Reports of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese companies’ overseas investments in the mining and refining of minerals needed for the clean energy transition are on the rise, research by a monitoring group has found.
The number of recorded allegations of harm at projects tied to Chinese firms have increased every year since 2021, rising to 148 in 2025, according to the Business and Human Rights Centre (BHRC). On Wednesday it released new data showing that a total of 434 allegations of abuse were made against Chinese-backed projects over the five-year period in projects across the world.
The world’s top cleantech manufacturer, China is also the leading financier of critical minerals projects worldwide. The country has committed more than $120 billion in foreign direct investment into mineral mining and processing since 2023, Australian think-tank Climate Energy Finance recently found.
“China plays a central role in global transition mineral supply chains, and as such has a unique opportunity to raise the bar on human rights and community engagement at every stage of mining,” said Michael Clements, BHRC’s executive director.
“While there have been encouraging developments, from stronger regulations to more company engagement, there remains a gap between human rights commitment and action,” he said.
The report comes as communities affected by Chinese-backed mineral projects have filed the first two cases to a Beijing-based mediation mechanism intended to bring willing Chinese companies to the discussion table with affected communities.
Allegations of harms on the rise
BHRC’s latest analysis – including data for the period 2023-2025 – covered mining, smelting and refining projects for 11 minerals considered key to manufacturing clean energy technologies such as batteries, EVs and solar panels needed to move away from climate-heating fossil fuels.
The highest number of abuses was recorded in Indonesia, the world’s largest producer of nickel, which is used to make EV batteries. After the Indonesian government banned exports of raw nickel, Chinese firms invested billions of dollars to develop a large-scale nickel smelting and processing industry in the Southeast Asian country, largely powered by coal.
Other countries with a high number of recorded harms include the Democratic Republic of Congo, where Chinese firms dominate cobalt and copper production; Myanmar, where unregulated rare earths mining has caused widespread environmental destruction; Serbia, where Chinese-backed mining of some of Europe’s most significant copper and gold deposits is swallowing land and homes, and Zimbabwe, where Chinese investments have turned the nation into Africa’s top lithium producer.
Growing risks for people and nature
Allegations tracked by BHRC included negative impacts on local livelihoods, health and land rights, workers’ health and safety and work-related deaths, as well as water pollution and environmental contamination. In addition, 18 people were attacked for raising concerns about Chinese transition mineral projects between 2023 and 2025.
The report shows that 10 Chinese companies, including Zijin Mining, Tsingshan Group and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, accounted for nearly two-thirds of all allegations recorded in the last five years. It found that some Chinese companies “still appear to turn a blind eye to these issues” but noted that several others have been more responsive to allegations of abuse. However, even among companies with human rights policies, implementation remains a challenge, BHRC warned.
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Zijin Mining and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt repeatedly responded to the allegations of harm by saying they take environmental and social risks seriously and adhere to international standards. Tsingshan Group never responded to BHRC’s requests for comment.
Platform for dialogue between communities and Chinese firms
At the same time, Chinese authorities have made “significant progress” on introducing a more specific framework for managing environmental and social risks in overseas investment, BHRC said.
This includes global consultation on a draft Sustainable Mining Code, adherence to UN guiding principles on business and human rights, and greater emphasis on oversight of companies operating overseas.
The China Chamber of Commerce of Metals, Minerals & Chemicals Importers & Exporters (CCCMC) set up a mediation and consultation mechanism intended to provide a platform for dialogue between affected communities or civil society groups that have raised concerns and Chinese companies.
More than three years since its launch, the mechanism has now received its first two complaints from local communities and many more are considering filing a case, Margaux Day, executive director at the nonprofit Accountability Counsel, told an event hosted by Climate Home News last month.
“This is incredibly exciting in that it fills a governance and accountability gap where often communities who are seeking to protect their rights and the environment can’t reach someone who will respond to them,” she told the panel discussion at London Climate Action Week.
Climate Home News understands that the complaints were filed by communities in Latin America and Southeast Asia over labour rights and resettlement issues. No information about the cases has yet been made public. The mechanism’s secretariat did not respond to Climate Home News’ questions.
The mechanism was set up after the Chinese regulator for banks and insurers called on investor-level institutions to establish complaints bodies to hear from communities outside of China. But whether the new initiative will prove effective in tackling grievances remains an open question.
“Real potential” for better mining practices
Participation in the mechanism is voluntary for Chinese firms and it doesn’t have a fact-finding function, nor can it impose provisions for compensation or compliance with human rights standards.
But Day told Climate Home News that, if successful, it could bring companies to negotiate an outcome that is better for people and the planet and leads to more sustainable mining practice.
Chen Yu, an independent China advisor for campaign group Global Witness, agreed that the mechanism holds “real potential”.
“There exists nothing else at a similar level to promote dialogue between communities and Chinese mining companies in particular,” she said.
For companies, the mechanism opens “a channel for problem-solving and dialogue with communities”, she added, as “Chinese companies often remain cautious of approaching affected communities directly, afraid of making the problem bigger”.
