World Peace Foundation

Projects:
Conflict Diamonds

The illegitimate trade of diamonds has had a powerful and far-reaching impact on conflicts in Africa. The World Peace Foundation held an important discussion of the conflict diamond issue in a closed meeting at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, on October 19-20, 2001. The meeting sought to disseminate a broader understanding of the way in which the conflict diamond issue fits within the much larger diamond industry and trade as a whole; and to create some meaningful consensus about the best ways in which to reduce the value of the conflict diamond trade to warring parties.

Entitled "Diamonds in Peace and War: Reforms and Results," the meeting examined three interrelated issues.

I - The Diamond Nexus: Mining, Trade, Polishing, and Sale

This session examined how the diamond business operates, and how the overall nature of the evolving diamond trade and diamond manufacturing provides a positive and a negative context for diamonds as a possible fuel for conflict. The central role of the diamond industry in southern Africa, and as far afield as India, was assessed.

II – Conflicts and Diamonds: A Complicated and Changing Association?

This session explored the ongoing conflicts in Angola, Congo, and Sierra Leone/Liberia, as well as the pull and push of diamonds and, inter alia, oil, timber, coltan, and other precious extractive products.

III - What is Being Done? What Remains to be Done?

This session examined existing and contemplated legislative initiatives in the United States and elsewhere, explored the Kimberley regime and progress toward its full implementation after the Moscow and London rounds, analyzed geochemical and other technical issues with regard to the marking and post-hoc identification of diamonds, and attempted to create a best policy consensus.

This initiative was sponsored and organized by the WPF Program on Intrastate Conflict, the Carr Center on Human Rights Policy, and the Project on Justice in Transition –- all within the Kennedy School of Government -- and the World Peace Foundation. For more information about conflict diamonds, see WPF Report 30, Diamonds in Peace and War: Severing the Conflict-Diamond Connection, by Ingrid J. Tamm (2002).