EU Sanctions Belgian Gold Trader for Links to Congo Conflict (1)

The Council of the European Union sanctioned eight people, including a Belgian gold trader, for their links to human rights abuses and conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Trader Alain Goetz is the owner of Ugandan-registered African Gold Refinery Ltd. Goetz and AGR allegedly have been key players in Congo’s illicit trade of the precious metal, which is worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year and is the largest source of revenue for armed groups in the country, the US government said in March when sanctioning both.

Conflict in mineral-rich eastern Congo began in the mid-1990s, when the ...