kombizz's moblog

I was born and brought up in Iran, a beautiful country full of history. I started taking photos at an early age of my life with a Lubitel, a Russian twin lenses camera. Most of my photos in those days were black and white. It was a very nice camera that my parents gave me when I was 15 years old.

I always loved to see images. I remember that I would spend time in the library for hours and hours looking at the different photos in Life Magazine, National Geographic and other photographic journals and books. Also I always loved nature, and the different patterns made in it. I remember because of my Entomology studies, I would spend hours in the laboratory looking into microscopes at those beautiful and perfect structures that God created in those different tiny flowers, plants, tiny nematods, animals and insects. Then after I finished university in Iran, I left to do on my M.Sc. in California, the Golden State. There I was witness to even more of the beauties that nature held in each different moments of time. I remember I was always walking and trying to absorb all the scenes in my mind and memory as well as recording them on film. I forgot to say that I received another precious gift from my parents. That was a Canon camera with a fixed lense (G-III QL17). Then after I finished my studies, I returned to Iran for work. I consider myself an artist photographer.

At present I have a lovely Minolta Dynax 7, Mamiya 7II with few lenses. I still love and adore nature and all aspects of it. As a result I love macro photography, landscape, architecture (old and new), and many other categories like artistic abstracts, travel, people, fashion, and photo journalism.

In February 2008, I was delighted to be one of the Amateur UK Photographers short-listed in the Sony World Photography Competition 2008. http://www.worldphotographyawards.org/shortlist/amateur-AB.html

> I have a vast numbers of printed photos, slides and thousands of negatives which all are archived in many folders.

I love to share my observations through my photos with those people who love and appreciate.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kombizz/

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Blood Coltan

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Before watching Unwatchable in the community channel, I did not know anything about the Coltan, this blood mineral. After I watched, I decided to do something about it. So, I made this image to inform other people who may not have heard about it.. In the hope that these horrible events stop and these poor unfortunate people find peace in their ordinary life for good.

Coltan (also C and known industrially as tantalite) is a dull black metallic mineral from which the elements niobium (formerly "columbium") and tantalum are extracted. The niobium-dominant mineral is columbite, hence the "col" half of the term. The mineral concentrates dominated by tantalum are referred to as tantalite.
Tantalum from coltan is used to manufacture electronic capacitors, used in consumer electronics products such as mobile phones, DVD players, video game systems and computers. Conflicts, including the Rwandan occupation in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) made it difficult for the DRC to exploit its coltan reserves. Mining of the mineral is mainly artisanal and small-scale. A 2003 UN Security Council report charged that a great deal of the ore is mined illegally and smuggled over the country's eastern borders by militias from neighbouring Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda.
To many this raises ethical questions akin to those of conflict diamonds. Owing to the difficulty of distinguishing legitimate from illegitimate mining operations, several processors such as Cabot Corp (USA) have decided to forgo central African coltan altogether, relying on other sources.
Toward Freedom claims that the 2000 launch of the Sony PlayStation 2 increased demand for tantalum electrolytic capacitors, causing the world price of coltan to increase sharply, in turn resulting in accelerated mining of the Congolese hills containing coltan.
All three countries named by the United Nations as smugglers of coltan have denied being involved. Austrian journalist Klaus Werner has documented links between multi-national companies like Bayer and the illegal coltan traffic. A United Nations committee investigating the plunder of gems and minerals in the Congo listed in its final report approximately 125 companies and individuals involved in business activities breaching international norms. Companies accused of irresponsible corporate behavior are for example the Cabot Corporation, Eagle Wings Resources International Forrest Group and OM Group.
Estimates of the Congo's fraction of the world's coltan reserves range from 64% to 80%. Tantalum, the primary mineral extracted from Coltan is also mined from other sources, and Congolese coltan represented around 10% of world production in recent years.

Unwatchable: Masika tells her story
Blood Coltan - Part 1
Blood Coltan - Part 2
Blood Coltan - Part 3
Blood Coltan - Part 4
Blood Coltan - Part 5
Blood Coltan - Part 6
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coltan
Blood Coltan
Telegraph - Pressure on mobile phone makers to stop using Congolese 'blood minerals'
Cellular News - Coltan, Gorillas and cellphones
The Politics of Coltan
Grand Theft Congo - DRC

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