Marange Diamond Fields - International Response

International Response

Zimbabwe is a participant in the Kimberley Process (KP), that regulates trade in diamonds, although by June 2007 the KP annual plenary stated that it

noted with concern the continuing challenges to KP implementation in Zimbabwe and recommended further monitoring of developments and concerted actions in that respect.

The World Diamond Council has called for a clampdown on smuggling of diamonds from Zimbabwe. In December 2008, the Kimberley Process Civil Society Coalition, representing non-governmental organisations which participate in KP, called for Zimbabwe's suspension. In a statement issued by Global Witness, the coalition said

the Kimberley Process (should) suspend Zimbabwe from the rough diamond certification scheme, in light of recent violence used by the government to take control of the Chiadzwa diamond fields.

On November 5, 2009, however, the Kimberley Process conducted its annual meeting in Namibia and decided against the suspension of Zimbabwe. Instead, it recommended and then implemented with the compliance of the Zimbabwean government a 12-month working plan to monitor diamonds mined from the Marange field. The plan is aimed towards preventing exports curbing illegal digging, stopping smuggling of diamonds from Marange, better securing the area, improving the accounting and auditing of Marange diamonds, and supervising exports from the mine.

Many NGO’s came out in support of the plan, while others protested it as shielding Zimbabwe’s alleged grave human rights abuses. The Rapaport Group, chaired by Martin Rapaport, went so far as to ban traders on its internet diamond trading network from trading any diamonds from the Marange fields.

Towards the end of 2009, it was claimed that Marange diamonds were being smuggled out of Zimbabwe through Mozambique.

On May 6, 2010, the KP Chair reminded all participants that they should maintain vigilance to ensure that Marange diamonds comply with the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme. The five-page notice also included photographs and descriptions of rough diamonds from the Marange fields: "On first sight, strong 'gravel' impression resembling rounded pebbles in a riverbed. Look like tumbled and abraded coarse chips of broken beer bottles with colours ranging from dark brown to black to darkish green. Most surfaces are matt (sic) and dulled with rounded corners and edges. Broken surfaces display 'metallic-like' lustre." The report also contains photographs showing Marange diamonds in various stages of processing, so they can be recognized if they are mixed in with a legitimate diamond export.

In July 2010 the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme agreed that diamonds from Marange could be sold on the international market after a report from the Scheme's monitor a month earlier described diamonds mined from the fields as conflict-free.