Diamonds: The Kimberly Process

Introduction Diamonds are well known around the world for their value. There is a high value attached to diamonds since their discovery in the 1800s. Diamonds have been popularized by the fact that they are highly preferred for engagement rings. As precious and liked as they are, diamonds are also well known to their consumers to have long histories of human suffering and violence ("Brilliant Earth", n.d.). The end consumers of diamonds, however, rarely receive further information on diamonds rather than the primary, “avoid buying a ‘blood’ or ‘conflict’ diamond”. Most of the diamonds sold around the world have been linked to severe levels of conflicts, injustices, human suffering, child labor, and sexual violence ("Brilliant Earth", n.d.).

The Kimberly Process has a big loophole in its definition. It fails to take into account the massive abuse of human rights in the diamond-producing territories under the control of governments (Allen, 2010). The Kimberly process might have successfully ended the tenures of notorious rebel groups, but it also paved the way for corrupt governments to oppress and abuse their citizens. This controversy can be linked to the recent report by the Human Rights Watch that focused on Zimbabwe (Haufler, 2009). The group exposed the massacre of over 200 people by the Zimbabwean military fighting to take control of the diamond mines in the eastern side of the country. The soldiers reportedly pressed and threatened the peasants into working in the mine fields and raped the local women (Allen, 2010). The sad part is that the Kimberly process only suspended the exports on grounds of chaos. This is a good example of why there is limited success in ending conflict diamond

The past decade has witnessed the up rise of civil wars in Ivory Coast and the Central African Republic. Stability returned to Ivory Coast in 2012 after years of fighting while over a million people have been displaced from their homes by civil conflict in the Central African Republic (Allen, 2010). Violence linked to diamonds has also trickled into new settings. Most of the most dangerous violence cases related to the diamond trade take place in countries that are officially perceived to be at peace and not in the middle of civil wars. A good example is in Zimbabwe where more than 200 artisanal diamond miners were massacred by soldiers in and locals further enslaved in the mines in 2008. Torture camps for diamond miners run by the government were discovered by BBC in 2011 in Zimbabwe (Allen, 2010). The same goes for Angola where the military has been torturing and killing artisanal diamond miners in some regions while raping the girls and women and demanding a share of the profits. The Kimberly Process still certifies the diamonds from all these countries, apart from the Central African Republic, as conflict free despite all the grave problems ("Brilliant Earth", n.d.). These countries are able to sell their diamonds with the approval of the Kimberly Process despite all the ethical