The residents of Bages have organized this weekend to demand that the company ICL –Israel Chemicals Limited– leave the territory. A thousand people spent the night in a camp in Callús as part of a mobilization driven by Revoltes de la Terra to denounce the environmental and social impact of this company that has been exploiting the region's salt mines since 1998. The intention is to stay for the entire weekend.

In Sweden, if you want to find the center of a city, the most effective way is usually to search for the location of Espresso House, a Starbucks-style coffee chain ubiquitous in the country. In Kiruna, in the far north of the country, the search for Espresso House takes you away from the historic center, about four kilometers away, to where this small town is relocating. This is where the world's largest underground iron ore mine is located. Active since 1898, it is forcing the city to relocate, gradually sinking.

The mining company Poderosa confirmed this weekend that 13 of its workers, who had been kidnapped a week earlier by criminal gangs, were murdered. This Monday, relatives of the 13 deceased miners were finally able to identify the bodies, as protests against the Peruvian government for losing control of the Pataz region in the northwest of the country to organized crime continue to grow. Poderosa itself, for which the R&R company that hired the men worked, confirmed that its kidnapped workers had been "cruelly murdered by criminals allied with illegal mining."

The mining company Poderosa confirmed this weekend that 13 of its workers, who had been kidnapped a week earlier by criminal gangs, were murdered. This Monday, relatives of the 13 deceased miners were finally able to identify the bodies, as protests against the Peruvian government for losing control of the Pataz region in the northwest of the country to organized crime continue to grow. Poderosa itself, for which the R&R company that hired the men worked, confirmed that its kidnapped workers had been "cruelly murdered by criminals allied with illegal mining."

From her office in Antananarivo, Zo Randriamaro coordinates an ecofeminist organization, CRAAD-OI, that fights against extractive projects that threaten ecosystems and communities in Madagascar. The project is a means of attracting foreign companies involved in the project. Global research into critical minerals for the energy and digital transition, and also for a growing arms industry.

Windmills for wind energy production, electric car batteries, or compact electronic devices like GPS devices. These are examples of technologies that require a critical mineral to function. Although these raw materials have been highly valued for years, the spotlight has recently returned to them.

Two weeks ago, the European Commission proposed a Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA) with the aim of securing the EU's access to a secure, diversified, affordable, and sustainable supply of critical raw materials. The proposal is a response to concerns about the EU's dependence on raw material imports and the supply risk associated with them. A recent report identified thirty-four raw materials as "critical" due to their importance for the EU's economy. "Lithium and rare earths are already replacing gas and oil at the heart of our economy," declared Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in her 2022 State of the Union Address, warning that "we have to avoid falling into the same dependency as with oil and gas."