BLOOD DIAMONDS

Blood Diamonds are African diamonds that have been mined, traded or sold by militant rebel forces in parts of Southern and West Africa. The name “Blood Diamond” indicates that there has been a certain level of bloodshed associated with the retrieval of the said diamond in question.

Blood Diamonds have been a disastrous source of murder and mutilation—particularly in the West African country of Sierra Leone and the South African country of Angola.

The Partnership [of] Africa and Canada (PAC) reported that in Sierra Leone, “upwards of 50,000 [have been] killed, half the population displaced, and more than two-thirds of its already severely limited infrastructure destroyed.” These startling statistics can be attributed to the overabundance of illegal, underground diamond trading in the region—a trade that is as lucrative as it is corrupt.

Blood Diamonds, also known as “conflict diamonds,” make up an estimated 5-to-15% of the world’s total diamond market, and are thought to generate annual trade revenues of about $7.5 billion.

Sierra Leone’s blood war over regional diamonds started in March 1991, when a rebel group known as the Revolutionary United Front (R.U.F.) crossed the Liberian border and lay siege on a series of small towns, in an attempt to gain power over the newly devastated locals. Then, in 1992, the R.U.F. successfully gained control of Kono, the key diamond-mining town in the African west. In response to this attack, the National Provisional Ruling Council (N.P.R.C.) made efforts to stabilize the region and re-constitute democratic rule; and in doing so, waged a war with the R.U.F. rebels.

When the N.P.R.C. tried to hold their first democratic election in the newly restored Sierra Leone, the R.U.F. rebels attacked the polls—going on a violent rampage; cutting off voter’s hands and feet to intimidate any other civilians from coming forward and trying to vote. In doing so, they maintained control of the masses, and ultimately, control of the diamond mines. Teens, children, women, infants… none were at mercy in the R.U.F.’s ferociously bloody amputation spree.

Therefore, the West African diamonds derived from the diamond mines of Kono became known as the first “blood diamonds.”

The United Nations finally intervened in Sierra Leone in June 2001, when they decided that the bloodshed over blood diamonds could be stopped only when the world diamond market agreed not to engage in business with Liberian diamond sellers. Because if the world refused to acknowledge the value of blood diamonds in the market, then they would no longer have a value worth killing for.