8 Minutes at 8PM: Highest Vision of Peace for the Congo, 12-07-17

Imagine the Congo. . . what comes to mind?

Rubber plantations, the jungle, childhood studies and stories?

Located in the heart of the continent of Africa, the Congo today is a place of conflict, rape, war, and pillage of their minerals.

The information gathered below is very disturbing.

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What Can We Do?

To my understanding, how we feel and regard ourselves within contributes to the whole.

When we treat ourselves with respect, honour, and Love, everything transforms.

Our state of being — pausing to trust, to apologize, to forgive at every opportunity, in meditation to self, and in person — creates Love and peace on Gaia.

Please join 8 @ 8

being the highest vision

of Love and peace

for the Congo,

for Gaia.

Congo’s Forgotten War

The Week, July 15, 2017

https://theweek.com/articles/711748/congos-forgotten-war

A brutal civil war in Congo has displaced more people in the past year than the wars in Syria and Iraq. Who’s fighting? Here’s information including:

What is happening?

What prompted the uprising?

Why are the peacekeepers there?

What is Kabila’s agenda?

Is the U.S. involved?

Not directly, but U.S. companies are. Impoverished Congo has $24 trillion worth of mineral wealth in the ground, including cobalt, diamonds, gold, and coltan — a highly valuable ore containing the heat-resistant element tantalum, used to make the circuit boards in smartphones, laptops, and other electronic devices.

The proceeds, often made off child labor, fund the rebel factions and the Congolese military — much as “blood diamonds” did in Sierra Leone.

U.S. companies participate indirectly, by buying tantalum and circuit boards, and directly, by investing in Congolese mining: Just last year, U.S. hedge fund Och-Ziff Capital Management was hit with a record fine of $412 million for bribing Kabila for mineral concessions.

Documentary: When Elephants Fight

Actor, Robin Wright, has produced and narrated the documentary, When Elephants Fight.

The trailer below illustrates a need for greater transparency in the mining of so-called “conflict minerals” such as coltan and the violence in the Congo.

Robin and her fellow campaigners hope this will become a movement for reform under the banner #StandWithCongo.

httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gtui6sSJPo

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Robin Wright: Stand With Congo Campaign — video

Actor Robin Wright sits down with the Guardian’s Ed Pilkington to discuss her new documentary, When Elephants Fight.

Her film draws links between the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the mining of so-called ‘conflict minerals’ such as coltan that continue to spark war in the region.

The country is estimated to have $24 trillion of minerals under its soil.

Yet despite such enormous natural wealth, the country remains one of the most destitute in the world, with one in seven children dying before the age of five, according to Unicef.

Robin Wright:

“When I was informed the level of crisis that was going on there — that a woman was being raped every 48 minutes, the worst war since WW2, that over 5 million people had died — all from this illicit trade that was going on.

“Our electronics companies are buying these minerals to allow us to have our gadgets, our phones everyday.

“I felt a personal responsibility to step up, take action, create a voice.

“There are over 25 international companies mining in Katanga.”

Omekongo, JD Stier, and Robin Wright speak on Congo

httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAvllGGNg2k

Rape as a Weapon of War in the Congo

45,482.

That is the number of rape survivors treated by Dr. Denis Mukwege and his associates at Panzi Hospital between 1999 and 2015. Some 35,000 of those survivors, who range in age from toddlers to seniors, suffered complex gynecological injuries, inflicted by members of rebel groups and the Congolese military.

httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soBNcJUmtDw

httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJH4VA0U01I

httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kcj4EG6eUk

Seeds of Hope

In a corner of Eastern Congo one woman puts herself at risk everyday to help thousands of Congolese rape survivors embark on a journey of healing.

Seeds of Hope tells the story of Masika, herself the victim of multiple rapes, who runs a centre that helps other rape survivors and children born from rape come to terms with what they have lived through.

The women and children farm a small patch of land together that provides them with an income, a sense of stability, and a form of therapy.

However, the battle against endemic rape is far from over. Filmed over two years, Seeds of Hope takes us deep into the lives of women and children rarely seen.