BBC News recently sent a team into Zimbabwe to investigate on their own the notorious illegal diamond trade from that country into the rest of the world.  Eastern Zimbabwe is home to Marange, which has the highest-known concentration of diamonds in the world.  Six months ago, the Marange diamond fields were host to hundreds of illegal diamond miners, all of whom were welcomed to come by the Mugabe government after it seized the mine from the British-based Africa Consolidated Resources in 2007. 

It was easy to find the diamonds, which are either on or only a few feet below the surface.  These diggers, however, not being part of a diamond-mining company, had only one place to sell the gems they found.  They sold the diamonds to dealers in nearby Mutare, and the dealers then smuggled the diamonds out of the country.

On October 31st, the government decided to put an end to this ‘illegal trade’, and came at the diggers with helicopter gunships, heavily-armed soldiers and police.  Some survivors claim that police dogs were released, and several people were literally torn apart.  In that attack, at least 150 were killed.  Now the fields are under the control of the army, and the roads around it are protected by police roadblocks.  Senior officials in Zimbabwe, refusing to give their names for fear of retribution, state that an operation of this magnitude could have only been ordered by President Robert Mugabe himself. 

The suspicion is not that Mugabe took over the diamond fields to legitimize the diamond trade in Zimbabwe, but rather to take control of the illegal diamond trade to generate revenue for the now nearly-empty treasury.  These same senior officials say that the diamonds are still being smuggled out of the country, but the money is going to the government, and to Mugabe.  All of his closest supporters are living like kings as a result of illegal diamond sales, while the rest of the country starves.  At this point, quotes the BBC, one hundred trillion Zimbabwe dollars are now worth three American dollars.

Zimbabwe natives call the gems supporting the government “blood diamonds”.  It is, perhaps, now time for the Kimberley Process team to redefine the term, which has, until now, only referred to diamonds being sold to fund rebel uprisings in countries at war.  In Zimbabwe, blood is still being shed, although there is, technically, no war there.  Does this mean that these diamonds are truly "conflict-free"?

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