Life As Collateral Damage

Jovana Đajić and Nataša Prljević

Commissioned by Crvena (the Association for Culture and Art – Crvena)

Over the last two decades, global multinational corporations in search of valuable minerals and metals crucial for various modern industries have come to our region. New mines are being opened in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Macedonia, with the complicity and repression of the state apparatus. This must be a cause for alarm, since the experiences in other parts of the world show us the lethal consequences that the search for profitable resources facilitated by a public-private alliance can have.

Rio Tinto, a British-Australian mining corporation, began exploring the ore potentials in Mačva (Serbia) in 2004 and discovered the significant and highly valuable presence of a previously unknown mineral: lithium-sodium-borosilicate. The newly discovered ore is named jadarite after its location in the Jadar Valley of Western Serbia. This discovery represented a turning point for the Jadar Valley to become a potential vein of lithium, "new gold and new oil of the new century" crucial in the production of lithium-ion batteries and for the needs of military industry. According to projections, the quantities of jadarite in Serbia could meet as much as 10% of world demand for lithium, which will undoubtedly grow because the biggest industrial and traffic pollutants are being forced to turn to alternative energy sources and green policies through international agreements and obligations. 

At the commemoration of the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement on December 12th this year, UN Secretary General António Guterres urged the signatories to declare a state of climate emergency, calling the current efforts to keep the global temperature below 2 °C unsustainable and suicidal. Distributing resources to developing countries to reduce pollution and switching to renewable energy sources is becoming an imperative, while the United States, as the second largest global producer of carbon dioxide emissions, withdrew from the agreement a month earlier. In September this year, the European Commission officially launched the European Raw Materials Alliance (ERMA), publicly supporting “industrial alliance dedicated to securing a sustainable supply of raw materials in Europe”, thereby activating existing platforms for innovative technologies and market competition. The search for cobalt, lithium and nickel, needed for sustainable energy technologies, is part of the European Union's green goal to provide one billion electric vehicles for EU member countries by 2050. Such ambitions are conditioned by the upper class and threaten ecological catastrophes at the sites of extraction, which, given the projected demand, will inevitably be more and more intense. A typical “Tesla” electric vehicle battery contains 10 kg of lithium. One ton of lithium, obtained by the extraction from 5.3 tons of lithium carbonate, can produce 90 vehicles. The production of 30 million electric vehicles requires 1.8 million tons of lithium or five times the amount of total world lithium extraction in 2019. This places the lithium deposits in western Serbia in the crosshairs of many interest groups and multinational mining corporations. 

At the same time, the Government of the Republic of Serbia (RS) recognizes the potential and has renewed the contracts with Rio Tinto that have been active since 2004. So far, about $130 million has been invested in the preparatory work of extensive testing, planning and evaluation. The RS government is manipulating the data on the invested capital to present the situation as a road without return, insisting that too much money has already been invested to abandon the project or change course. Before she was appointed head of the Ministry of Mining and Energy, Zorana Mihajlović was the head of the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure, which in March 2020 adopted the Spatial Plan of the Special Purpose Area for the lithium mine with an accompanying Strategic Environmental Impact Assessment. Local residents, activists and independent experts challenged the plan due to a lack of transparency in public hearings that were intentionally made difficult to attend. A critical problem is that “the author of the Strategic Environmental Impact Assessment did not take into account all relevant parameters, such as the method of lithium and boron extraction, the chemical composition of the cake to be disposed of and, above all, the impact that climate change has on the area allocated for the mine", claims Miroslav Mijatović, activist and representative of the Podrinje Anticorruption Team (PAKT) from Loznica.

The Spatial Plan of the project “Jadar” includes mines that will cover 300 square kilometers, covering 28 villages from the area of ​​Loznica and Krupanj, and two thousand hectares will be added to the mine for infrastructural changes, factories and landfills. The consequences of such a massive intervention are dramatic and long-term because this is the most fertile agricultural land in Serbia and a home for 19,000 people, mostly farmers, who have lived and worked there for centuries. Extraction of chemically stable lithium, which is present in jadarite ore in small percentages, from 1.4 to 1.8%, involves the use of concentrated sulfuric acid, about 120 railway tank cars per day, under high processing temperatures. The flotation plant, a lithium separation facility, would be stationed 20 km away from the Drina River, from which about 300 cubic meters of water per hour would be extracted by pipes, while 50% more wastewater would be returned to Jadar River, Drina’s tributary. The outpouring of polluted water on the land, as well as underground water flows that contain arsenic, mercury and lead, would contaminate the river basins across the Jadar Valley into the Drina and Sava Rivers, polluting vast geographic areas. Treatment with aggressive acids, whose vapors create toxic gases that can spread tens of kilometers, will affect the air and "corrode the skin and lungs of humans and animals". This impact is not just immediate. It is estimated that water polluted in this way can remain so for centuries, according to Dragana Đorđević, a scientist and advisor at the Institute of Chemistry, Technology and Metallurgy (IHTM) of the University of Belgrade. 

