Police arrested two Chinese nationals on Sunday while invading the lands of the Kangankunde rare project in Malawi.
Security personnel said that the suspects were carrying out an “unauthorized geological sampling” or one of the largest rare land deposits in the world, and one of the few main deposits that China does not control.
The Kangankunde project is administered by an Australian company called Lindian Resources that described The transfer incident as a serious security violation.
“This event underlines the critical importance of Kangankunde in the global rare earth supply chain at a time of increased geopolitical and commercial tensions, particularly in the midst of tariff scales between the United States and China, where access to the rare land is a central strategic concern,” said Lindian Resources Robert Martin’s executive on Tuesday.
“Special with the previous construction works well in progress, finding foreign citizens on an active Hul road and without assigning that supposedly taking geological samples, specifically worried about the current geopolitical nature of the rare earth market,” Martin said.
Lindiano Began The preliminary work on the Kangankunde site last week, with the view to completing a three -mile access road in June, and then starting work in the infrastructure necessary to support a complete mining project.
The $ 40 million mining and processing project is scheduled to start producing mineral usable in 2026 and operating for at least 45 years after that, producing more than 15,000 metric tons of high -grade concentrate per year. Lindian’s lease contract includes a ten percent royalty payment to the Malawi government.
The Kangankunde site has several attractive characteristics, including proximity to a considerable city, groundwater that can be used for the mining project and a low concentration of radioactive elements that can hinder the mining of rare earth. These characteristics allowed establishing a very aggressive schedule to launch the mine.
As Martin said, strange land minerals are a great Strategic resource With applications in everything, from military hardware to advanced electronics and battery technology. China dominates the world market for rare earths, especially in the processing area, which is exensive and complicated.
Lindian tok the precaution of fourteen security personnel on the unveloped mining site equipped with automated cameras and drones. According to reports, they have frustrated several drag attempts.
According to the reports, the incident on Sunday involved two Chinese citizens and two Malawi guides who deliberately ignored security barriers to obtain access to a wooded area on the grounds of the Kangankunde project. The security team gets the intruders in a matter of hours.
“The incorporators used not assigned transport paths to evade detection, which suggests prior recognition of the site design. Their activities are aligned with the historical patterns of industrial espionage in the rare earth sector, where the methodologies of the mineral composition and the extraction methodologies have a significant commercial value”, Investment Site discovery alerty alert alert. reported.
“Cyber’s security firm, Mandiant reports a 300% increase in Phishing attacks aimed at strange executives from the Earth since 2022, from Traced to Apt41, a piracy group sponsored by the Chinese state,” the report said.
Local media aforementioned Malawi villagers living in the Kangankunde area saying They He caught the Chinese national transfer and then handed them the security of Lindian Resources and the police in the nearby city of Balaka.
“This is the third time that Chinese citizens have done this. Their actions are beginning to let us be alarmed as community members,” said local community leader James Makanga.
As for what intruders could have expected to achieve, a local business leader suggested that the Malawi government may not have signed a binding agreement with Lindian yet, so Chinese agents are trying to evaluate the site and take samples before making a competitive offer for lease.
An equally strange turn in the case arrived on Monday, when a spokesman for the Balaka Police Station denied that someone had arrested intrUUD on the site of the mine.
“We only make them question them,” police spokesman told Malawi’s Nyasa Times. “Some members of the community wanted to attack them on suspicion that they are illegal miners.”
Trevor Hiwa, Malawi Projects for Lindian Resources manager, confirmed the local statements that Chinese agents were caught that dragged into the Kangankunde site on two previous occasions, in October and January. Hiwa said she believed that China is interested in “undermining the access of the West to rare earths.”
“The police seem strangely not willing to treat intrusions with the gravity they deserve. Is this incompetence or complicity?” he Nyasa Times Wondeed, which implies some elements within the Malawi government was colluding with the Chinese or feared making them angry.
