On Dec 30, 2025, the Financial Times ran a long, effusive article announcing that the “tin, tungstun, tantalum” (3T) mineral chain had been cleansed of all “blood metal,” and that a certifiably clean 3T chain (key to phones, etc) could now be confirmed. Key to the breakthrough was the cooperation of Rwanda, which has profited immensely from the export of minerals of “dirty” minerals from Democratic Republic of the Congo’s northeastern war zone.
According to the FT, planning for the operation began as far back as 2002 (a year after Trump got in), when Trinity Metals Group acquired the Nyakabingo mine, which had been producing artisanal minerals for some time. Trinity, they say, is backed by “Dublin-based TechMet,” a company that the U.S. Development Finance Corporation has had relations with since at least 2022. In September 2025, Trinity sent the first shipment to Global Tungsten and Powders in Pennsylvania, the leading processor and supplier for the greater West. “Rwanda is directly in the American defense supply chain now,” Trinity’s CEO Shawn McCormick is quoted as saying.
Whatever bragging rights “the West” intends to get from this—the Western segment of the 3T market is a mere 20%, the 80% majority is controlled by China—at the heart of the operation is Tony Blair. In April 2024, the D.R.C. sent a letter to Trump, lamenting that Apple was using tainted metals in its products. The lawyer on the case was Robert Amsterdam, of Amsterdam & Partners, a man known to be close to Blair, and like Blair, active across Africa. At the time, the Rwanda-backed terror outfit M23 had just seized the town of Rubaya, in D.R.C.’s North Kivu province, and was producing an embarrassing abundance (i.e., “hard to hide") of T3 metals (plus gold, T3G).
