Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017 Afghans dangle mineral trove
They offer lithium, coal, copper but need support of U.S.
KABUL, Afghanistan — The Afghan government is trying to grab the attention of President Donald Trump and gain greater U.S. support by dangling its huge and untouched wealth of minerals, including lithium, the silvery metal used in mobile phone and computer batteries.
But tapping into that wealth, which also includes coal, copper, rare earths and far more that estimates say could be worth from $1 trillion to $3 trillion, is likely a long way off.
Security has worsened in Afghanistan in the past year, with Taliban insurgents seizing territory and inflicting increasing casualties on Afghan forces. The regions with the greatest lithium deposits, for example, are currently too dangerous to enter.
So far, Trump’s policy on Afghanistan remains unknown.
He has said little about America’s longest-running war, beyond saying on the campaign trail that he wishes the United States were not involved in Afghanistan. Last month, the top U.S. military commander called for an increase in American forces to help support security, a call Kabul enthusiastically backed. But the White House has not said which direction it will go — toward beefing up the American role, drawing it down further or something else entirely. There are currently around 8,400 U.S. troops in the country, involved in training Afghan forces and in counterterror-
● ism operations.
Kabul clearly hopes the promise of mineral wealth will entice Trump into making a greater commitment.
“Afghanistan can be an appropriate place for U.S. industry, and specifically the mining sector, to look at opportunities for investment” because so few potential deposits have been mined, said Mohammad Humayon Qayoumi, chief adviser to the Afghan president on infrastructure, human capital and technology.
“Afghanistan has always been interested in the U.S. investing in many areas, specifically the mining area. Within mining, there are some areas that are strategic materials such as lithium,” Qayoumi told The Associated Press.
President Ashraf Ghani spoke with Trump in December,
and they discussed the mineral wealth. “There was a quite good matter of interest from President Trump’s administration,” Qayoumi said. The two leaders spoke again in February for the first time since the inauguration in talks that focused on security.
A White House official said the U.S. sees sustainable economic development as “essential” to Afghanistan’s stability, including in the mining sector. He said the U.S. will work with Afghan businessmen and officials on reforms that “enhance private sector development” and contribute to development.
Mineral resources have been touted as potentially transformative for Afghanistan, a key to lifting it out of poverty and bringing major wealth for development.
Interest was particularly spiked by a 2007 report by the U.S. Geological Survey and the Afghan government that found the country’s deposits
of a wide variety of minerals were much larger than had been known from surveys decades earlier by the Soviets.
The mountainous, landlocked nation has huge, largely untouched reserves of copper, iron ore, chromite, mercury, zinc, gems, including rubies and emeralds, as well as gold and silver. Particularly alluring is its lithium, crucial to laptop and cellphone batteries.
But getting those minerals out of the ground — and doing it in a way that actually benefits the country as a whole — has been elusive.
The war has scared away investors. Also, corruption is rife, and many of the mines that do exist are controlled by warlords who reap the profits. The Taliban are believed to earn millions from illegal mining.
In 2016, anti-corruption watchdog Global Witness warned that the mining sector
was paying for the war. It pointed to lapis lazuli — a blue stone found almost exclusively in Afghanistan — saying strongmen, lawmakers and Taliban insurgents were all in a violent competition over control of the mines, earning $20 million a year from illegal mining and in the process destabilizing northeastern Badakhshan province.
Integrity Watch Afghanistan said in a 2015 report that the great majority of more than 300 mining contracts awarded so far “may have been exploited by local strongmen under the protection of warlords.” It examined five mines and estimated the government was losing tens of millions of dollars from those mines alone because of corruption that means taxes, rents and royalties are not collected.
The main lithium deposits are in three regions — Ghazni province in the east and Herat and Nimroz provinces in the west. Herat and Nimroz are the scene of regular fighting between Afghan forces and the Taliban, and the areas of Ghazni that hold the lithium have a strong Taliban presence.
The government’s mines and petroleum ministry also has been in disarray. The minister’s post has been empty for nearly a year since the resignation of Daud Shah Saba, who often complained of “power brokers” controlling the mineral resources. Finally, the government recently named Nargis Nehan, a prominent rights and anticorruption campaigner, as acting minister.
Introducing her, Second Vice President Sarwar Danesh vowed action to change the sector, “sever the hands of traitors” controlling minerals and bring “balanced development.”