Three Chinese nationals have been arrested with 12 gold bars and $800,000 (£650,000) in cash in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, officials say.
The gold and money were hidden under the seats of the vehicle they were traveling in, said Jean Jacques Purusi, the governor of South Kivu province.
He said the operation to arrest the men was kept secret after the recent release of another group of Chinese nationals accused of running an illegal gold mine in the area.
Eastern DR Congo has rich reserves of gold, diamonds and minerals used to make batteries for mobile phones and electric vehicles.
This mineral wealth has been plundered by foreign groups since colonial times and is one of the main reasons why the region has been plagued by instability for the past 30 years.
Militia groups control many mines in eastern DR Congo and their leaders get rich by selling the mines to middlemen.
Purusi said some of these precious metals traders had good relations with influential people in the capital Kinshasa and that is why the mission to carry out these latest arrests had to be kept quiet.
He said they were acting on a tip-off and that the gold and money were found only after a thorough search of the vehicle in the Walungu area near the border with Rwanda.
He did not say exactly how much gold was seized.
Last month, the governor told reporters he was shocked to hear that 17 Chinese nationals arrested on charges of operating an illegal gold mine had been released and allowed to return to China.
He said it undermined efforts to clean up DR Congo’s notoriously dark mineral sector.
They owed the government 10 million dollars in taxes and fines, Reuters news agency quotes him.
The Chinese embassy did not comment on these allegations.
The arrests come as fighting continues in neighboring North Kivu province, where a A rebel group backed by Rwanda has seized large swathes of territory.
last month, DR Congo said it is suing Apple due to the use of “blood minerals”, which is why the tech giant said it stopped getting supplies from both the DR Congo and neighboring Rwanda.
Rwanda has denied being a conduit for the export of illegal minerals from the DR Congo.
In their lawsuit, lawyers representing the Congolese government alleged that minerals taken from the conflict zone were then “laundered through international supply chains.”
“These activities fueled a cycle of violence and conflict by funding militias and terrorist groups and contributed to forced child labor and environmental destruction,” they said.