However, Chen said the mechanism remains at an early stage of development, faces resourcing challenges and is not yet sufficiently understood by communities in mining areas or Chinese firms.
To help it address some of these challenges, the secretariat is currently seeking technical support from a range of organisations, including civil society groups. But, Chen said, “it will take time for the mechanism to show its value”.
The post Allegations of harms at China-backed transition minerals projects rise appeared first on Climate Home News.
Allegations of harms at China-backed transition minerals projects rise
June Rubis is a steering group committee member for the Cali Fund, from Sarawak in Malaysian Borneo.
At COP16 in Cali, governments made a significant commitment: at least half of the funding from the new Cali Fund should support the self-identified needs of Indigenous Peoples and local communities, including women and youth. It was a watershed moment for multilateral benefit-sharing.
The challenge now is to translate that commitment into access arrangements that recognise the different institutions, priorities and decision-making processes of Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
For generations, biodiversity and traditional Indigenous knowledge have provided significant value to companies who depend on nature’s genetic diversity to discover new drugs that fight diseases, create products that improve health, and grow crops resilient to extreme heat and flooding events. While some compounds are sampled directly from the source country, increasingly the digital blueprints are held in online public databases which are freely accessible to use for innovation and research.
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The Cali Fund was established at COP16 to encourage commercial users of Digital Sequence Information, or DSI, to share benefits arising from its use. Estimates suggest it could generate over $3.5 billion a year – a stark contrast to the modest $10,656 currently committed to the fund from just five SMEs, underlining how much progress must be made at COP17 over the next two weeks.
The COP16 decision that set up the fund offers two routes for money to reach Indigenous Peoples and local communities: through government authorities, and through direct payments to institutions identified by Indigenous Peoples and local communities themselves.
Varied ways of organising
Indigenous Peoples and local communities organise through a wide range of institutions. Some have national or regional organisations experienced in managing international grants. Others work through territorial organisations, customary institutions, community associations, cooperatives or networks. Some have professional finance teams and audited accounts; others have extensive experience governing territories, collective resources or conservation work without having been organised around international funding requirements.
For direct access, some questions are already apparent. Which institutions should be able to receive funds? How should they be identified? What fiduciary standards should apply? How should safeguards and accountability work where institutional capacities differ? What support may be needed where institutions have strong community mandates but less experience with international finance?
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If access is designed mainly around institutions that already meet the expectations of large international finance mechanisms, early funding will tend to favour those already familiar to funders. They will gain further experience and become better positioned for future funding, while institutions with less administrative capacity may remain outside the system despite strong community mandates and long histories of stewardship.
These first decisions matter most, because they set the terms for everyone who follows.
The role of intermediaries requires care. Some Indigenous organisations may want a fiscal host to hold and manage funds on their behalf. Communities may choose to work through an NGO they trust. Government-facilitated arrangements may work well in particular national contexts.
What matters is the function an intermediary performs and the authority that comes with it. Providing administrative support is different from deciding which Indigenous organisations qualify, which priorities can receive support, or how success will be assessed. Direct access means communities keep that decision-making authority.
Decision-making power
The COP16 decision refers to institutions that Indigenous Peoples and local communities identify. But authority among Indigenous Peoples does not sit in one kind of body. It may sit with territorial organisations, customary institutions, community associations or combinations of these. Legal recognition and customary authority do not always align neatly.
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An important feature of the Cali Fund’s governance is that Indigenous Peoples and local communities participate as full members of the Steering Committee, rather than as observers. Seven Indigenous Peoples and local community representatives, one from each of the seven socio-cultural regions, participate in consensus-based decision-making alongside representatives of governments and UN entities. Six additional representatives from civil society, scientific institutions and the private sector participate as observers.
That representation carries responsibility. Institutional legitimacy, access and representation take different forms across the seven socio-cultural regions. Indigenous Peoples and local communities members therefore have an important role in bringing those differences into the Fund’s governance and in ensuring that arrangements developed for one context do not become the assumed model for everyone else.
Safeguards and clear responsibilities
COP17 can establish the core principles and direction, while allowing operational pathways to develop in ways that respond to different regional contexts. The decisions countries take in Yerevan will shape how that flexibility is realised in practice.
The choices made around access will influence which institutions are able to participate, which routes become established and which forms of authority are recognised within the funding architecture. The aim should be an architecture with enough structure to maintain confidence while allowing for different forms of Indigenous and community governance.
A credible direct-access pathway will need safeguards, financial oversight and clear responsibilities. This would give the 50% commitment a stronger institutional foundation.
The Cali Fund’s importance will ultimately depend not only on how much funding reaches Indigenous Peoples and local communities, but on whether they are able to determine how the money is accessed, governed and used. This requires access pathways that recognise their institutions, priorities and decision-making processes, rather than requiring them to conform to a single predetermined model.
The post COP17 must settle who decides how Cali Fund money is disbursed appeared first on Climate Home News.
