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01/19/2006:

"Do American economic interests threaten democracy in the Congo?"

...The United States do not have friends, they say. They only have interests to defend. This is the lesson that anyone who wants to understand international relations needs to take on board in their analyses.

Since its independence, the DRC has always been a major stake in any global economic discourse. Multinational companies continue, through their governments, to influence the internal politics of the DRC.

In 1960, the free world‘s rhetoric against the expansion of international communism masked economic wars being waged by both the capitalist and communist blocs. With the end of the cold war, the mask fell away.

All the developed or industrialised countries are motivated by the defence of their economic interests. The report by a UN team of experts about the economic stakes, the main cause of the wars in the DRC, is very clear.

Mining contracts that the government in Kinshasa has just signed with a number of American companies perhaps explain this controversy about involving the UDPS in the political process. For some, it illustrates the adage: ‘Better the devil you know, than the devil you don’t,’ and just goes to show that the attitude of the Americans is no different from other countries with an interest in the Congo. ‘If I don’t do it, someone else will.’
globalresearch.ca