Around 40 000 children mine gold in Mali
Between 20,000 and 40,000 children work in artisanal gold mines in Mali, Africa's third-largest producer of the precious metal, Human Rights Watch said in a report Tuesday.
Picture taken from www.newsone.comOne boy about six years old described the pain he felt when digging shafts with a pickaxe for hours on end
In a statement, HRW said that "children as young as six dig mining shafts, work underground, pull up heavy weights of ore, and carry, crush, and pan ore."
It also said that many children "work with mercury, a toxic substance, to separate the gold from the ore. Mercury attacks the central nervous system and is particularly harmful to children."
HRW children's rights researcher Juliane Kippenberg said children carried loads heavier than their own weight, climbed into unstable shafts, and touched and inhaled mercury, one of the most toxic substances on earth.
Children interviewed complained of regular pain in the back, head, neck, arms or joints, as well as coughing and respiratory diseases.
"One boy about six years old described the pain he felt when digging shafts with a pickaxe for hours on end. Another boy said that 'everything hurts' when he comes home after a day’s work underground."
Many children worked alongside their parents to supplement meagre incomes, while others migrated to the mines by themselves and ended up exploited and abused by relatives or strangers who take their pay.
Some girls are sexually abused.
Children come to the mines from other parts of Mali, as well as Guinea, Burkina Faso and other neighbouring countries, HRW said.
Citing figures from Mali's ministry of mines, it said the country exported about four metric tonnes of gold every year, worth about $218 million (more than 162 million euros) at November 2011 prices.
Most is exported to Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.
The rights group urged the government to implement existing strict laws on child labour and compulsory education, but added that "local officials often benefit from artisanal gold mining and have little interest in addressing child labour."
It also urged businesses that have not yet done so, "to put in place procedures to ensure their gold has not been mined by children."
Into_Enje!
Whats wrong with African Countries mara? mercury is a sh!t man, and is even worse for kids!Where are the opportunists Anglo American and Anglo Ashanti?
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Papage
S.A is still blessed, but with Zuma and his Ministers, I see us going down the drainReport Abuse
MuAfro
Mother Africa is full of milk but is struggling to feed its kids.Not that good management can not be achieved but we just greedy.
It hurts.
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Into_Enje!
PapageS.A is still blessed, but with Zuma and his Ministers, I see us going down the drain
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Even if the President is doing good, its always comes bad to your stu*pid minds, stop hat*ing and join the game man
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Tabza325is
What drives this kids to work in mines in the first place, are this kids forced to work in this mine or do they go there as a desparate attempt to put food in their stormach, it is hard for people starving to think of human right some of those kids have parent whom are not able to take care of them, sadly they is no room for compasion in a capitalist society, non can stand in the way of profit, our African govt are aware of such situation throughout Africa and they have no plans to end such situation anytime soon, as much as mining companies rig in trillions with their mining oparations out of all those trillions they are not willing to spare a single dime to help end such mercery. In Africa we have enough resources to end this but we wont.Report Abuse
BlackLion
Just like being arrested for buying stolen goods; why don’t they apply the same stand here and arrest all the buyers? How will prevention laws help the situation?Where are all these noisy human rights organizations? They won’t say anything because these INVESTORS are their funders anyway.
Poverty is wicked
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GERMAN-CUT
Into_Enje!Papage
S.A is still blessed, but with Zuma and his Ministers, I see us going down the drain
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Even if the President is doing good, its always comes bad to your stu*pid minds, stop hat*ing and join the game man
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my friend stop defending Zuma,fact is he is the worst President we ever had...
A president with many scandals,ministers who are not doing their jobs properly,many wives and many kids(he is the father of a nation),stop attacking people here,we do not only look at the GOOD,we also look at the BAD he does,and the BAD he did over-powers the GOOD,if he was a president in a country like USA he would be a former President by now.
i hope you not defending him just because he is Zulu and you are of the same culture
he is flop,with two heads which are both not working
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