The Congo: Crisis Over Copper

Congo President Joseph Mobutu last week nationalized the Union Minière du Haut-Katanga, the Belgian company that provided a living for 100,000 Congolese, accounted for about one-half of the government's revenues and 70% of the nation's foreign exchange. He thus took revenge on an institution that he held responsible for Moise Tshombe's Katanga secession in 1961, and that he charged with bilking the Congo out of its rightful share of the company's profits.

Mobutu turned all the company's copper-mining installations and other assets over to a new Congolese company, gave it a ten-man board of directors composed entirely of Congolese, and...

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