DRC's PM resigns - DRC is a country the size of Western Europe & contains a third of the world's cobalt and 4% of global copper reserves

Bloomberg report by Franz Wild September 25, 2008 Congo's Prime Minister Resigns, Citing Health Reasons (Update 1) - excerpt:

Democratic Republic of Congo Prime Minister Antoine Gizenga resigned for health reasons, his spokesman Patrick Muyaya said.

The 82-year-old leader's resignation means the entire Cabinet will have to be replaced, Muyaya said in a telephone interview today from the capital, Kinshasa. Gizenga is a member of the Unified Lumumbist Party, known by its French acronym Palu, which is the second-largest party in the governing Alliance for the Presidential Majority.

Congo held its first democratic elections in four decades in 2006, a key step in the central African nation's transition after civil wars between 1996 and 2003 killed more than 4 million people. The country, the size of Western Europe, contains a third of the world's cobalt and 4 percent of global copper reserves.

Hat tip Friends of the Congo