How war in Myanmar is driving a deadly rare earth mining boom

Grist reports that Myanmar's civil war is fueling a dangerous boom in rare earth mining along the country's mountainous eastern border with China. Since a twenty twenty-one military coup gutted the formal economy, workers with few options have taken hazardous jobs at heavily guarded sites in territory run by ethnic armies — one laborer told Grist his younger brother was killed in a landslide weeks after arriving, and local media have documented at least five fatal slides in recent years. These heavy rare earths, vital to everything from wind turbines and electric vehicles to advanced weapons, are trucked into China and blended with other supplies before reaching global products, obscuring their origins. As Grist tells it, superpowers competing to control these critical mineral supply chains are, in effect, funneling demand into a lawless conflict zone where poisoned rivers, toxic farmland, and reports of trafficked and prison labor mark the cost of extraction.

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