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De Beers diamond urges action on “conflict diamonds”

Diamond giant De Beers says that a “collective response to the issue of diamonds being used as a source of funding for rebel armies in Africa” was needed, news reports said on Wednesday.

De Beers was quoted as saying that it would urge that traders dealing in so-called “conflict diamonds” should be expelled from the world diamond community at the World Diamond Congress in Antwerp, Belgium, in July.

De Beers said it put conflict diamonds - largely from rebel movements in Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sierra Leone - at four percent of the world total and said its own diamonds, sold through the London-based Central Selling Organization, were “conflict free”.


This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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