.
wow. that was difficult to get through.
think it was because of embedded t-words for breast and d-word for lesbian in that actor’s name. and names for religious and anti religious groups.
that is one seriously politically correct and demanding bot.
Gosh, the pictures of the building with the reptile snake eye windows and even has the slit in the middle of the eyes. Very creepy!!! Who are these “people” ? Snake eyes at the Vatican also.
Doc, u did not just air some socialist ideals did u? My biggest surprise here is finding this out. Where and how did the parents and attny’s get the resources and the venue to bring this. Especially without being Saro Wewoed (sp?)
Makes me wonder if we are using the same definition for the word hidden. I have bought jeans from Rural King for a few years at $10/pr. Comparable jeans 40 years ago were $30. What are the odds these cheaps were made with slave labor? What are the odds that the alternative expensive jeans are not as well. Remember when our beloved psyop artist Michael Moore gotcha’d Phil Knight (I think) at Nike about Air Jordans costing a couple bucks to make, $5 to market and sold for minimum $150? What about those suicide nets at the apple factories?
No wonder parents are lined up for blocks at elementary and middle schools to pick up their children. School buses in my area pretty much pick up and drop off the students door to door, yet many parents line up for blocks every day at the same schools to pick up their children.
We used to have to walk many blocks to the bus stop and wait in line. The bus ride home was back to the same bus stop and walked the many blocks home. A car waiting to pick anyone up was a rarity.
Confirmed. The poorest kids ride crowded buses. Or the short bus that drops at their door to authorized adults. The lines of suv’s double in length about every 4 years. Even kids 2 blocks away get rides or walking parent escorts.
Good news that 2 million Congalese were not slaughtered for our smart phones (nearly embedded chips). Bad news they were exported to D.U.M.B. bases for body parts.
This artist, Stefan Verstappen has a very haunting possible near future in his How It Will All Go Down videos , Orwell on steroids with 5g added. Part 2 has some prepper positives to lift our spirits a little.
https://www.youtube.com/user/shaolinmountainbike/videos
we are all Congolians now.
In the good old CSA aka USA child labor is used harvesting our vegetables and grains. Though it would not surprise me if they are used in other workplaces off the books. We use prison labor in manufacturing so this story unfortunately does not surprise me. It is unfortunate that corporations have never considered workers of what ever age or sex a part of the economic system who should be treated as a vital part of capitalism but as beast of burden to be worked to death.
If human civilization has expanded off planet this pattern must be an integral part of that secret space economy also. Be careful for the things you wish–because slavery will be a very real and very dangerous part of that future until the first wave of revolts succeed.
Hey, Goshawks, do you remember the Babylon V episode regarding the Warlord Jha’Dur’s (of the Dilgar) serum for immortality? Remember her deconstruction in the end regarding her reasons for engineering the serum in the way she did? If your intuition leads you to conclude my post is heading in this direction, where slavery will become the source for food, organs, labor, DNA, etc, then your instincts are right. If these are being perfected in DUMBS, the policies will be a huge part of the secret space agenda once we are off-world.
OC, yeah, Jupiter Ascending was also of this ilk. I really wonder if “humanity” – meaning treating others as you would like to be treated – is rare. It certainly appears – as Joseph documents above – that accumulating money/power is valued over “humanity” aspects. “Putting yourself in another’s shoes” does not seem to apply to oligarchy and corporatism. I wonder if they see themselves as a step ‘forward’ as much as we see them as a step ‘back’?
(Also curious whether this is genetic – meaning parts of the brain that control ‘reptilian’ desires are dominant over ‘mammalian’ segments – or whether this is because we ‘came in’ from different Higher Areas…)
Does anyone else ever wonder if anyone else cares?
Like Ms. Austin has stated there is a way to have a health and productive society and went into detail on how it is to be achieved.. If she knows this others must also.
I don’t think I have met a truly good soul that would not suffer if they did not follow the leader. I believe Some people have numbed their self to keep form having a guilty conscious, some are born this way and some just don’t know any better.
I dunno Danna. Just because I have yet to see a way through this mess does not mean I stop looking (nor working). I am unlikely to accept the blame CAF heaps on me about our economy (and my retirement) being based on this monster (guns oil drugs sex) economy. She posits we would not push her famous red button to stop this. I think she is wrong. We would if we thought that button worked. The fact that she posits that our 401k’s go away when we push that button confirms two thinks. That she is marketing consciously or not for the monsters in a backdoor way. And that her premise is flawed. Since I am posited as the blackmailed would be button pusher in her scenario, I do not yet have a good enough view to clarify solutions. Yet.
Sad to say, that the slavery market is expanding beyond historical measures, both in breadth and depth.
But I’m afraid, one hasn’t seen nothing yet, in terms of where this “slavery” is headed. Technologies being formed, technologies now only a gleam in the slave masters’ eyes; are all marching down a futures’ pipeline.
The children are only a tip of the looming iceberg of ice-cold intent heading towards mankind’s future, not-so-perfect.
One wonders where the Chinese are in this?
The Party has had outside handlers since Mao. Soviets and a variety of Banksters, from what I can gather.
Govt by blackmail( pedo-abuse based?) and control files(same?) isn’t hard to conceive in a polity built on the blood and bones of the Cultural Revolution.
The judicial judgements in these child cases will be decided by… [drum roll]
an algorithm.
It’s reported that almost one million people go missing in the U.S. each year and eight million worldwide every year.
In most of the developing world—including Africa, Asia, and Latin America—no one is counting missing children. Additionally, there are no specific laws on missing children, no established protocol, and no central missing child registries.https://www.factretriever.com/missing-people-facts
The Anunnaki needed slave labor to mine for gold and it’s still going on today. Our past, present and future are intertwined.
The two-legged chimney sweeper, underneath the Victorian masquerade – in the satanic mills – is the source of brilliants and golden carriages for pretenders, who drive over corpses in Rotherham.
Today, king bestows lords. Yet, “cyning” (king) was originally elected by “hlafordas” (lords), suggesting a coup d’état, somewhere along the time line. That is not lawful.
Exposure of unlawfulness is, what the logic of the suppressed Druidic Runes provide. Do the farmers elect the sheriff, or does the sheriff bestow the farmers?
Upside-down!
“Today, king bestows lords. Yet, “cyning” (king) was originally elected by “hlafordas” (lords), suggesting a coup d’état, somewhere along the time line.
That is not lawful.
Do the farmers elect the sheriff, or does the sheriff bestow the farmers?”
Insightful.
Thanks, anakephalaiosis.
I second that shoe.
Insightful indeed.