[NYTr] Rights Activists Slam Venezuela's Diamond Trade
 
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2007 15:53:12 -0500 (CDT)

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit
 
Bloomberg - October 9, 2007
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aoCpo_yOMupc

Venezuela Diamond Exports Should Be Blocked, Advocates Say

By Steven Bodzin

Two human-rights groups called for Venezuela to be kicked out of a
network of diamond-trading nations for allegedly illegal exports that
violate terms of a treaty designed to prevent sales of gems that fund
arms sales.

Mines in Venezuela have produced and smuggled out of the country about
150,000 carats of diamonds a year, even as the government reports no
exports of the gems the past two years, according to a report today
from London-based Global Witness and Ottawa-based Partnership Africa
Canada.

The groups called for Venezuela to be kicked out of the 47- nation
Kimberley Process treaty. Under the treaty, governments certify that
stones aren't ``blood diamonds'' purchased from guerillas in war-torn
mining regions. Members of the treaty may buy diamonds only from other
members. Venezuela's failure to control illegal exports undermines the
treaty, the groups said.

``Venezuela made a half-hearted attempt to supply a few statistics
earlier this year, but the numbers are simply not credible,'' Ian
Smillie, a researcher at Partnership Africa Canada, said today in a
statement.

Karel Kovanda, Kimberley Process chairman, didn't return a call seeking
comment. A spokeswoman at Venezuela's Ministry of Basic Industries and
Mining didn't answer calls seeking comment. 

                              ***

AFP via Google - Oct 9, 2007
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iWu4jRRYV-dcHUlfjSm3o1yZS30A

Expel Venezuela from diamond trade, says rights group

Agence France Presse

LONDON (AFP) ? Rights campaigners Global Witness called Tuesday for
Venezuela to be excluded from the international diamond market,
accusing it of undermining the fight against trade in so-called blood
diamonds.

The group called on the European Commission to expel Venezuela for
"flagrant non-compliance" with the Kimberley Process (KP), the
regulatory system designed to prevent trade in diamonds used to fund
conflicts.

"Failure to do so could compromise the entire scheme," said a statement
from the group.

"Nearly one year after clear evidence of massive diamond smuggling in
Venezuela came to light, the country continues to flout the KP," said
Charmian Gooch, Director of Global Witness in the statement.

"If the KP does not address large-scale smuggling of rough diamonds in
Venezuela and other countries, it cannot effectively protect against
the threat of blood diamonds."

Global Witness referred to a 2006 report by Partnership Africa Canada,
a non-governmental agency, that implicated Venezuela in the trade in
illicitly mined and smuggled diamonds.

"Venezuela has also failed in its obligation to provide the KP with an
annual report and credible statistics this year," it added.

Partnership Africa Canada (PAC) itself echoed that position in a press
release on its website:

"Venezuela made a half-hearted attempt to supply a few statistics
earlier this year, but the numbers are simply not credible," it said.

PAC said it had repeatedly called on the European Commission, which
currently administers the Kimberley Process, to "get tough with
Venezuela."

Global Witness noted that Ivory Coast was also involved in the trade in
conflict or blood diamonds.

It referred to a 2006 UN report that indicated that 23 million dollars
of conflict diamonds had been smuggled out of Ivory Coast and into the
international market, a situation confirmed by subsequent reports.

"The international diamond industry also needs to live up to its
promise of self-regulation to combat the trade in conflict diamonds,"
said Global Witness.

The Kimberley Process is jointly run by governments and the diamond
industry and groups 45 countries and international organisations.

The UN-backed scheme was set up in 2000 to try to end the use of
diamonds to fund conflicts such as those fought in Angola, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
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