China’s Minerals Mafia: Select Committee Investigation Mines China’s Worldwide Environmental Destruction

China is destroying the planet and leaving behind a trail of corruption and human rights abuses in its quest to dominate critical minerals. That is the conclusion of the Select Committee’s new three-part report documenting 14 cases of Chinese mining companies – under the control of the Chinese Communist Party – engaging in “corrupt, illegal, and abusive practices in countries around the world…including exploitation of weak and indebted governments, corrupt and predatory business practices, the use of forced and child labor, [and] environmental destruction.” 

China’s Minerals Mafia: A Global Pattern of Corruption, Environmental Destruction, and Human Rights Abuses begins with “tens of millions of liters of highly toxic mining waste” spilling out of the tailings dam of a Chinese state-owned copper mine in Zambia and destroying the lives of local villagers, polluting the drinking water, killing fish, and ruining vegetation. 

For the first time, the Select Committee is publishing the entire extensive environmental assessment that was suppressed by Sino Metals, the state-owned Chinese company responsible for the disaster in Zambia. In April 2025, Drizit Zambia, which is an environmental management company, presented findings on the severity of the pollution to Sino Metals and the Zambian Environmental Agency (ZEMA). The company’s assessment found that 1.5 million tons of waste material had been spilled down the river and that 900,000 tons of toxic metals containing cyanide, arsenic, zinc, and lead were leaching into the soil and groundwater.

Worse, the Zambian government has been complicit in enabling Sino Metals and it has failed to stand up for its citizens. China has tremendous influence politically and financially in the country. China controls major parts of the media ecosystem, including a 60% stake in the Zambia National Broadcast Channel, giving China significant control over the media narrative. Sino-Metals is a Chinese state-owned company, so to criticize it is to criticize the Chinese government.

On the Ground in Zambia

Select Committee staff traveled to Zambia earlier this year where they met with civil society organizations working to get answers on the scale of the negligent Sino Metals disaster. These organizations told Committee staff they were targets of harassment by the company and that the number of organizations working to mitigate the damage of the spill has shrunk from 30 to five because of the company’s intimidation tactics. Many of the community members who go to the spill site have been arrested for taking pictures.

Additionally, Sino Metals has failed to provide meaningful compensation to the victims of its negligent failure. The company has forced victims to sign agreements that are not written in their language and offered only meager compensation for families that have lost their livestock, land, and crops. One farmer who used to make more than $200 a week has received no compensation and must survive on one income of $42 a week.

Conclusions

The Select Committee’s investigation documents 13 more cases from around the world that show how CCP companies are ruining lives and hurting the environment of the local communities they work in. It concludes, “the unfortunate truth is that the more Chinese mining companies cut corners on environmental, labor, and human rights standards, lowering their cost of doing business, combined with the PRC’s global market manipulation, the more difficult it is for U.S. and other Western companies to compete.”

Finally, the committee’s investigation makes multiple policy recommendations including: 

• Offer a better option to countries seeking investment in their critical minerals sectors—specifically, critical minerals partnerships with the U.S. and American companies that will respect the laws and regulations of the host government, operate transparently, protect the environment, and add value to local communities.
• Continue developing alternative, Western, and sovereign supply chains.
• Seek sanctions for Chinese government and mining company officials engaged in corruption and gross human rights violations in the mining sector. 

The Committee’s full three-part report can be read here.

The new, never-before-seen environmental assessment can be read here.

Drizit letter to the Zambian Government detailing the environmental disaster here.