Such unfolding of events would affect the water supply of millions of people through the pollution of the Drina and Sava, the spreading of toxic water in floodplains, not only towards Mačva and Belgrade but also the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the Republic of Croatia. That is why, according to activist Marija Alimpić, “Let's Protect Jadar and Radjevina”, the Coalition for Sustainable Mining and the Center the Environment Banja Luka also addressed the institutions of Bosnia and Herzegovina, citing the Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context (ESPOO) to which Serbia is a signatory, which obligates it to consult with the institutions and the public of the countries with which it borders in case of the possibility of transborder impact on the environment.

Pressure on the local population intensified after local residents refused to sell their property and protested in front of Rio Tinto’s office in the village of Brezjak. The government began rezoning agricultural land into construction land without consulting nearly 200 landowners who were subsequently informed about this process. Legal representatives used threats and extortion, encouraging the landowners to accept the current price, from 104 to 130 euros per acre, then to wait for the eventual land expropriation. Serbian representatives of Rio Tinto and the authorities, in meetings with activists and local representatives, generally provide scant information alleging that they are restricted by proprietary rights. In parallel, Rio Tinto works closely with official Serbian institutions and bodies that should be independent arbitrators, supervisors and advocates in service of public interest. Some examples of cooperation, according to PAKT activists, who have been researching the background of Rio Tinto's engagement for several years, include millions in payments to the Faculty of Mining and Geology in Belgrade (100 million dinars), the Faculty of Civil Engineering (10 million dinars), the Institute of Public Health (13 million dinars), as well as millions directed to the Republic Geodetic Authority. The institutions refuse to provide PAKT activists with documentation on how payments are being distributed, thus providing material for well-founded doubts about their objectivity in representing the interests of the citizens of the Republic of Serbia. Ownership of the ore and the majority of the earnings from the sale of lithium goes to Rio Tinto, while the Republic of Serbia will earn only through its share in the so-called ore rent, which in this case is only 5% of the profit. The plan is thus unfavorable in many ways, because in the event that the project Jadar is realized, Serbia would receive a pitifully minor share in profit in exchange for ecocide and the exploitation of human labor.

The Spatial Plan defines a set of measures related to the obligations of the corporation and the alleged special benefits that the construction of the mine will bring to the local population and Serbia. Reading the plan reveals that some of them, in a colonizing and patronizing manner, promise, "reduction of emigration of the younger population due to providing conditions for job creation, improving the quality of knowledge and skills of the local workforce", "development of local infrastructure", as well as regular consultations, timely and truthful information, encouragement of dialogue, with readiness to consider objections. The air of cynicism is proven by the spectacular announcement of 700 mining jobs for the people who are the current landowners and farmers. This, especially in the context of Serbia, can hardly be taken as a sign of favorable development, taking into account previous practices and experiences related to violations of workers’ rights and care for safety and health at work, which is often completely subordinated to the pursuit of profit. The most drastic example is the case of the South Korean cable factory Jura in Vranje, where workers reported sexual assaults, beatings with metal objects and were pressured to wear diapers so as not to interrupt work by using the restroom. Troubling numbers of dead and injured workers, inefficient safety standards, and the absence or slow enforcement of sanctions against employers, are all commonplace in Serbia. When we add all this to the mosaic of knowledge about Rio Tinto's business so far, its attitude towards local communities, as well as the specific and controversial position of the mining industry in general, it is clear why job announcements and promises of prosperity are met with skepticism and pessimism. It is inevitable to ask ourselves: what does the shining future that is being promised actually look like?

Rio Tinto’s business history is a trail of collaboration with repressive regimes. According to research from the London Mining Network, the dynamics of the relationship between Rio Tinto, the people, and the land, can be called bloody exploitation. The struggle of locals, miners and their families for the preservation of the environment, workers' rights, and resistance against forced evictions have on many occasions been greeted by militarized state force. In Spain under Franco’s rule, Rio Tinto supplied the war production of Nazi Germany, in South Africa they exploited the Black population in violation of the already inhumane laws prescribed under Apartheid. Today, Rio Tinto's racist colonial policy in the former colonies, with the support of the World Bank, plans to displace the impoverished population, a situation facing 28,000 people in Cameroon over the construction of the Lom-Pangar Dam, and the destruction of 46,000-year-old Aboriginal settlements in the Juukan Gorge in Australia. The culmination of their criminal policy is demonstrated by the example of Papua New Guinea, where a claim for compensation from the local population of Bougainville Island, financially dependent on the mine, escalated into a ten-year (1989-1999) civil separatist war. During that period Rio Tinto was an accomplice in war crimes and crimes against humanity by financing and providing logistic support for the army of Papua New Guinea. By the end of the war, about 15,000 civilians had died, about 10% of the island's population.

