The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has banned exports of copper and cobalt concentrates as part of efforts to increase domestic processing and retain more revenue from its vast mineral wealth, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing an official order. The move comes as Washington is seeking greater access to the country’s critical minerals, a sector dominated by Chinese companies.
The prohibition took effect immediately under an order signed on June 29. The mines minister may grant one-year exemptions in “strategic” circumstances, it said. The authorities also introduced a new tax regime for economically significant mining by-products, with a three-month transition period.
DR Congo is the world’s largest cobalt producer and second-largest copper supplier. Major operators include Chinese companies CMOC, Huayou Cobalt and Zijin Mining, the Anglo-Swiss group Glencore, Canada’s Ivanhoe Mines and Luxembourg-based Eurasian Resources Group.
The sector has long been dogged by allegations that proceeds from illegally mined and smuggled minerals have financed armed groups and fueled the escalating conflict in the country’s east. M23 controls large areas of mineral-rich territory, including the Rubaya mining area in North Kivu, a major source of coltan.
The authorities previously restricted cobalt exports in 2025 after oversupply drove prices to a nine-year low, later replacing the ban with annual quotas.
In December, Washington and Kinshasa signed a strategic minerals partnership alongside a US-brokered peace agreement between DR Congo and Rwanda aimed at ending hostilities in eastern DR Congo. The minerals deal is intended to give American and allied companies long-term access to Congolese resources.
Washington has presented the agreement as a way to support Congolese industrialization while reducing US dependence on China-dominated supply chains.
Congolese lawyers and human rights activists have asked DR Congo’s Constitutional Court to invalidate the US deal, arguing that it could undermine national sovereignty. Archbishop Fulgence Muteba, president of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo, described it as “selling off the minerals of an entire nation to save a regime or a political system.”
In January, Corneille Nangaa, leader of the Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC) coalition that includes M23, warned that concessions offered under the US agreement could face disputes because some sites may already have been allocated to other partners. The Congolese presidency dismissed the claim as “speculative,” saying existing contracts would be respected.