COP17 must settle who decides how Cali Fund money is disbursed
The UK government has approved extraction at the Jackdaw gas field in the North Sea, despite acknowledging that this decision could make it harder for Britain to convince other countries to move away from fossil fuel production.
UK energy secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh approved the drilling on Wednesday after months of high-profile debate, fuelled in part by interventions from US President Donald Trump. She argued that the project would boost energy security in the wake of the Middle East fossil fuel crisis, protect hundreds of jobs and add £2.9 billion ($3.88bn) to the UK economy.
She said Jackdaw’s gas would be cleaner than imported gas and would not prevent the UK from meeting its legally-binding carbon targets and its goal of net zero by 2050. As the field is already licensed, she said extraction was consistent with the Labour Party’s 2024 manifesto promise not to issue any new oil and gas licenses.
The same morning, the government announced a new Energy Wealth Fund to reinvest oil and gas revenues in the climate transition. It will start with £2 billion ($2.67bn) from the government and be topped up over time with tax revenues from offshore oil and gas production.
Climate campaigners in the UK and abroad were quick to condemn the decision, while a leading legal expert told Climate Home News it goes against the advice of the International Court of Justice. Meanwhile, the government’s own documents reveal that it recognises the drilling could damage the UK’s reputation and its ability to push forward the global transition away from fossil fuels.
“Climate leadership” blow
The 92-page decision document says Fahnbulleh “acknowledges that international standing on climate is important and accepts that a decision to grant consent may not further the UK’s international climate leadership.”
It adds: “She acknowledges concerns about the potential implications for the UK’s credibility and influence – including the difficulty inherent in encouraging other states to move away from fossil fuel production while the UK continues, in a limited and transitional way, to draw on its own domestic resources.”
While noting that Jackdaw has not been issued with a new license – just permission to extract gas – the document says Fahnbulleh “accepts this does not fully resolve the underlying tension in the UK’s position” but “considers this alongside the substance of the UK’s wider record [on emissions reduction], which remains significant”.
It continues that she accepts these concerns are “legitimate” and weigh against approving gas extraction, but only gives this argument a “moderate negative weight” set against the benefits of gas production.
“Huge” wrong signal
In international climate talks, the UK has long supported the transition away from fossil fuels and is one of very few major oil and gas producers to ban new licenses. Across the North Sea, the Norwegian government continues to make offshore areas available for oil and gas exploration through annual licensing rounds.
Climate experts and campaigners shared the concern, acknowledged in the decision document, that approving Jackdaw could set a precedent for fossil fuel production elsewhere. Sam Fankhauser, professor of climate change economics at Oxford University, said the direct climate impact of Jackdaw is “much smaller than the debate around it would suggest” but the “wrong signal it sends, however, is huge”.
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Bob Ward, policy and communications director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change, said that while Jackdaw’s output will be very small, “it will signal to other fossil fuel producers that they too should carry on with business as usual, less than a month before the COP31”.
Kenyan campaigner Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa, called the decision “a serious blow to Britain’s international climate credibility” as “the UK cannot expect developing countries to move away from fossil fuels while giving the green light to new drilling in its own backyard”.
International Court of Justice
In July 2025, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) advised that government failure to take appropriate climate action “including through fossil fuel production” may amount to an internationally wrongful act.
The UK voted in favour of a United Nations resolution welcoming the advisory opinion. Yet, in its Jackdaw decision document, it notes that the ICJ opinion is not legally binding and says the UK does not accept the court’s opinion that the customary international law duty to prevent significant harm to the environment applies to climate change.
Fahnbulleh concludes that, although it will have “significant effect on the environment”, gas drilling in Jackdaw “would not lead to significant harm to the environment” – and so does not breach any duty to prevent such harm. Instead, the government document says the duty should be considered “as a matter of policy rather than legal obligation”.
Margaretha Wewerinke-Singh, who led Vanuatu’s legal team pushing for the ICJ’s advisory opinion, told Climate Home News that treating the duty as a matter of policy rather than legal obligation is “not how international law works”. “An advisory opinion is not a judgement,” she said, “but it states the law as it stands, and that law binds the UK whether or not it accepts it.”
“Even as a matter of policy,” she added, “the decision asks the wrong question: whether Jackdaw on its own would cause significant harm. The Court found that accumulated emissions are already causing significant harm. What matters is whether approving new production is consistent with the stringent due diligence the duty requires.”
Public support for decision
While the decision was criticised by climate campaigners and the opposition Green party, polling reported by Politico suggests that 55% of British adults support drilling at Jackdaw, with just 14% opposed. Even supporters of the UK’s net zero target back new drilling by more than two to one, the polling found.
Jackdaw is one of two North Sea oil and gas fields the government has been debating whether to extract more from for months. While Jackdaw is a small gas field, the other, Rosebank, is a much larger field that holds mostly oil.
Rosebank’s emissions are estimated to be around seven times higher than Jackdaw’s. Fahnbulleh told Sky News that Rosebank is “different” to Jackdaw because its oil would be exported, whereas Jackdaw’s gas will be used in the UK, adding that she will consider it “in its own right”.