We see that the activities of this corporation are capable of producing dystopian and apocalyptic vacuums. Taking this into account, it becomes clear how fatal, and insatiable, the appetites of the corrupt neoliberal Balkan political elite embodied in Aleksandar Vučić, his Serbian Progessive Party, and its associates can be. Cooperation with controversial mining companies is a frightening testing ground for corruption, exploitation and environmental disaster. With the passage of time and the approaching deadline in which the company is scheduled to start building the plant, billions of euros, millions of tons of ore, and thousands of new jobs are being touted more and more aggressively. All available arsenal in the political populist discourse of Serbia is engaged in support of the project and it is becoming louder and more intense. 

In the split between the parallel realities of the regime media and everyday life, in the face of cultures of humiliation, shaming and self-annihilation whose bearers and promoters are the ruling and upper class, we are almost convinced that we do not deserve to live. It is this seemingly hopeless situation that becomes the reason for rebellion and local self-organizing. Across Serbia and the region, from the poisoned cities and half-abandoned villages, the voices of brave people are rising who are transforming their long-standing fear of autocracy into unity, common will and action. The growing power, which this regime tendentiously and perfidiously convinced us was worthless and small, calls for standing up in a growing ecological uprising. Since our institutions have been stolen from us, with the constitution violated countless times, this power, whose reservoir is rebellion and solidarity, is the only potential we can rely on. This kind of struggle requires us to create space for every voice and mutual empowerment in order to build the foundations for deeper social transformation. This is an opportunity for the intellectual elite to regain its integrity by pulling its head out of the sand and ending their silent complicity. Academic activity must become socially accessible and common, focused especially on the most vulnerable from whom it must simultaneously learn. In the spirit of activist Aleksandar Jovanović Ćuta and the movement "Defend the Rivers of Mt. Stara Planina (ORSP)", this revolution needs both the pen and the plow.

Jovana Đajić and Nataša Prljević

Užice, Serbia. December 20th 2020

This text was commissioned by Crvena (the Association for Culture and Art – Crvena), Sarajevo, and originally published in Serbian, “Život kao kolateralna šteta”, as a part of their biweekly issue O: Prilozi o radno-proizvodnim odnosima, br.11 (O: Contributions about the labor-production relations, number 11). More about Crvena after the sources.

We thank Marija Alimpić (Zaštitimo Jadar i Rađevinu), Miroslav Mijatović (PAKT), Dragana Đorđević, Ljiljana Tomović, Marija Nikolić, and Collective Action Serbia on their work and generous conversations as well as Crvena on their support. 

Sources: 

Lawrence Henry Summers, an American economist, former Vice President of Development Economics and Chief Economist of the World Bank (1991–93), senior U.S. Treasury Department official throughout President Clinton's administration (ultimately Treasury Secretary, 1999–2001), and former director of the National Economic Council for President Obama (2009–2010). He is a former president of Harvard University (2001–2006),where he is currently (as of March 2017) a professor and director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.

Alexander Dunlap, “The Politics of Ecocide, Genocide and Megaprojects: Interrogating Natural Resource Extraction, Identity and the Normalization of Erasure”, Journal of Genocide (2020).

Marija Nikolić, U ime ekonomije, Odiseja (https://www.odiseja.rs/u-ime-ekonomije/).

Podrinjski antikorupcijiski tim (PAKT) (https://www.pakt.org.rs/sr/).

Vázquez Ruiz, A.  Op – Ed: The End of Naïve Europe, The Rise of Green Imperialism, 2020..

Lj. Bukvić, Šta se dešava u fabrikama Jure u Srbiji i zašto država ćuti o tome: Ne daju im da idu u toalet, teraju ih da nose pelene, Danas, 27. april 2016.

Lj. Bukvić, Šta se dešava u fabrikama Jure u Srbiji i zašto država ćuti o tome: Ne daju im da idu u toalet, teraju ih da nose pelene, Danas, 27. april 2016.

Benjamin Hitchcock Auciello, A Just(ice) Transition is a Post-Extractive Transition,  London Mining Network and War on Want, 2019.

Oliver Balch, The curse of ‘white oil’: electric vehicles’ dirty secret, The Guardian, 2020.

About Crvena

Crvena (officially, the Association for Culture and Art – Crvena) is a feminist and left-oriented organization from Sarajevo. Our work uses research and artistic, educational and political practices, to create, advance and maintain the conditions for progressive social change through developing self-governing skills, critical and imaginative horizons, and organizational relationships and capacities in society. The organization was established in 2010 and celebrates its birthday on March 8th. Crvena was founded by a group of friends with the aim to work in the sphere of culture to generate energy and impulses which then dynamize other spheres and everyday life in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Crvena operates on the principle of regular membership which constitutes the Assembly of the organization. The everyday work, conceptual orientation, strategic and project planning, as well as logistical, operational and financial management are the competencies of the Operational Team: Ada Hamidović, Alma Midžić, Andreja Dugandžić, Boriša Mraović, Danijela Dugandžić, Haris Sahačić. The management of statutory and legal issues is performed by the Steering Committee: Lejla Somun-Krupalija, Damir Imamović, Hana Ćurak, Midhat Izmirlija and Aida Vežić